15% Annual Revenue Growth For 1KOMMA5° In Turbulent Year 2024

German clean energy company and residential rooftop solar installer 1KOMMA5° has announced a 15.5% year-on-year (YoY) increase in its preliminary revenues for the year 2024 with close to €520 million earned, compared to around €450 million in the previous year.  

For a company that has been around only since 2021, 1KOMMA5° reports its organic sales rose by 36% from €360 million in 2023 to €490 million in 2024 ‘even in the midst of a crisis year and in a shrinking market environment.’

1KOMMA5° says this represents its ‘strongest’ growth to date, especially in a year marked by ‘recession and declining demand’ for solar systems and heat pumps. Several installers and PV companies in Germany have declared insolvency or undertaken major restructuring citing a lack of demand in the market with electricity prices stabilizing (see Germany’s Wegatech Seeks Insolvency Protection & Restructuring). 

“Despite sourcing polysilicon from Germany, which is far more expensive than production in Asia, and facing rising sales costs, we remain sustainably profitable on an operational level and debt-free. Over the last two years, we have consistently increased our revenue and profits without using an already approved credit line in 2024,” said 1KOMMA5° CEO and Co-founder Philipp Schröder. 

The company secured a credit line of up to €100 million in 2023, which it says has not been utilized as yet.

A major contributor to this growth is the German installer’s artificial intelligence (AI) powered Heartbeat software that helped increase the number of connected energy systems to 40,000. The company claims that it is now ‘Europe’s largest virtual power plant for residential customers.’ 

As part of its business model, it charges a flat-rate software fee instead of charging as an electricity supplier to enable dynamic and individual electricity prices in real-time, instead of fixed tariffs, which makes Heartbeat AI attractive to users.  

Over the next 3 years, 1KOMMA5° aims to invest €100 million to expand the Heartbeat AI software business to grow its 2025 sales in the double-digit million range.  

Last year, 1KOMMA5° bundled Heartbeat and its software business into a subsidiary with the target to achieve an annual revenue of €10 billion from hardware and software sales in 2030. It is compatible with heat pumps, electricity storage systems and wall boxes from any manufacturer (see Europe Solar PV News Snippets: French Companies Rally Around HoloSolis For 5 GW French PV Fab & More). 

Recently, the company won a court case filed by a competitor seeking an interim injunction against 1KOMMA5° for advertising ‘free electricity’ calling it anti-competitive.