Solar installers managing 50 or more concurrent projects in spreadsheets lose permit status, miss equipment delivery windows, and send crews to the wrong site. Generic project management tools don't understand the solar installation lifecycle, from site survey to permit submission to interconnection approval to energization.
We build software for solar companies that's designed around how solar projects actually run. Installation pipelines, monitoring data from inverters and meters, sales CRM with proposal generation, and customer portals showing live generation data, not a PDF emailed at the end of the month.
Solar installation project management from sale to energization
Real-time solar monitoring and performance dashboards
Solar sales CRM with proposal and financing tools
Permit tracking and inspection management
What you can count on
Retention
3+ years
Average client relationship across active accounts
First milestone
Week 1
A straight read on what to keep and what to rebuild
Pricing
Fixed price
Scope and cost agreed before work starts
Team
No handoffs
The senior engineers who scope the build also ship it
Solar installation company managing 50+ concurrent projects in spreadsheets with no unified view of permit status, crew scheduling, and equipment delivery?
Customer solar monitoring dashboard that's a PDF emailed monthly instead of a live portal showing real-time generation and savings?
Short answer
RaftLabs builds custom solar software: installation project management from sale to energization, inverter monitoring with performance-ratio dashboards, sales CRM, permit tracking, and customer portals. A first module launches as a validated v1 in 10 to 14 weeks, from around $20K to $35K, at a fixed cost agreed before work starts. The platform grows from there.
Trusted by
01
Median US solar interconnection time, 2018-2023 (Berkeley Lab)
4+ years
02
Median crystalline-silicon PV degradation rate (NREL)
~0.5%/yr
03
Healthy performance-ratio band (IEC 61724 method)
75-85%
04
To a launch-ready solar v1
10-14 wk
Solar software built for the full installation lifecycle
Solar installation is a project-based business with permit complexity, equipment lead times, utility interconnection rules, and long customer relationships built on performance data. Most off-the-shelf tools handle one part of that well. A CRM manages leads but not permit milestones. A monitoring platform shows data but doesn't connect to the customer's contract or the sales proposal that set their expectations.
Custom software connects those parts. A permit milestone that clears triggers a crew scheduling workflow. An inverter data feed populates a customer portal showing live generation and cumulative savings against the original estimate. A solar sales CRM generates a proposal using the customer's actual utility rate and roof data. These connections don't exist in generic tools. They have to be built.
Problems we solve in solar
01
Problem
Field service crews dispatched to sites that aren't ready because permit status lives in a spreadsheet
Solution
At 50+ concurrent projects, spreadsheet tracking breaks down fast. Permit milestones get missed. Crews arrive at sites where interconnection paperwork is still pending. Operations managers spend their days chasing status by phone instead of managing the business. A project management system with a live pipeline from signed contract to energization gives every team member one view of what's blocked and why. Crews get dispatched only when the site is ready. That alone cuts wasted labor on the O&M side.
02
Problem
Monitoring data scattered across inverter OEM portals with no single view of fleet performance
Solution
When generation data lives in the SolarEdge portal for one client, the Enphase app for another, and a spreadsheet for a third, O&M teams can't see underperforming systems until a customer calls. A unified monitoring platform pulls data from every inverter brand via API, normalizes it into a single schema, and surfaces faults before customers notice. Commercial operators with multi-site fleets get one screen for the whole portfolio, not ten browser tabs.
03
Problem
Permitting and interconnection paperwork creating weeks of delay on every project
Solution
Permit requirements differ significantly across jurisdictions. Some require stamped structural engineering. Others allow permit-by-affidavit. Without a system that knows the specific steps, document requirements, and typical timelines per authority, projects in less-familiar jurisdictions slip because the team doesn't know what's missing. According to Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory's Queued Up 2024 report, the median time from interconnection request to commercial operation for U.S. solar projects built between 2018 and 2023 exceeded four years, more than double the timeline for projects built before 2010. Interconnection approval adds another queue with timelines ranging from two weeks to six months. A permit workflow configured per jurisdiction prevents those gaps before they become delays.
