Wattminder provides accurate solar power plant monitoring and diagnostics using data analysis and algorithms. Their software-as-a-service model detects and diagnoses underperformance to help operators maintain optimal performance and revenue. Commercial operators currently lack rigorous monitoring, resulting in poor visibility and unstructured metrics. Wattminder seeks funding to complete product development and begin beta testing.

1. Executive Summary
Wattminder combines sophisticated data acquisition and analysis circuitry with intelligent algorithms to
provide the most accurate online monitoring and diagnostic service available to the solar industry.
Our solution will allow operators of revenue-critical solar power plants to maintain optimal
performance by detecting and diagnosing under-performance with actionable messaging. An average PV
system can under perform by as much as 13% leading to a $4B in lost revenue worldwide.
Business Model
Competitive solutions are primarily hardware centric. Wattminder is focusing on analytics with a
software as a service business model. The analytics require sophisticated but relatively low cost
hardware to perform 'signature analysis' on system faults at the string level, instantly. Our algorithms
constantly examine the streamed measurement data to:
• Detect for presence of under-perform in a solar power site
• Diagnose for fault(s) causing such under-performance
• Provide actionable instruction to the site supervisor & field technicians to enable restoration of
full production.
•
Wattminder’s solution combines monitoring hardware priced at a few cents/watt and automated
software monitoring service priced at 10% of the O&M budget for a typical power installation. The
total market for monitoring and diagnostics can exceed $200M in five years.
Wattminder is seeking seed level investment to complete instrumentation of our 3KW test facility,
complete software integration, develop customer-ready hardware and begin beta testing.
Wattminder Inc.
1153 Bordeaux Suite 199 Sunnyvale, CA 94089 (408) 734-2907 www.wattminder.com

2. Customers
Commerical site operators (PPA lease type) such as SunEdison, Solar Power Partners, Sun Power, and
Fotowatio, utilize dedicated Operation Centers staff who watch over walls of computer monitor
screens, some with alarm mechanism triggered by inverters. Although some of these sites utilize web-
monitoring services, with industrial grade sensors, this process is far from rigorous. The result is poor
visibility and unstructured metrics for availability, mean-time-to-repair, and system reliability.
Market Entry
Exploratory discussions are in progress with Balance-of-Product manufacturers who wish to take the
lead in offering the next generation of combiner boxes, incorporating our hardware technology. Pilot
implementation is being planned with Jasper Ridge Biological Preserve (Stanford University).
Competition
FatSpaniel is the leading PV monitoring service provider, focused on residential and institutional sites.
Energy Recommerce Inc. is the market leader in monitoring with high precision string current sensors
for the revenue-critical commercial segment. Neither of these market leaders have demonstrated ability
to detect under-performance or fault diagnosis beyond what is provided by the inverter, typically the
weakest link in PV system. There are several 'electronic optimizer' products in the market with mixed
reception: SolarMagic from National Semiconductor, Powerbox from SolarEdge, PowerMaximizer
from Tigo Energy, and micro-inverters from Enphase, Zandex, and eiQ. These per-module add-on
modules claim to reduce the effect of system imbalance, and partial shading on random modules.
Company Background
Wattminder Inc. was incorporated in 2010 and evolved from a 10 year engineering consultation
business founded by Stephen Yang, P.E. To date, the company has relied on consulting income, co-
founders' investments, and extensive use of nominally paid interns and consultant-contractors.
Wattminder has won two SBIR grants (DOE & NSF) in conjunction with Carnegie Mellon University.
Team
Currently we have 5 full-time employees, 5 part-time consultant/interns and 2 collaborative partners.
• Steve Yang, PE, Acting CEO
• Sam Beal, PhD, VP Marketing
• Dennis Feick, VP Engineering
• Bob Getsla, RF and Analog wizard
• Dave Hui, VP, Program Management
• Johannes Hsieh, PhD Computer scientist
• Dan Liddell, Web software director
• Don Zulch, Algorithm programmer, C, Java
Collaborative Partners:
• Abe Ishihara, PhD. Professor, Carnegie Mellon, Silicon Valley
• Shahar Menahem PhD. Research Scientist, Carnegie Mellon, Silicon Valley
Board of Directors
A slate of Board of Directors, technical advisors, has been identified, Dr. Charlie Gay of Applied
Materials, Dr. Barry Cinnamon of Akeena Solar, and Mr. Brian Farhi a seasoned PV consultant are
being retained. The patent firm Haverstock, Owens LLC is our legal counsel.
Wattminder Inc.
1153 Bordeaux Suite 199 Sunnyvale, CA 94089 (408) 734-2907 www.wattminder.com

3. Appendix A. Cost Analysis
Power Output (KW) Annual Revenue $ Strings of Modules KW-HR Price $
1000 $400,000 416 0.2
Modules O&M Budget (12% ) Wattminder Installation Total ASP
5000 $48,000 GateWay H/W per Site $500 $500
DAC units (1 per 8 strings) $19,500 $375
Watts/Module Monitoring % of O&M Theft & Safety / string $52,000 $125
200 10.00% Sensors per string $18,720 $45
Installation $24,960 $120
System Cost $K Annual Service Cost $ Total Installation NRE
$7,000 $4,800 $115,680
Wattminder Cost Service / Revenue NRE / Installation Cost NRE $/Watt
1.20% 1.65% $0.12
Per-Module Electronic Optimization / Diagnostics
Company Product Technology – Cost Key Feature
Parallux
eIQ DC-DC MPPT $139 safety
PowerBox
SolarEdge DC-DC MPPT $3500 Inverter coupled, safety
Maximizer ES, EP
Tigo Energy DC-DC MPPT $79 Inverter coupled, safety
SunMizer
Xandex DC-DC MPPT $250 String option, No monitoring
Enphase
Enphase Micro Inverter $230 safety
Wattminder Inc.
1153 Bordeaux Suite 199 Sunnyvale, CA 94089 (408) 734-2907 www.wattminder.com