Sustainable Infrastructure Funding: Banyan Raises $25 Million

Banyan Infrastructure, which develops a sustainable financing software platform, has raised $25 million in Series B funding. Climate software investor Energize Ventures led the round. Other participants included SE Ventures (the venture capital arm of Schneider Electric), Elemental Excelerator, VoLo Earth and Ulu Ventures.

Banyan, based in San Francisco, California, was founded in 2018. The company had 35 employees listed on LinkedIn as of March 2023. Banyan plans to double headcount near-term, though specific hiring figures were not disclosed. Open positions are listed here.

Banyan develops project finance software that "enables banks, financiers, and developers to automate and track complex project finance transactions with a unified risk and data management system." As a result, "customers can rapidly grow their sustainable infrastructure portfolio and achieve net-zero targets," the company said.

Early adopters include NY Green Bank, a $1 billion sustainable infrastructure investment fund and a division of the New York State Energy Research and Development Authority. NY Green Bank leverages Banyan's to support its portfolio management activities, the company said in a prepared statement.

The Series B funding arrived less than one year after an $8.2 million Series A round in June 2022. The Series A round valued Banyan at $47 million. The Series B round's valuation was not disclosed.

In a prepared statement about the Series B funding, Banyan Co-founder and CEO Will Greene said: “Because standardization is lacking for sustainable technology, risk averse investors are hesitant to move quickly in this relatively new industry. Our software focuses on reducing transaction costs and increasing transparency to create previously unseen speed and scale of project finance. The support from Energize and our new investors helps unlock the rapid deployment of sustainable infrastructure that our planet needs.”

Added Banyan Cofounder and Chief Operations Officer Amanda Li: “Software is key to making the very nuanced and complex project financing process quicker and more profitable, especially given the unique challenges around financing renewable energy projects. These projects are far smaller and more distributed, which can lead to the underwriting and risk management process being too complex, or too unprofitable with current timelines and overhead. Working at Generate Capital, I saw the limitations of the status quo firsthand and it severely limits the growth potential of our industry.”

Banyan Infrastructure is not to be confused with Banyan Systems -- a network operating system (NOS) software provider that gained traction in the early 1990s. Banyan Systems ultimately imploded amid the rise of Microsoft Windows NT (now Windows Server and Azure).