Singapore deep-tech firm Quantified Energy Labs Pte. Ltd. (QE-Labs) announced Wednesday that the company has secured $1.5 million angel round funding from investor Liu Xiaosong, for accelerating its commercialization of the company’s proprietary autonomous drone electroluminescence (EL) mapping technology.

With the angel funding in place, QE-Labs will improve its innovative solution and replicate the business model to expand into more major markets such as Europe, Australia, Japan, India and China, the firm said in a statement.

QE-Labs develops and commercialises aerial solar solutions for the global PV industry to support its clients in the photovoltaics (PV) asset lifecycle management, which covers initial site survey, PV system design, construction auditing, Pre-COD commissioning, and operations and maintenance (O&M) phases.

The firm is revolutionizing the PV inspection through development of autonomous drone EL mapping, offering fast and cost-effective way to accurately identify defective PV modules.

For optimized EL inspection, it developed comprehensive hardware and software solutions, covering both front-end data collection and back-end data analysis.

The front-end data collection tools consist of software suites and algorithms for automated measurement plan creation, route planning, drone maneuvers, and autonomous scanning of the PV strings, etc. In the backend, there is dedicated software and algorithms to process and analyze the massive amount of collected EL raw data, transforming it into actionable insights for the end user.

The technologies developed at QE-Labs are protected by international patent laws.

“EL is the golden standard inspection for quality control of PV module manufacturing. With our autonomous drone EL mapping solution, we are bringing the rigorous factory-level quality control to the field, empowering the global solar PV inspection sector and technical lifecycle asset management.” said Wang Yan, Chief Executive Officer of QE-Labs.

“With these innovations, our clients can reliably track and identify of all kinds of defective PV modules from the site based on a precise geo-referenced database of the entire system. It is the most powerful digital solution to enable intelligent business decision by the asset owner,” he said.

QE-Labs’ autonomous drone EL mapping solution has been proven in regional market through successful completion of the world’s largest EL inspection project at the 60MW floating PV system operated by Sembcorp Singapore.

For global expansion, the firm has partnered with PVEL, the leading independent testing lab and a member of the Kiwa Group, to bring the solution to the United States market.

This partnership was established based on drone enabled data-as-a-service (DaaS) business model where PVEL will be performing the front-end filed inspection while QE-Labs providing the data processing and analysis service.

“We are delighted to invest into QE-Labs who is offering the most advanced drone EL inspection solution in the market. We give unconditional commitment to support QE-Labs in fighting against climate change, sharing our priceless experience in shaping company’s business model and market entry strategy. Together with our portfolio companies, we will make positive impact to our society,” said Liu.

Liu is an experienced entrepreneur and an investor. He founded A8 New Media Group in 2000. He is also one of the founding partners of Qingsong Fund, a leading venture capital firm with the focus on disruptive technology and renewable energy sector.

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