BrightSource Energy raises $150 Million Series D financing

BrightSource Energy, Inc., developer of utility-scale solar thermal power plants, has raised an additional $150 million in its most recent equity financing. The Series D round brings BrightSource’s total equity financing to more than $300 million and positions the company for significant growth.

New investors including Alstom and the California State Teachers Retirement System (CalSTRS) joined existing investors in this round, led by VantagePoint Venture Partners, Morgan Stanley and Draper Fisher Jurvetson.

The additional financing will be used to support BrightSource's 2,610 megawatts in contracts with Pacific Gas and Electric Company (PG&E) and Southern California Edison to build 14 solar power plants in the US southwest by 2016. The funds will also be used by BrightSource to further its international expansion plans.

“A Series D capital raise of this magnitude reflects the market’s confidence in our world-class team and the important role of our Luz Power Tower technology in meeting the growing global demand for cost-effective and reliable solar power,” said John Woolard, Chief Executive Officer of BrightSource. “By adding new strategic investors to our current blue chip investor base, we strengthen our ability to make solar thermal energy a significant part of the world’s energy mix.”



As part of the financing, global power-generation leader Alstom has committed to invest up to $55 million. This investment in BrightSource represents Alstom’s entry into the solar market and underscores BrightSource’s leading position in this industry.

Philippe Joubert, Alstom Power President, said, “BrightSource Energy’s market-leading solar-tower thermal-power technology complements Alstom’s strong portfolio of renewable energy solutions, building on our strength in hydro, geothermal, wind, tidal power, biomass and waste-to-energy solutions. Following this investment, both companies intend to enter into an industrial relationship, which will enhance BrightSource’s leading position in this industry.”

In February 2010, BrightSource received a conditional commitment from the U.S. Department of Energy for $1.37 billion in loan guarantees to support the financing of BrightSource’s Ivanpah Solar Electric Generating System project – the first of its US-based power projects. Once constructed, Ivanpah will be the world’s largest solar energy project, nearly doubling the amount of solar thermal electricity produced in the US today. The project will also create more than 1,000 local jobs at the peak of construction and generate $250 million in construction wages. The power plant will be constructed by Bechtel, the engineering, procurement and construction (EPC) contractor for the Ivanpah project. BrightSource expects to commence construction later this year.

“The BrightSource team continues to execute at the highest levels and set the bar for the utility-scale solar industry,” said Alan Salzman, Chief Executive Officer and Managing Partner of VantagePoint Venture Partners. “With BrightSource’s proven ability to hit commercial and technological milestones, we see no limit to the company’s potential in transforming global power markets.”

BrightSource is the parent of Jerusalem, Israel-based BrightSource Industries Israel (BSII), formerly called Luz II. BSII performs R&D, production and project engineering for its California-based parent company.

In June 2008, BrightSource launched the Negev Solar Energy Development Center, a demonstration plant producing the world’s highest temperature steam from solar, at the Rotem Industrial Park near Dimona, Israel.

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Arnold Goldman, Chairman of BrightSource Energy

BrightSource Energy raises $115 million in latest round of funding

BrightSource Energy signs large solar deal with PG&E

Kaiima raises $8mm in Series A financing from DFJ Tamir Fishman and Draper Fisher Jurvetson

Kaiima, a agro-biotech company based in Kfar Tavor, Israel, that develops and uses proprietary non-transgenic technologies to boost inherent crop productivity for sustainable development, closed in July on an $8mm Series A financing round co-led by DFJ Tamir Fishman Ventures and Draper Fisher Jurvetson (DFJ) along with alternative energy fund Musea Ventures.

According to a press release, the company is using the new financing to establish a world-wide production, marketing and commercialization network to meet growing demand for its products and to expand its development pipeline to additional high-impact strategic crops.

Founded in 2006, Kaiima (formerly – Biofuel International) is led by a team of experts in the fields of advanced plant breeding and agro-biotechnology, agrotechnology, and energy. The company is using a proprietary non-transgenic technology platform that increases the yield potential in important crops such as wheat, rapeseed, and castor. The successful application of this technology can help mitigate the threatened shortage in basic food and energy.

Green Prophet's Karin Kloosterman interviewed a product manager at Kaiima who explained the company's technology and business plan.

At the time of Kaiima's Series A financing, Dr. Benny Zeevi, Managing General Partner at Tamir Fishman Ventures and a Board Member at Kaiima stated: “Kaiima represents for us the winning combination that we seek in Israeli high tech companies: a top tier group of founders, and a unique breakthrough technology. The company’s products are aimed at one of the most urgent major global needs and it has the potential to become a market leader.

Jennifer Fonstad, Managing Director at DFJ added that “Kaiima’s platform promises to deliver important solutions for the alternative energy market worldwide. We are excited to work with the team, the Board, and our partners at DFJ Tamir Fishman in building on this opportunity."

Dr. Doron Gal, Kaiima CEO and co-founder of Kaiima said: "We share a mutual vision with DFJ Tamir Fishman Ventures and with Draper Fisher Jurvetson, and a mutual excitement at the opportunity to provide solutions to some key challenges faced by contemporary society. We are proud to team with these two leading venture capital groups, and we believe that they will provide both the local support and the global leverage needed by Kaiima to fully realize its potential."

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Isaac Berzin, Israel's "Green Giant"

Dr. Isaac Berzin, founder of Greenfuel Technologies, was recently profiled in Ha'aretz.

Berzin and Greenfuel have developed a revolutionary technology to produce biofuels from algae that are bred on gases emitted by power plants.

