InnoEnergy, Europe's largest sustainable energy accelerator, and EBAN, the European trade association for business angels, seed funds and early stage market players, have entered into a partnership to create EBAN Energy, a network that will drive more sustainable energy innovations to market.

The collaboration was unveiled this morning by Diego Pavia, the CEO of InnoEnergy at the 2017 EBAN Annual Congress in Malaga, Spain. EBAN Energy will establish more successful sustainable energy innovations by alleviating common investment challenges, including the long lead-time to market, the capital-intensive nature of the industry and strict legislation.

The partnership will give EBANs network of business angels and InnoEnergys 170+ pan-European sustainable energy start-ups a networking platform, paving the way for future investments and in turn increasing the number of commercially successful sustainable energy businesses. This will provide InnoEnergys start-ups with direct access to funding, helping to reduce the time to commercialisation. InnoEnergy and EBAN will also educate EBANs business angels to ensure better understanding of the complex regulatory challenges associated with the sustainable energy industry.

Elena Bou, Innovation Director and executive board member at InnoEnergy, says: "There are challenges for start-ups in any industry, but sustainable energy innovators are faced with a much longer list of hurdles that can make it difficult to achieve market potential.

"Despite these challenges, sustainable energy has a huge impact on society, making it an attractive industry for the brightest entrepreneurs. The launch of EBAN Energy will enable us to provide further support to our high-potential start-ups, helping to drive them to commercialisation."

EBAN Energys aims are threefold: to increase the number of sustainable energy funding applications (and the number of successful sector applications), improve the sustainable energy knowledge of EBANs business angels to support more informed investment decisions and provide a platform for networking between the EBAN business angel community and InnoEnergys start-ups.

Candace Johnson, President of EBAN, says: "Our goals are clear. We want to democratise access to sustainable energy by investing in green assets and encouraging entrepreneurs and investors to be active in building sustainable and green development capital. And we want to inspire the global entrepreneur, innovation and early stage investment communities to develop sustainable and green capital."

EBAN will also attend InnoEnergys events, including the annual The Business Booster (TBB) event. TBB is taking place in Amsterdam, The Netherlands from 25 - 26 October, where attendees will have access to more than 160 sustainable energy start-ups in the exhibition.