Simtel gets EUR 12.2 million EU grant for Romanian solar power project

Romanian engineering and technology company Simtel Team won EUR 12.2 million from the National Recovery and Resilience Plan for its 52 MW solar power project in Giurgiu county in the country’s south. In addition to installing solar panels for clients, it is leaning on its own investments in photovoltaics and other sectors for growth.

Renewable energy developers aren’t wasting time in efforts to tap into Romania’s surging market. Turnkey photovoltaic solutions provider Simtel Team, which is investing in its own solar power plants as well, received a hefty grant through the European Union’s Recovery and Resilience Facility.

The subsidies from the mechanism are facilitated via the national National Recovery and Resilience Plan (NRRP or, in Romanian, PNRR). Simtel Team said it also counts on Agency for Financing Rural Investments (AFIR), the EU’s Modernisation Fund and the second round of the Electric Up program, intended for small and medium enterprises (SMEs) and firms in the hospitality industry, also known as HoReCa – hotels, restaurants and cafés.

The EUR 12.2 million in funds from the NRRP are for a solar power project of 52.2 MW in peak capacity. The facility will be located in Giurgiu in southern Romania. The company revealed it would finance the rest from own funds and loans.

It estimated it would commission the PV plant, on its own land, within a year, adding its is ready to build. Simtel Team owns the land.

Romania’s biggest rooftop PV plant in Simtel Team’s portfolio

Late last year the firm completed the largest rooftop solar power plant in Romania on a single building. It installed the system on the Dedeman Turda logistics center on behalf of Grunman Energy. Both are part of Pavăl Holding.

Four more such facilities are planned to be covered with PV plants. The first one, on a roof of four hectares, has a peak capacity of 4.1 MW. Simtel Team is tasked with maintenance, too.

The company recently said that so far in 2023 serviced inverters in 28 solar power plants in France, of 162 MW in total. The entire portfolio amounts to 284 MW.

Series of own solar power investments

Earlier this month Simtel Team said it is buying Oasis Green Energy 3. The business was set up to develop a 5.35 MW project in peak terms. Located in western Romania’s Bihor county, it is ready for the start of construction.

Simtel Team has six more PV projects in different stages of maturity and an overall peak capacity of 75 MW. “In 2024, we aim to significantly exceed the total capacity installed in 2023, of 86 MWp, thanks to the photovoltaic power plants that we will build for customers, but also on the background of the contribution that our photovoltaic parks will bring,” Chief Executive Officer Mihai Tudor said.

The company’s market capitalization soared 38% since the end of 2023

The company has just reported a rise in annual turnover of 112% to of 295.6 million lei (EUR 59.5 million). Profit surged 115% in 2023, to RON 27.4 million or EUR 5.5 million. Simtel Team, listed on the Bucharest Stock Exchange since 2021, was founded in 2010. Its market capitalization skyrocketed 38% in lei terms just since the beginning of the year, to RON 465 million (EUR 93.6 million).

Simtel Team is also active in electricity supply, automation, chargers for electric vehicles and telecommunications. It said it intends to expand to innovative energy storage solutions and virtual power plant measurement and control solutions.