People, process and platform – that's what makes Ampion a unique, leading subscription and revenue management company for distributed generation developers. All three are important, but it’s the people who enable the processes and the platform.

Account Management is an integral part of the “people” aspect. The team is dedicated to realizing our clients’ revenues while managing their community solar and other CDG sites. Meet the leader of these operations, Sana Jameel, our VP of Account Management.

Sana has been dazzling Ampion’s clients and perfecting the client experience since 2018. She has nearly a decade of experience in the clean energy industry. Our developer and asset owner clients interact with Sana on a day-to-day basis. They rave about her attention to detail and commitment to service. A “people person,” her passion for client service and the clean energy transition drives her every move. She oversees all client communications, internal coordination and revenue reporting.

Q: Can you walk us through your day-to-day in Account Management?

A: My work varies every day, but half of my time is dedicated to client communication, whether that's on the phone or in-person, in their office or in conferences. It's definitely a lot of relationship building and communication, which has to be my favorite aspect of the role. I’ve been speaking to some of our clients for five years now, so we have a really positive rapport. They have my cell phone number, so they can call me any time with questions.

The other half of my role is data and project management, ensuring that the information that we are absorbing from various places on behalf of our clients is logged appropriately in our systems. This allows other departments within Ampion to be more effective in serving both our clients and subscribers. The feedback that we get from clients about their sites lets the Revenue Management team know how and when to resize allocations, or which sites to assign new subscribers to based on the date the solar farms go live. Customer Care also needs to know that information and log it in a systematic way so that they are providing the right information to our customers.

Q: What’s one Account Management activity that provides the most value to clients?

A: I will say that managing the data and giving clients access to insights is an unexpected bonus for many new clients. True profit optimization in community solar requires a lot more than basic price times quantity calculations in a spreadsheet. While initial subscriber acquisition is obviously important, the ongoing revenue management part of the process is where our clients make their money.

Your site produces clean energy. If the site is underallocated, or if you can’t access the credits due to data exchange challenges (which are so common in this industry), that energy can’t generate revenue.

This is the hard work of billing, allocating subscribers to sites, responding quickly to inevitable curveballs from utilities, effectively collecting payment, and so much more. It’s all these processes together that drive revenue realization.

I feel fortunate to work with industry veterans who have years of experience working with utilities. These colleagues had the foresight early on in the company’s history to prioritize data access and robust software systems. Every day I see how important it is to be on top of the data, and to continuously update the platform as the industry evolves. I really don’t know how I’d do my job– helping developers get the most value from their community solar sites– without such a strong technology platform and team.

Q: What's your favorite part about your role?

A: I really like knowing that I’m contributing to an important mission. The work that we're doing is really impactful. It’s gratifying to know that everything I do today is helping to drive growth in the solar industry, pushing additional clean energy to the grid and reducing our reliance on fossil fuels.

Q: You started at Ampion in 2018 – what has your experience been like since you joined?

A: I've been here since October of 2018. The company itself was much smaller. Interestingly, we were just launching our first more large-scale, traditional community solar acquisition campaign and it was really grassroots, which is very different from how our company has scaled to date. Now we’re serving clients across the country for a range of distributed generation sources. We've definitely grown and scaled substantially since I started.

I joined as an Account Manager; that was my initial title. I really got to build this department from the ground up. It was really trial and error, and we quickly learned how we want to manage our client relationships. We developed the right cadence for meeting with clients on the phone and in person. I'm excited to continue growing the team and mentoring account managers that we onboard, especially as we continue to expand our base of developer and investor clients.

Q: How have you seen the community solar industry change since you joined Ampion?

A: It's changed quite a bit, and there’s been more change recently than ever before. The fact that the federal government released incentives in the Inflation Reduction Act is very telling of how community solar and (CDG more broadly) is maturing as a market. The federal government is investing a ton of money into the industry. That is a positive indicator of industry growth. It is federal recognition that community solar has the potential to benefit millions more people.

Community solar has also gained recognition in the commercial space. When I first started, commercial entities weren’t aware of community solar. Now, we talk with Fortune 500 enterprises and smaller commercial entities all the time about ways to save money on electricity while achieving aggressive ESG goals. Most of them have heard of community solar and are eager to learn more. I think recognition will continue to grow as these markets mature.

Since I started, state markets have evolved in positive ways. New York and Massachusetts were early adopters of community solar. Although there are still some growing pains, I think they've gotten past most of them, and those programs are running pretty seamlessly. Massachusetts and New York are also some of the largest programs in the country, with significant volumes of management capacity. But the number of new markets that have emerged since I've been here has also grown dramatically. Those are all positive indicators that the industry is not only growing, but here to stay.