04
Problem
Sales proposals assembled manually for each customer, taking 30 to 60 minutes per proposal
Solution
Manual proposal assembly from utility rate tables, roof data, and system sizing calculations is slow and inconsistent. Every prospect gets a slightly different format. Senior staff spend time on document production instead of closing. A proposal generator that takes the customer's utility rate, roof characteristics, and proposed system size and produces a professional savings estimate in minutes lets your sales team quote more prospects. Conversation time goes to the customer, not the document.
What we build
01
Solar installation project management
Project pipeline from signed contract to energization. Every milestone tracked: site survey, permit submission, permit approval, equipment delivery, installation, utility inspection, and interconnection. Each project has a live status view showing what's complete, what's pending, and what's blocking forward progress. Crew scheduling ties to permit approval and equipment delivery windows so crews aren't dispatched to a site that isn't ready. Milestone alerts notify the operations team when a step is overdue and the energization date is at risk.
02
Solar monitoring and performance platform
Real-time data collection from inverters, energy meters, and weather stations via API or hardware gateway. System performance dashboard showing live generation, daily and monthly totals, performance ratio against expected output, and degradation trends over time. Fault detection and alert routing when a system drops below expected performance thresholds. Multi-site fleet view for commercial and community solar operators. Data stored at the granularity needed for utility reporting and performance guarantee verification.
03
Solar sales CRM
Lead pipeline with source tracking, follow-up task management, and lead-to-proposal conversion metrics. Solar savings proposal generator that uses the customer's utility rate, roof characteristics, and proposed system size to produce a projected generation and savings estimate in a professional document. Financing option comparison presenting loan, lease, and PPA structures side by side. Contract generation and digital signature. Handoff to the installation team with all site and design data transferred automatically with no manual re-entry.
04
Permit and inspection management
Permit workflow tracking by jurisdiction, with the specific steps, document requirements, and typical timelines for each authority configured in the system. Document storage for permit applications, structural engineering stamps, electrical single-line diagrams, and inspection sign-offs. Automatic deadline tracking so permit submissions and inspection scheduling don't slip. Status notifications to the customer and internal team when permits advance. Inspection result recording with pass, conditional pass, or correction required workflows.
05
Customer solar portal
Customer-facing web or mobile portal showing live system generation, historical production data, cumulative savings against the original estimate, and environmental impact metrics. Billing and payment history for customers on a lease or PPA. Service request submission and status tracking. System health indicators with plain-language explanations when performance is below expectation. Proposal and contract document access for the life of the customer relationship. Branded to the installing company, not a white-label with another company's logo.
06
Solar fleet and asset management
Asset registry for commercial solar operators and O&M providers: system location, equipment make and model, inverter serial numbers, warranty status, and service history. Scheduled maintenance tracking with automatic job generation at the right service interval for each system. Performance benchmarking across the fleet to identify underperforming systems before customers notice. Work order management for site visits with technician assignment, travel time, and parts used recorded against each system's service history.
How to scope it
Phase the build, price the first slice
You do not buy the whole platform on day one. Start with the phase causing the most operational pain, ship a validated v1, then grow onto the same data model.
Phase 1: Installation pipeline
Launch a validated v1
The system most installers need first: signed contract to energization in one pipeline. Permit milestones, crew scheduling tied to permit approval and equipment delivery, and alerts when a step is overdue and the energization date is at risk.
$20K to $35K
10 to 14 weeks to v1
Installation pipeline plus a customer portal
Phase 2: Monitoring and portal
Add live performance data
Inverter and meter telemetry over SunSpec Modbus and cloud APIs, normalized into one schema. Performance-ratio dashboards, fault alerts before customers notice, and a branded customer portal showing live generation and cumulative savings.
Scoped on inverter-brand count
SolarEdge, Enphase, SMA, Fronius
Performance ratio per IEC 61724
Phase 3: Full platform
CRM, fleet, and multi-jurisdiction permits
Sales CRM with proposal generation, financing comparison, and e-signature; fleet and asset management for O&M teams; a permit engine configured per jurisdiction. The platform the whole business runs on.
Grows from the Phase 1 base
Scoped on integration count
Fixed cost, agreed before work starts
Each phase builds on the last data model, so a permit approval can trigger a crew schedule and a monitoring alert can open a service record without anything being rebuilt later.
