Sunder Energy is a leading solar sales organization built on a high-performance, independent sales team. Their "Sunder 2.0" model, which partners with a vast network of EPC (Engineering, Procurement, and Construction) companies, allows them to focus on their core strength—sales. This model makes operational efficiency and multi-partner management business-critical.

We transformed Sunder Energy's operations by conceptualizing, engineering, and scaling Merdeka.AI, a bespoke, enterprise-grade business automation platform. This strategic partnership replaced a chaotic spreadsheet-based system, providing the core technological asset that enabled Sunder to scale from a small team to a national sales force operating in 48 states with 60+ partners.

This robust and sophisticated platform became a key strategic strength, ultimately playing a pivotal role in Sunder Energy's acquisition by SunPower, one of the largest and most respected solar companies in the United States.

In 2023, Sunder Energy’s "Sunder 2.0" pivot was in jeopardy. Their entire operational pipeline—managing projects across multiple states and EPC partners—was being run from a single, overwhelmed SharePoint spreadsheet.

This manual system was a critical bottleneck, creating:

• No Single Source of Truth: Each partner used different terminology, tools, and milestone updates. Sunder’s team was blind, unable to get a real-time, consolidated view of their entire project pipeline.
• Crippling Inefficiency: Thousands of hours were lost to manual data entry, cross-referencing, and back-and-forth communication just to determine a project's status.
• A Hard Limit on Scale: The spreadsheet-based "system" could not scale. Every new partner added an exponential layer of complexity that threatened to grind Sunder's growth to a halt.

Sunder initially engaged us for a three-person Customer Success (CSM) team to simply manage this chaos. It was from this embedded position that a true strategic partnership was born.

Our CSM team didn't just manage the problem; we diagnosed its root cause. From our front-line position, we saw that Sunder didn't just need more people—they needed a central nervous system.

We proactively began conceptualizing a solution, working in lockstep with Sunder to design and build Merdeka.AI.

Merdeka.AI is not just a CRM. It is a sophisticated, enterprise-grade business automation ecosystem, custom-built to solve Sunder's unique challenges. We engineered the platform from the ground up on a modern, scalable microservices architecture to ensure security, uptime, and independent deployment of new features.

This robust foundation allowed us to build and integrate several mission-critical systems that directly addressed Sunder's pain points.

1. The Core: A "Single Source of Truth" Project View

Our first priority was to destroy the data silos. We designed the Consolidated Project Detail Page to be the "command center" for every project. This view centralizes every piece of data, communication, and document, providing a single source of truth for all stakeholders—from sales reps to the operations team, partners, and even the homeowner.

2. The "Universal Translator": Our API & Data Review System

This consolidated view is powered by Merdeka.AI's most critical component: our "Universal Translator" API & Data Review System.

• Intelligent Ingestion: Our external services hub ingests project data from all 60+ partners, handling data from CRMs like Enerflo and JobNimbus via webhooks and API polling.
• Intelligent Validation: An "Intelligent Field Comparison Engine" analyzes the data, translates dozens of different partner terminologies into one uniform Sunder Energy status, and flags discrepancies.
• Operational Control: All changes are placed in a manual review queue for Sunder's operators, with auto-approval rules handling the rest. This gave Sunder, for the first time, a single, reliable pipeline.

3. Intelligent Automation: Scaling Sales & Operations

With a clean data pipeline, we built automation to manage it. A key example is the Automated Contact Attempt System. To solve the problem of projects stalling, this system automatically drives engagement:

• Omni-Channel Outreach: It automatically sends follow-up messages via in-app chat, email, and SMS.
• Smart Escalation: If a project reaches 10 unresponded contact attempts, the system automatically marks the project as "Abandoned" and sends a final warning email to the Sales Rep.

4. Empowering Sales & Finance: Commission & Accounting Tools

Sunder is a sales organization. We built a sophisticated financial and commission-tracking module to manage their most critical assets.

• Commission Split System: We engineered a flexible system to manage complex sales hierarchies, including "Closer / Setter" commission splits.
• Automated Accounting: The system tracks commissions, manages financial data, and integrates directly with financing partners, providing the Accounting team with a robust management and reporting tool.

5. The Admin Command Center: Data-Driven Decisions

We built a powerful Backoffice (Admin Dashboard) that transformed Sunder from "reactive" to "proactive." This command center gave leadership unprecedented visibility into their business:

• Pipeline Management: Admins can view and manage the entire project pipeline in real-time.
• Comparative Partner Analytics: Sunder's leadership can view key analytics and statistics on every partner's performance, allowing them to compare partner efficiency (e.g., installation times, failure rates) against others in the same state.

Competitive Pricing Reports: We built specific "Adder Pricing Comparison Reports", enabling Sunder to analyze adder pricing across their network, identify competitive advantages, and optimize profitability.

From Beta to Enterprise: A Story of Agile Growth

Merdeka.AI is a living platform that has evolved with Sunder Energy, proving our commitment as a long-term partner. The platform's patch history tells the story of this agile, responsive development.

• Phase 1 (Q4 2023 - Q1 2024): Building the Foundation
  After the initial beta, our team immediately focused on Sunder's two biggest challenges. By March 2024, we had deployed the two most critical features: the Hierarchy Management system and the first version of the EPC Data Review "universal translator".
• Phase 2 (Q2 2024): Automation & Financial Integration
  With the core in place, we automated key processes like Stage Progress Automation and built out the comprehensive Proposal Engine, integrating key financiers.
• Phase 3 (Q3-Q4 2024): Launching the Enterprise Platform
  This phase marked a major leap in maturity. Our engineers migrated the entire infrastructure to AWS ECS, implementing a true Zero Downtime Deployment pipeline. This was followed by the launch of the Escalation Ticketing System, the Merdeka AI Bot, and the full EPC Dashboard.
• Phase 4 (2025): Deep Integration & Enterprise Services
  The focus shifted to deep enterprise integration, including building out the Amazon Connect call center, launching the Escalation Dashboard, and integrating directly with complex partner APIs.

By embedding ourselves in Sunder's business and taking full ownership of their operational technology, we delivered operational freedom. Relieved from the stress of managing broken systems, Sunder's leadership was free to focus 100% on their core business: sales, partnerships, and strategic growth.

The results were transformative:

• National Scale: Sunder Energy's network expanded from a few states to 48 states.
• Partner Network Explosion: Grew from a handful of partners to 60+ EPCs and 10+ financiers.
• A True, Scaled Partnership: Our embedded team grew from 3 CSMs to a fully-integrated technology and operations team of over 50 employees.

Merdeka.AI was more than an internal tool; it was a key strategic asset. Its robust, scalable, and sophisticated architecture was a significant factor in Sunder Energy's acquisition by SunPower.

We didn't just build a CRM; we built the proven, enterprise-grade platform that became a cornerstone of Sunder's valuation and success.