Q: What's a common question that you get from clients and how do you successfully answer that question?

A: Clients often ask how they can optimize the revenue that is generated by these projects. The answer is always very nuanced and specific to markets and utilities; it's usually all policy-driven. It is an important question because ultimately, our clients need to maximize revenue to improve the return on their invested capital. Better ROI creates incentive to build more sites. The more our clients build, the closer we both are to achieving our mutual missions. So of course, we want to optimize their revenue as much as possible.

Investors and developers who we work with view Ampion as an expert in the space. These clients have mastered building renewable energy assets and getting them through the interconnection and permitting processes, but most of them look to us for administrative and policy guidance. We’re lucky to have a Regulatory and Policy team that is personable and incredibly easy to work with. I rely heavily on our Regulatory & Policy Team for important information to help clients succeed.

Our Finance Team will also help define revenue optimization strategies such as, “Which factors should be included in our clients’ models?” Account Management is able to provide clients with dedicated research into specific market policies and understanding how credits are valued, allocation rules in a particular market and what incentives are available. Our teams work together to understand all those different options for revenue optimization, which we report back to clients. I’m always happy to connect our clients with our teams, because I know they’ll come away happy and more prepared to maximize the ROI of their projects.

In addition to revenue optimization, we offer insight into strategic subscriber management. There's a lot of interest in LMI incentives now, at both the state and federal levels. We understand the desire for incentives because they're so lucrative, but I think Ampion also has a unique perspective. We believe that credit value at the time of generation is extremely important, but we also want to think long term about an optimal subscriber mix. We understand where revenue shortfalls can occur and how to prevent them. We look into which state-implemented programs may inherently mitigate nonpayment issues and churn, such as consolidated utility billing. We go beyond just numbers on a spreadsheet.

Q: What’s an example of information your team provides that clients really appreciate?

A: They really appreciate the bidirectional flow of information and how easy we make it for them to give and receive information that is crucial to maximizing project ROI.

We take the projection for our initial allocation sizing, and then proactively adjust subscription sizes on an ongoing basis depending on subscriber energy usage. Optimizing allocations like this is not only great for the client and their revenue, but it’s also extremely important for the subscriber experience. We want to make sure subscribers are getting the maximum benefit from the program, too.

Q: What inspired you to work in community solar? Or the cleantech and clean energy industry in general?

A: I'm the youngest of three and as I was applying to college, my siblings had suggested that I choose a STEM-focused major. I valued what they had to say because they both were either graduated or in college at that time. Environmental Science jumped out at me just because I was worried about climate change – and still do of course, and learned a bit about environmental impacts in high school. Al Gore was Vice President for my first eight years of life and my dad was a big fan of his. I think that definitely had an influence on me. When I went to college, I started to really like my classes, learning about the human impact on the environment and how mitigating it is really in the best interest of everyone on the planet. I really aligned with it.

After I graduated, I landed a role at a Boston-based home energy efficiency startup. It was a large, fast-growing startup and they offered home energy efficiency products to Massachusetts homeowners. I sat near the community solar team, and I heard them on the phone pitching the product to subscribers. I thought it was fascinating because rooftop solar access is pretty restrictive. I ended up working in the rooftop solar space for the next few years, but I always had community solar in the back of my mind.

In 2018, I saw a job description for a role at Ampion and I applied. I was so thrilled when I got the role–I really liked that Ampion was hyper-focused on client service.

Q: What’s your favorite part about working at Ampion?

A: I really appreciate the culture here. I have found a lot of professional development opportunities here at Ampion. My favorite memories from Ampion have to be from our summer company outings. The Ampion Summer Outing is something everyone looks forward to each year; I'm glad that we've been able to maintain that tradition of going to Thompson Island in Boston Harbor. It's an employee appreciation day.

One of my favorite memories is the first conference that I went to with Ampion, which was the Community Solar Power Summit. I'd never been to a professional conference before as a representative for a company. It was definitely a big professional development moment for me to be able to connect with clients in person and experience a large-scale industry event. I know this industry is pretty male-dominated, but I met a lot of women and saw a lot of diversity at the conference. It was inspiring and motivating to see. I've been to a number of conferences since then; that aspect of my role is awesome.

Q: What do you like to do when you’re not working?

A: I’m a big concert-goer. I go to a concert or live music venue just about every weekend. If there’s live music, I’m there. Having grown up in the Boston area, I’m also a big Celtics fan. I try to go to a few games a season. I’ll root for any Boston sports team, though!

I also love to cook. I’m Pakistani, so I like to learn Pakistani recipes through my family and keep the tradition going. If I have a family of my own, I want to pass those recipes along to them.

Also, I have a cat named Sock.