Palmetto, a Charleston, SC-based clean energy marketplace and technology services platform provider, raised $375M in funding.
The round was led by Social Capital, with participation from ArcTern Ventures, Gaingels, Lerer Hippeau, and MacKinnon, Bennett & Co. (MKB).
The company intends to use the funds to invest in growing its marketplace of independent contractors, as well as the technology, people, and resources to maintain – and over time grow – its overall operating efficiencies in order to expand its addressable market.
Led by CEO Chris Kemper, Palmetto has developed a clean energy marketplace, with proprietary technology designed to make it easier and affordable for homeowners to source their energy from renewables like solar power.
The company takes a marketplace-based approach to the most expensive aspects of the residential solar value chain – customer acquisition and installation – by facilitating a third-party network of trained sales specialists and certified technicians. Combined with Palmetto’s proprietary software platform that manages the survey, design, engineering, financing, permitting, maintenance, and active system monitoring aspects of the transaction, the company offers a complete end-to-end transaction platform without the operating expenses of a vertically-integrated provider.
Palmetto also announced that Chamath Palihapitiya and Nirav Tolia, Co-founder and former CEO of Nextdoor, have joined Palmetto’s Board of Directors. They join other directors and advisors, including Joanne Bradford (former Pinterest and SoFi), Monica Wililams (Equity Project), Francis Suarez (Mayor of Miami), Will Szczerbiak (Greycroft), Kyle Burks (STR Services), Jared Wray (Palmetto, CTO & Co-Founder), and Sean Hayes (Palmetto, Founding Team).
