Odyssey Energy Solutions raised $5.34 million to scale its investment and asset management platform for distributed renewable energy projects. The funding round was led by Equal Ventures. Participating investors included Twelve Below, Abstract Ventures, Founder Collective, and MCJ Collective.

The company enables developers to plan, finance, build, and operate projects. The platform is catalyzing over $1 billion in financing in emerging markets in Africa and Asia. Over 1500 companies have used the platform across five continents.

BloombergNEF said investment in energy supply and infrastructure may reach up to $173 trillion over the next 30 years. Existing grid infrastructure is strained in emerging markets, and costs of renewable technologies are falling. As such, distributed renewable energy is leapfrogging centralized grids and will be at the core of infrastructure investment in the years to come, said Odyssey.

“The DRE market is fragmented, lacking the data and standardization required for large-scale investments,” said Emily McAteer, CEO, Odyssey Energy Solutions. “By solving for core frictions in one platform, our solution provides the tools to build investable portfolios and truly unlock scale.”

Odyssey said the funding will be used to launch new financial products for distributed renewable energy by infusing more private capital to the markets. The funds will also scale the company’s aggregated procurement platform and advance remote monitoring, control and analytics technologies for a wide array of asset types.

“We see the energy transition as one of the greatest (and most challenging) opportunities of our lifetime. Emerging markets represent one of the most economically and environmentally impactful areas to address the challenges but have thus far been hindered by access to technology and capital,” said Rick Zullo, general partner, Equal Ventures. “We are thrilled to partner with this first-class team to accelerate the global energy transition in a way that no one else has done before.”

Odyssey’s CEO, Emily McAteer, has more than 15 years of experience in energy management and distributed renewable energy, having launched SunEdison’s microgrid business as chief revenue officer of Frontier Power, along with Odyssey co-founder Cathy Zoi, clean energy leader and former Assistant Secretary for Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy at the U.S. Department of Energy.

Since 2019, the company has supported a series of major electrification projects on the platform. It is the platform for the Nigeria Electrification Project (NEP), a $550M initiative of the Federal Government of Nigeria financed by the World Bank and the African Development Bank.

NEP is one of the most ambitious electrification projects in history, targeting to connect over 3.5 million people to electricity, 109,000 businesses, and over 500 hospitals, universities, and health centers