Time Magazine included Berzin in its list of the 100 most influential people in the world in 2008, and Fortune Magazine also published a flattering article about the company, which has raised tens of millions of dollars in venture capital. Just last week the company raised another $13.9 million from Access Private Equity, Draper Fisher Jurvetson, and Polaris Venture Partners.

Berzin, a senior faculty member at the Interdisciplinary Center in Herzliya, is now busy establishing an Israel-based international institute to formulate an alternative energy policy. With the thriving market for growing algae as a source of energy - more than 250 companies and universities are engaged in this sphere - Berzin has decided to focus on setting policy. "I want Israel to become an international center of knowledge in the realm of alternative energy. The world is looking for solutions in this sphere, and in my view Israel is in a very special position. The toolbox that is needed to create solutions of this kind is here."

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Jennifer Fonstad -- DFJ Tamir Fishman Ventures

BrightSource Energy raises $115 million in latest round of funding

BrightSource Energy, Inc., the US parent company of Israeli solar energy technology company Luz II, has secured $115 million in additional corporate funding from its Series C round of financing. This brings the total the company has raised to date to over $160 million.

BrightSource said these additional funds will enable it to accelerate its plans to deliver utility-grade solar power at a time when many utilities are searching for reliable sources of renewable energy.

VantagePoint Venture Partners, the company’s initial investor, led the syndicate, which includes Google.org, BP Alternative Energy, StatoilHydro Venture and Black River. All of the company’s existing investors, including Morgan Stanley, DBL Investors (formerly a subsidiary of JP Morgan), Draper Fisher Jurvetson, and Chevron Technology Ventures participated in the round.

“The quality of the investors in this round of financing, coupled with increased support from our earlier investors, underscores the confidence that major strategic players have in our ability to reliably generate clean, cost-effective, utility-scale solar power,” said John Woolard, Chief Executive Officer of BrightSource. “We believe in the transformational role of solar energy, and that the broad reach of our new investors will enable us to accelerate the growth of solar thermal into a mainstream energy source.”

“With its unique ability to reliably produce superheated steam at efficient high temperatures, our power tower technology is the strongest commercially viable approach to solar energy,” said Arnold Goldman, chairman and founder, BrightSource Energy, Inc. and Luz II Ltd. “Operating more efficiently than older solar thermal methods, and costing much less to build, our technology will change the way utilities generate electricity.”

In March 2008, BrightSource entered into a series of power purchase agreements with PG&E for up to 900MW of electricity. BrightSource is currently developing a number of solar power plants in the Mojave Desert of Southern California, with construction of the first plant planned to start in 2009.

BrightSource Energy signs large solar deal with PG&E

BrightSource Energy announced this week that it has entered into a series of contracts with Pacific Gas and Electric Company (PG&E) for renewable solar power. The first three contracts are for a total of 500 megawatts (MW) of power to be supplied from three solar thermal electric generating projects. PG&E also signed two contracts for options on an additional 400 MW of solar power, which would bring the total amount of power purchased under these five agreements to 900 MW.

This is one of the largest solar thermal power deals to date. Building the five plants will cost between $2 billion to $3 billion, and Morgan Stanley will reportedly lead the financing of the first plant.

According to Earth2Tech, the plants will use BrightSource’s power tower design, which includes an array of mirrors that reflect the sun’s light onto a central receiver full of water, creating steam and powering a turbine. The plants, the first of which could come online as early as 2011, are to be built in the Mojave Desert.

Luz II, Ltd., a wholly owned subsidiary of BrightSource Energy, provides product development and engineering, project engineering and management, and solar field manufacturing and supply services to BrightSource's plants. Luz II is headquartered in Jerusalem, Israel.

Brightsource COO and Luz II president Israel Kroizer, in an interview with "Globes", says that if PG&E exercises its options, BrightSource's solar power stations will provide 2.7% of the company's electricity supply.

Luz II is apparently due to launch a commercial pilot of its solar thermal power station at Rotem Industries Ltd. in Dimona in the Negev in a few weeks. The station will generate a few megawatts of solar thermal energy.

Privately held, BrightSource Energy is headquartered in Oakland, California. Its principle investors include: VantagePoint Venture Partners, Morgan Stanley, Draper Fisher Jurvetson, J.P. Morgan, and Chevron Technology Ventures.

Last July, PG&E also agreed to buy 553 megawatts of solar power from Solel's Mojave solar park, which is under construction and due to begin operating in 2011. Solel, based in Beit Shemesh, is another leading developer of solar thermal energy technology.

Jennifer Fonstad -- DFJ Tamir Fishman Ventures

Jennifer Fonstad, a managing director at Draper Fischer Jurvetson and DFJ's representative to the joint investment committee recently established with Tamir Fishman Ventures, discusses cleantech in a lengthy interview with Globes.

Fonstad, recently featured in an article on biofuels that appeared in the Venture Capital Journal, is enthusiastic about cleantech investment opportunities in Israel. She reports that DFJ portfolio company BrightSource Energy acquired Luz II, a Jerusalem-based developer of utility-scale solar power plants. GreenFuel Technologies, another DJF portfolio company, is working in Israel to develop a biofuel system. Fonstad singled out clean water technologies as an example of a sector where Israel is a global leader.

DFJ Tamir Fishman Ventures

Draper Fisher Jurvetson ("DJF"), a Silicon Valley-based venture capital firm, has joined forces with Israeli VC Tamir Fishman Ventures. "DFJ Tamir Fishman Ventures" will serve as DFJ's exclusive partner in Israel. (Here's their statement.)

Tamir Fishman has focused on early-stage communications, IT and life sciences companies. DFJ, however, has a large portfolio of almost twenty clean technology companies in the U.S. It will be interesting to see whether the new partnership will now invest in Israeli clean technology companies.