Tag: Press Release

SunSpec Alliance Names Blu Banyan CEO Jan Rippingale to its Board of Directors

Visionary Thought Leader for Solar Industry Digital Transformation Added to Help Drive SunSpec’s Next Phase of Growth

April 7, 2023, SAN JOSE, Calif. — The SunSpec Alliance and Blu Banyan Inc. today announced the appointment of Jan Rippingale to SunSpec’s Board of Directors. Rippingale serves as the CEO of Blu Banyan, a leading cloud-based business management software provider for the solar and construction industry.  Rippingale is also the co-chair of the Orange Button Workgroup, a program launched as part of the U.S. Department of Energy SunShot Initiative, that is enabling the automation of sales, design, construction, and supply chain management in the solar and energy storage industry. 

“We are excited to welcome Jan to the SunSpec Board of Directors,” said Tom Tansy, Chairman of the SunSpec Alliance. “Jan has been a driving force towards the goal of reducing the soft costs of solar installation by streamlining the collection, management, and exchange of data, and the creation of standardized datasets such as the AHJ (Authority Having Jurisdiction) Registry. She has also been instrumental in leading integrations with commonly used solar business applications, while strengthening cybersecurity capabilities, across the distributed Solar PV value chain. 

“The U.S. Distributed Energy Resource (DER) industry, including solar, energy storage, and electric vehicle charging, has been constrained by high soft costs. Fully two-thirds of the cost of a typical distributed energy system is soft costs comprised of supply-chain management, customer acquisition, permitting, interconnection, installation labor, and overhead,” said Rippingale. “These costs can be reduced by at least 30% and system quality can be increased by more accurate data exchange. The SunSpec Alliance and the Orange Button Initiative, are catalysts for reducing soft costs and that is why I am so excited to join the company’s board,” Rippingale stated.

Rippingale’s Software-as-a-Service (SaaS) company is a market leader in the solar industry. Its SolarSuccess software is the first fully integrated business management software for solar installers, enabling them to scale their business, protect and grow margins, drive productivity, and manage solar projects more profitably. SolarSuccess integrates seamlessly with the Orange Button AHJ Registry, Product Registry, SolarAPP+, and over 20 other solar applications, providing solar installers the efficiencies of scale to deploy more solar faster. 

“For more than a decade SunSpec has been a leading developer of core information standards, SunSpec Modbus, IEEE 2030.5, and Orange Button, that are shaping the Distributed Energy Resource (DER) market,” said Dylan Tansy, Executive Director of the SunSpec Alliance. “As SunSpec’s primary focus shifts from developing standards to driving adoption, Jan’s leadership, energy, and passion for our shared mission are a welcome addition to the SunSpec board of directors,” Tansy added.

With the addition of Ms. Rippingale, the SunSpec board now consists of global leaders: Mike Bourton, founder and VP of Business Development at Kitu Systems; David Erhart, founder and Head of Technical Standards at STEM Energy, Vish Ganti, VP of Product, Autogrid; Hannes Knopf, Head of Business and Portfolio Strategy at SMA; Larry Truong, Product Manager of Solar and Energy Storage at TMEIC; and Thomas Tansy, CEO of DER Security Corp and Chairman of SunSpec Alliance. 

About Blu Banyan 

Blu Banyan is an enterprise cloud-based business management solutions company helping digitally transform small and mid-sized businesses to optimize operations and deliver metrics that drive growth and profitability.

Blu Banyan’s flagship, product, SolarSuccess, is the leading solar business management software in the industry today, used by over one-third of the top 100 residential solar installers in the U.S.

For more information, visit www.blubanyan.com.

About the SunSpec Alliance

SunSpec Alliance is the open information standards and certification organization for the Distributed Energy Resources industry. SunSpec communication standards address operational requirements of solar and energy storage on the smart grid to reduce cost, promote technology innovation, and accelerate industry growth. 

Global leaders from Asia, Europe, and North America are members of the SunSpec Alliance. Membership is open to corporations, non-profits, and individuals. For more information about the SunSpec Alliance, or to download SunSpec specifications free of charge, please visit www.sunspec.org.

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Top 3 residential solar contractors use Blu Banyan’s SolarSuccess

Latest installation data shows that SolarSuccess customers grow fastest

By Matthew Hirsch, CMO and Partner at TerraCurrent

BERKELEY, CALIF., September 8th, 2021 – A list of Top Solar Contractors in 2021 compiled by the media outlet Solar Power World places three of Blu Banyan’s SolarSuccess customers—Titan Solar Power, Sunpro Solar, and Momentum Solar—at the top of the rankings for companies that primarily serve the residential market. Solar Power World published the annual list, based on a nationwide survey of more than 400 companies, in July.

Data from the past three years also shows that while the solar market is growing fast, SolarSuccess customers are growing faster.

Last year, Titan, Sunpro, and Momentum placed among the top 5 residential contractors in the Solar Power World rankings. In 2019, the trio featured among the top 10.

“Companies that can reduce overhead, accelerate cash flow, and increase profitability put themselves in position to succeed in any market sector. Credit to Titan, Sunpro, and Momentum for not only scaling fastest but pushing the boundaries of innovation in residential solar,” said Blu Banyan co-founder and CEO Jan Rippingale.

Custom-built for solar companies, SolarSuccess provides end-to-end communication for each part of the business, including sales, operations, and accounting.

BluBanyan pushes out frequent updates to SolarSucess customers, about twice a month. One of the newest features is a context-specific training tool, bluTraining, that simplifies onboarding and customer support.

“The platform that enabled Titan Solar Power to install over 132 MW in 2020 can accommodate any number of users, projects, and documents as we prepare for additional growth,” said Titan’s technology and infrastructure director Aaron Casillas.

Sunpro CEO Marc Jones said, “Now that all our departments can speak to one another, it gives us tremendous insight. Looking down the road, Sunpro Solar knows as we continue to grow and scale, we have a product that can support us.”

About Blu Banyan

Blu Banyan is an award-winning NetSuite Solution Provider and SuiteApp developer, with extensive experience in the solar distribution and installation sectors. Blu Banyan’s SolarSuccess is the leading NetSuite application designed to meet the specific operational needs of residential and commercial solar installers. SolarSuccess provides customized dashboards, KPIs, task queues, solar project workflows, visual timelines, financial project templates, plus multiple partner integrations. Learn more at blubanyan.com.

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