How we work with solar clients
01
Discovery
We map your installation pipeline stage by stage, from signed contract through permit, equipment delivery, installation, inspection, and interconnection. We identify where permit jurisdictions, crew scheduling, or monitoring data requirements fall outside what off-the-shelf tools handle. This produces a clear scope before any development begins.
02
Architecture
We design the data model around the solar project lifecycle: system record, permit milestone, crew schedule, monitoring feed, and customer account. They connect, so a permit approval can trigger a crew schedule and a monitoring alert can open a service record with no manual step.
03
Build
Development runs in two-week sprints with working software available throughout. The installation pipeline is built first because it's the foundation that monitoring data and the customer portal draw from. Inverter API integrations are confirmed and tested early so monitoring data availability doesn't block later phases.
04
Launch and support
We run a parallel period where the new system and existing spreadsheets are both active, giving your operations team time to build confidence before the cutover. Post-launch support covers configuration changes for new permit jurisdictions, new inverter brands added to the fleet, and any operational changes that need to be reflected in the system.
Where solar software is heading
Two policy shifts are reshaping what solar software has to track. FERC Order 2023, issued in 2023, is moving grid interconnection from first-come, first-served to a first-ready cluster study model. Queue position, readiness deposits, and cluster deadlines now decide whether a project energizes on schedule. Permit and interconnection modules have to track those, not just a submission date.
On the customer side, export-rate reform like California's Net Billing Tariff, known as NEM 3.0, has cut what utilities pay for exported solar. The economics now favor self-consumption and batteries. Monitoring platforms and customer portals increasingly need battery state of charge, time-of-use savings, and grid-services enrollment, not just kilowatt-hours generated. Software built only around generation data will read as dated within a couple of years. We design the data model so storage and tariff logic can be added without a rebuild.
Frequently asked questions
Off-the-shelf platforms like Salesforce Solar Cloud, JobNimbus, or SolarEdge monitoring work well for companies whose operations fit the standard model. Custom software is the right choice when your installation workflow, permit jurisdictions, or monitoring data requirements are specific enough that platform configuration takes more effort than it saves. It's also the right choice when you want a branded customer portal rather than a white-label experience, or when you need to connect installation pipeline data, monitoring data, and customer account data in a way no single platform supports. We'll tell you directly if a well-configured existing platform would solve your problem at lower cost.
There are two paths. For real-time, on-site telemetry we poll inverters and meters over Modbus TCP using the SunSpec Alliance register maps, the open data model most inverter brands implement, so the platform reads the same points regardless of manufacturer. For fleets without local network access, we use the vendor cloud APIs (SolarEdge, Enphase, SMA, Fronius, and others) for generation and fault data. Systems with neither get an on-site gateway on a Raspberry Pi or industrial IoT device. Utility meters are read via the utility's customer API, a smart-meter API, or interval-data files from the billing system. The platform normalizes every source into one schema and computes performance ratio, actual output against weather-adjusted expected output per the IEC 61724 method, so underperformance shows up as a number rather than a guess.
Permit requirements for solar installations vary significantly between jurisdictions. Some allow permit-by-affidavit for small residential systems with a simple checklist. Others require stamped structural engineering reports, electrical single-line diagrams reviewed by a licensed engineer, and multiple inspection stages. Utility interconnection has its own separate process with timelines ranging from two weeks to six months depending on the utility and system size. We map the specific steps, document requirements, and typical timelines for each jurisdiction you operate in during the scoping phase and configure the permit workflow module accordingly.
Start with the piece causing the most operational pain today. For most growing solar installers, that's the installation project management pipeline: permit tracking, crew scheduling, and equipment delivery coordination across more projects than a spreadsheet can manage. That system is also the foundation the other tools connect to. Monitoring data links to the installed system record, the CRM handoff feeds the installation pipeline, and the customer portal draws from both. Build the pipeline first, then layer monitoring and the customer portal on top of a foundation that already has the right data structure.
Tell us the operational challenge, installation management, monitoring data, sales pipeline, or customer portal. We'll tell you what we'd build and how long it would take.
Scope and cost agreed before work starts. No surprises. No obligation.
Working prototype within 3 weeks of kickoff.
Pay by milestone. You see progress before each invoice.
60-day post-launch warranty. Bug fixes, UI tweaks, and deployment support. No retainer.
