Planno, a software company based in United Arab Emirates (UAE), has launched subscription-based prospecting software for commercial and industrial (C&I) solar developers and planners to use to identify and qualify promising rooftops in a growing number of countries.
It automates several steps of the prospecting stage for commercial and industrial (C&I) rooftop project developers, “making the process faster and more data-driven,” according to Daniel Domingues, Planno founder and CEO.
“It offers an alternative to manual processes, as well as a platform where opportunities can be organized, managed, and shared across the development team,” Domingues told pv magazine.
Planno uses geospatial artificial intelligence (AI) technology, which taps into satellite data, imagery and machine learning models, to detect viable rooftops. The findings are augmented with estimates of potential energy potential and business contacts.
There is a structured quality control process involving Planno team member checking to make sure “what has been identified matches real-world C&I characteristics and excludes non-relevant structures,” according to Domingues.
The manual process involves scanning sources like Google Maps and Google Earth to find large rooftops, or searching land registries, municipal platforms, and business databases, and cold calling to identify prospects for each new market, according to Domingues.
Early customers are based in in the UAE, Saudi Arabia, South Africa, Belgium, the Netherlands, France, Cyprus, and the United States. “So far, we found the strongest traction in the Middle East, where our team is based, and South Africa, but we expect European adoption to grow significantly in 2026 as we open more markets,” said Domingues.
Currently operating as a standalone solution, there is a long term plan to offer integration with the tools that developers already use, according to Domingues, as well as customer relationship management (CRM) tools.
The company most recently announced that Spark Wave Energy, an Octopus Energy Generation joint venture that is focused on Portuguese C&I projects, as a new customer. According to Planno’s analysis, Portugal hosts 79,000 C&I rooftops with a potential 15.4 GW capacity.
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