Infinite Invention: NextFab company aims to make solar installations easy

Installing solar power at your home can be a headache. The process is expensive (you have to hire both a solar installer and an electrician), invasive (that electrician will drill holes in your walls to wire your house) and time-consuming (you have to get a permit from the city).

Infinite Invention, a Washington, D.C.-area company whose development arm is based at South Philly’s NextFab Studio, doesn’t think it should be so hard.

With help from two grants from the Department of Energy totaling $886,462, the company built the ConnectDER, a device that makes the solar installation process easier, cheaper and safer by creating a simple way to connect a solar system to a house’s electric meter.

Utilities can also the device to monitor how much solar energy is being generated at any time, something they can’t currently do.

Three utilities are piloting the ConnectDER right now, said Infinite Invention CEO Whitman Fulton: the Orlando Utilities Commission, Maryland’s Potomac Electric Power Company (PEPCO) and Vermont-based Green Mountain Power.

Infinite Invention is training utilities staffers and other officials on how to use the device for free, but is selling the device itself to each utility, Fulton said. The company is selling a total of 30 ConnectDERs across the three pilots. (The pilot in Maryland is also funded in part by the Maryland Energy Administration.)

The ConnectDER from Infinite Invention makes the solar installation process easier, said Infinite Invention CEO Whitman Fulton.

Infinite Invention has to sell to utilities, rather than solar installers, because only utility companies have access and authority over electric meter cases, Fulton said.

Fulton, 39, used to live in West Philadelphia and now lives in northern Virginia, where Infinite Invention is headquartered. He relocated for his wife’s job and to be closer to family. Out of the four full-time employees, two are in Virginia (the management side) and two are in Philadelphia (the development side). It’s an example of a tech company that’s making use of the Northeast Corridor as a mega region.

The company has a retainer with makerspace NextFab Studio, where it uses NextFab’s engineering team to help build their product.

“There’s no way we could have done what we’ve done without NextFab,” said Fulton, who’s background is in clean tech startups and energy analytics consultancies.

He said the company’s Philadelphia presence will continue to grow.

“All the important work happens there,” he said.