Gazelle Finance continues to invest in Armenian small and medium enterprises (SME) during this economic downturn, targeting value investment opportunities.

The company has announced it recently committed an investment of USD 1,000,000 in Smart Energy Technologies, a leading regional solar power plant project development company based in Gyumri, Armenia. This investment positions Smart Energy Technologies to roll out 3 megawatts of solar power generation.

“Gazelle Finance specializes in investing in SMEs in high growth sectors,” says the CIO of Gazelle Finance Armenia, Ph.D. Tigran Hovhannisyan. “Distributed power generation is an attractive market segment for us because of the combination of government incentives promoting renewable energy and Smart Energy Technologies’ proven know-how to build-out small scale turn-key solar plants in a very cost-efficient manner.”  

Distributed power project development companies, like Smart Energy Technologies, are well-positioned to rapidly grow the largely untapped solar power market segment. Solar energy’s share in total electricity generation is still extremely small in Armenia, representing just 0.28%, yet the IEA estimates that the optimal share should be closer to 10%.

“Gazelle Finance provided a very creative financing solution to our company, which allows us to rapidly scale-up our business,” says the co-owner of Smart Energy Technologies Mr. Sahak Sahradyan. “With Gazelle Finance’s support, we can now provide project-based financing to our customers backstopped by secure energy offtake agreements and attractive feed-in tariffs. The demand for distributed grid-connected solar power plants is increasing year over year. More and more households and businesses opt for renewable sources of electricity supply, particularly because it results in improved energy security and generates additional income.”

Gazelle Finance UCO LLC

Gazelle Finance is an international investment fund (represented in Armenia as Gazelle Finance UCO LLC), that finances high-growth, small and medium-size enterprises in the Eurasia Region. The company seeks to identify gaps and barriers in frontier capital markets and provide combined financing and business advisory solution to ambitious entrepreneurs. By investing and partnering with these entrepreneurs, Gazelle Finance helps local markets and economies to expand, while generating commercial returns for its investors.

Smart Energy Technologies LLC

Headquartered in Gyumri Smart Energy Technologies was founded in 2016 by two brothers/friends Sahak and Ara. Smart Energy Technologies specializes in installing and financing small-scale solar power plants targeting businesses, individual households, and municipalities in the 250 KW - 2 MW power generation range throughout Armenia. To date, the company has achieved a cumulative installed capacity of solar power generation of 10MW.