The hidden ROI in Solar. How Asset Managers can protect margins in 2025?
When energy prices were high, efficiency in solar operations was rarely questioned. Investors and operators focused more on expansion than on optimizing existing assets. Today, with inflation, price caps, and tightening margins, profitability increasingly depends on efficiency and control rather than scale.
Why profits quietly leak from PV assets
O&M inefficiencies: Reactive maintenance, repeated site visits, and lack of prioritisation create unnecessary costs.
Escalating inflation and costs: Labour and service prices rise, but without clear ROI metrics, budgets are hard to defend.
Poor visibility into performance: PR-only metrics and scattered SCADA data mask underperformance and delay interventions.
These factors rarely make headlines, but together they quietly erode returns and reduce investor confidence.
Investor pressure is rising
It’s not only operators who feel the squeeze. Investors and funds are demanding greater transparency and discipline in operations and maintenance (O&M), as small inefficiencies at the site level compound into significant portfolio-wide value loss. For them, data-backed ROI is becoming a prerequisite for continued investment.
From short-term gains to long-term value
For years, many operators tolerated inefficiencies because overall returns were still acceptable. That era is ending. With tighter margins, every kWh and every truck roll matters. Asset managers and investors are realising that profitability doesn’t come from installing more capacity alone, but from operating smarter.
The skills gap adds urgency
At the same time, the solar sector faces a shortage of skilled technicians. As portfolios grow, there are simply not enough hands in the field to sustain reactive O&M. This labour gap makes automation and smarter diagnostics essential, ensuring that limited resources are focused where they deliver the greatest impact.
Where ROI is truly won
Automated diagnostics: Classifying and quantifying faults quickly, instead of spending time on false alarms.
Cost transparency: Linking O&M actions to financial impact, enabling smarter budget allocation.
Smarter KPIs: Moving beyond PR to indicators that reflect true performance, efficiency and revenue protection.
Procurement leverage: Reliable efficiency metrics strengthen tender negotiations and contracting terms, ensuring O&M partners are held accountable for performance.
These aren’t just technical upgrades. They are the foundations of financial discipline in today’s solar industry. Several studies estimate that properly applying advanced analytics should result in savings of 50% to 75%. For asset managers, this is not just efficiency, but a direct lift in profitability and resilience against inflationary pressures.
The way forward
The solar industry’s growth will continue, but margins will not return to the days of effortless profitability. Protecting ROI now means putting efficiency, transparency and smarter metrics at the centre of asset management.
👉 How is your team approaching ROI protection in 2025?
Adapted from an interview with Michał Frys (CRO at Solar Spy). First published on the Solar Spy blog. Edited for LinkedIn by our Marketing Team.