Lightsource Renewable Energy, a solar energy company, has appointed James Brooks as chief strategy officer, a member of the executive leadership team and board of the company.
After 18 years’ experience in the energy and technology sectors, Brooks has a wealth of knowledge in energy, technology and finance markets globally, and how to skilfully capitalise on disruptive and structural changes in complex global markets.
This includes working at First Reserve, a global private equity and infrastructure investment firm exclusively focused on energy, as well as private equity firm Advent International.
Most recently, Brooks was the co-head of energy investments in the merchant banking division of Goldman Sachs within EMEA from 2013 to 2016. The merchant banking division of Goldman Sachs is the largest European, and one on the largest global, private equity investors in energy across the value chain. Brooks has worked on a wide range of M&A transactions, structured financings, equity raises and has more than 15 years’ board room leadership experience.
Brooks will be responsible for overseeing the strategic development of Lightsource, focused on building the talent, culture, governance and strategy required to drive its evolution from Europe’s largest solar energy company to a global leader in the “smart energy” market globally.
He will be directly responsible for leading Lightsource’s utility-scale US and Indian operations, establishing future international markets, developing global go-to-market strategic partnerships and leading the firm’s LS Labs and “smart home” product offerings.
Brooks says: “I am delighted to be joining Lightsource at such an exciting time in both the solar market and in the development of the company. I look forward to working with one of the most successful teams in the solar sector globally; a mix of proven entrepreneurs in the UK, US and India alongside an enormously talented young team. Lightsource has the potential to be a true global leader in re-industrialising the energy market globally, through our unique integrated offering of solar, storage and software, and continue the impressive growth and shareholder value creation delivered over the last five years. I am privileged to have the opportunity to work with the whole team on this vision.”
Nick Boyle, CEO at Lightsource, says: “We’re very pleased to welcome James to the company. As the business grows, it’s important that we shore up our excellent management team with quality new members to keep us in the best position to attack our new markets. We take great pride in our ability to attract exciting new talent to our in-house team and you can expect more announcements soon.”
