Energetica India Magazine May - June 2026

Founder and CEO POWERCON PRAVEEN KAKULTE Q India’s renewable energy ambitions are accelerating fast, but the asset base remains highly scattered in terms of technology and geography. What are the operational blind spots you believe the sector still overlooks? Praveen Kakulte: The sector often operates on a few blind spots/myths: • The first – ‘Rapid capacity growth means performance’. Yes, we’re adding capacity quickly, but the backend isn’t keeping pace. Truly, performance means functionality of an asset to its rated capacity, with sound technical health, safe – no by - passing or missing parts, and thus securing full freedom to operate. • The second - ‘Once an asset is built, operational inefficiencies are minimal’. But in reality, construction pressures, shortcuts or delays often create issues that surface only during opera - tions. Such a disconnect becomes even more visible at scale. India’s renewable energy footprint is vast, but that very scale intro - duces complexity, ageing assets, scattered OEM technologies, and highly variable site conditions. Critical layers like digital infrastructure and even basic data hygiene frequently lag be - hind, leaving a fragmented view of asset performance. At POWERCON, we are seasoned technical detectives with 3 decades of domain expertise to detect such blind spots and to provide a cure and care during the asset creation as well as the operations phase. It’s not just about helping build more assets, but it’s more about controlling the built quality and then extracting more from what’s there on the ground. Pouring off capital during the construction phase qualifies for returns over the lifetime. The rate of returns and payback period is a function of operations cost per kWh, productivity and longevity. So, in principle, ‘yield maximisation’ becomes the North Star, and as such, our model focuses on making op - erations smart, scalable, and responsive. I’ve always believed in controlling the uncontrollable, and in our space, that be - gins with hands-on groundwork along with data intelligence. Q With India’s net zero goal by 2070 on the table, innova- tion in O&M is becoming pivotal. What are the most sig- nificant technology shifts you’ve implemented at POWERCON that move beyond incremental fixes and instead reshape the way assets are managed? Praveen Kakulte: Net zero by 2070 isn’t going to be achieved through maintenance checklists; it requires detection of de - ficiencies, enhancing throughputs, reducing downtimes, and correlating the availability of assets during the times when the renewable resources are available the most. That’s why POWERCON has moved beyond incremental fixes and built a centralised intelligence layer through our Asset Management Studio, powered by BaxEnergy. It’s more than just a monitoring tool; it integrates operations across different geographies into a unified control room, enabling real-time decisions and performance benchmarking at scale. I ndia’s renewable energy journey won’t be judged by megawatts installed, but by how reliably and efficiently those assets perform over lifetime, said Praveen Kakulte, CEO, POWERCON, in an interview with Energetica India. 24 energetica INDIA- May-June_2026 INTERVIEW