San Francisco-based Optivolt has raised $32 million in Series A financing led by VXI Capital to expand manufacturing of its solar panel-integrated power electronics technology, bringing the company’s total funding to $42 million.
The financing included participation from RA Capital, Valo Ventures and Atlas Innovate. Optivolt plans to use the capital to increase production capacity and accelerate deployment of its Power Balancer technology across residential, commercial and utility-scale solar installations, including projects supporting electricity demand from artificial intelligence data centers.
The investment follows the shipment of more than 20,000 solar panels incorporating Optivolt’s Power Balancer, a technology designed to improve electricity generation by managing power distribution among groups of solar cells within individual panels.
Founded by CEO Rohit Kalyanpur, Optivolt has spent nine years developing an alternative to conventional solar panel electrical architecture. Its technology embeds active power electronics directly into solar modules, allowing them to adjust to changing environmental conditions and recover energy that might otherwise be lost.
Traditional solar panels can experience reduced output when individual cells or groups of cells are affected by shade, dirt, debris or uneven degradation. Because solar cells are electrically interconnected, localized performance problems can restrict energy production across larger sections of a panel.
Optivolt’s Power Balancer addresses those limitations by redistributing energy among cell groups in real time, reducing the effects of mismatched performance.
The company says its technology replaces conventional bypass diodes while integrating rapid-shutdown and monitoring capabilities into the solar panel itself.
That architecture is intended to reduce the need for certain external module-level components, including separate power optimizers, microinverters and rapid-shutdown devices, depending on system design.
By combining power management and monitoring functions within the panel, Optivolt aims to improve energy output while simplifying solar system installation and associated hardware requirements.
Kalyanpur said the company’s development strategy has focused on improving solar performance under actual operating conditions rather than relying solely on laboratory efficiency measurements.
“For nine years, we’ve rebuilt the solar panel from first principles, embedding aerospace-grade power electronics so it can respond to Earth as it actually is, not the ideal conditions of a lab,” Kalyanpur said.
The company’s engineering approach draws on expertise in satellite power systems, where electronics must operate efficiently and reliably under demanding conditions.
Integrating active electronics inside solar modules presents thermal management challenges because the components must operate within panels exposed to prolonged sunlight and elevated temperatures.
Optivolt says its Power Balancer achieves 99.4% conversion efficiency under typical operating conditions.
The company has also developed an intellectual property portfolio covering its integrated power electronics architecture, with 19 issued patents and 27 additional patent applications pending.
Optivolt reports receiving UL certifications covering its integrated junction-box enclosure, panel-integrated electronics, rapid-shutdown system and solar-module safety.
In internal testing, the company says panels incorporating its technology generated up to six times as much power as panels using external optimizers under specified shading conditions. The result reflects defined test scenarios and should not be interpreted as a general performance improvement across all installations.
The Series A round was led by VXI Capital, a hard technology investment firm founded by the former chief technology officer of the U.S. military’s Defense Innovation Unit.
Orin Hoffman, managing director at VXI Capital, said the investment reflects the firm’s view that future solar infrastructure will increasingly depend on intelligent power management rather than improvements in panel manufacturing alone.
The financing also brings support from investors with experience in solar technology and energy markets.
Paul Nahi, founding CEO of Enphase and an Optivolt investor, said integrating power electronics inside solar modules represents a different approach from managing electricity at the output of each panel.
Tom Werner, former CEO of SunPower and an Optivolt investor, highlighted the importance of improving lifetime energy production under real-world operating conditions.
Richard Kauffman, former chairman of energy and finance for New York and an Optivolt investor, emphasized the potential financial implications of increasing the amount of electricity generated over a solar project’s operating life.
For solar developers and system owners, higher energy production from installed capacity can influence project economics, particularly where available space, installation costs and long-term performance affect investment returns.
Optivolt’s strategy targets those considerations by combining internal panel-level power management with monitoring and safety functions.
The company’s planned manufacturing expansion will support deployment across multiple solar market segments, from residential rooftops to large utility-scale installations.
Its focus on utility-scale projects also aligns with growing interest in renewable energy infrastructure capable of serving power-intensive facilities, including AI data centers.
With $42 million raised to date and more than 20,000 compatible panels shipped, Optivolt is moving from technology development toward broader commercial deployment. The latest financing will support manufacturing growth and the company’s efforts to establish panel-integrated power electronics as an alternative architecture for future solar installations.

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