Empower Energies hires Marathon Capital to raise equity for Solar and CHP Assets

Empower Energies, Inc. announced it has retained Marathon Capital as its financial advisor to raise cash equity financing consisting of limited partnership interests for the company’s Distributed Generation (DG) Fund.

The DG Fund is being formed to acquire and aggregate commercial and industrial (C&I) photovoltaic (PV) solar and combined heat and power (CHP) projects originated and developed by Empower and its co-development partners over the next 24 months.

The company has secured term sheets for tax equity and debt financing, and is now launching a process to secure equity financing for the DG Fund from cash equity investors. Tenor Capital, the principal investor in Empower Energies through the private investment funds it manages, will be the general partner and investment advisor for the DG Fund. Marathon Capital will be seeking additional cash equity from qualified institutional investors to invest alongside Tenor Capital’s investors.

The DG Fund is expected to comprise up to 80 MWs of completed projects. Empower’s pipeline currently consists of over 150 MWs of solar and CHP projects at various stages of development, with a number of projects targeted for start-of-construction in Q4 2015.

Ted Brandt, co-Founder and Chief Executive Officer of Marathon Capital:

"We see very strong demand in the market among investors for high quality portfolios of operating renewable assets through sale processes we are currently running. Empower’s experienced management team and multi-technology business strategy ensures that investors will see a continued supply of high quality assets in the future.”

Empower Energies is a distributed generation project developer focused on delivering a multi-technology mix of customer solutions, including PV Solar and CHP, to meet the profitability, resiliency, and sustainability objectives of the rapidly expanding C&I market, as well as for hospitals, universities, municipalities and schools.

David Kay, Principal at Tenor Capital Management, said:

"Tenor has been an active investor in both private and public renewables companies since 2009. We see real opportunities in the distributed generation market and, along with our investment partners, launched Empower Energies in 2013 to capitalize on the growth of renewables in the C&I market space. The creation of the DG Fund provides Tenor and other investors a mechanism to directly invest in the distributed generation assets that are in high demand.”

John Clapp, CFO at Empower Energies, said:

“Marathon Capital has already been instrumental in sourcing tax equity and debt financing for the DG Fund. We are now collaborating with Marathon and Tenor to secure cash equity financing to accelerate the Fund. Our relationship with the DG Fund and its investors will further enhance Empower’s ability to efficiently source high quality projects for the Fund’s investment committee. This relationship benefits both Empower’s origination and development efforts with our expanding network of C&I customers, and provides investors with a tailored and repeatable asset investment platform.”