Afrique du Sud
Infinity Power, a joint venture between Egypt's Infinity and the UAE's Masdar, has signed the EPC contracts for two South African solar complexes totalling 773.6 MWp, announced at the Africa Energy Forum in Cape Town. Four months on, the module supplier is known: the panels are ordered and the projects are moving into execution.
Two builds, two contractors
The first complex is Highveld Solar, 285.6 MWp in Mpumalanga, awarded to India's Sterling and Wilson Renewable Energy. On its own it is expected to supply some 167,000 households and avoid 660,000 tonnes of CO₂ a year.
The second, 488 MWp, goes to China's PowerChina Guizhou Engineering and accounts for close to 289,000 households and more than 1.1 million tonnes of CO₂ avoided annually. A word of caution on its name: June's communication presented it as the "Negwedi cluster" in the Free State, while October's refers to Onderstepoort Solar 1 and 2 in North West. Capacity, contractor, household count and tonnage are identical across both versions, so this is in all likelihood the same complex, renamed and relocated in the more recent announcement.
The division of labour is telling. An Indian EPC on one phase, a Chinese EPC on the other, Chinese modules on all three: the supply chain of African utility-scale solar remains largely Asian, a point we covered in our opinion piece on Made in China.
The largest award of Bid Window 7
The three projects were awarded under Bid Window 7 of the REIPPPP, South Africa's procurement programme for independent renewable power producers, and are due to operate under 20-year PPAs with Eskom.
That is where the most telling figure sits: Infinity Power secured 1.28 GW of solar capacity in that single round, the largest allocation among all successful bidders. The 773.6 MWp discussed here therefore represent only two thirds of it.
The volume says something about the South African market, by far the deepest on the continent, where tariff reform is gradually opening the door to private competition. It also says South Africa is no longer alone: five other countries have joined the club of markets above a gigawatt a year.
The modules are ordered
On 12 October 2026, manufacturer AIKO announced a supply agreement covering 773.5 MWp of All Back Contact (ABC) modules for Highveld and the two Onderstepoort phases, roughly 1,195,136 panels.
It is the two groups' first collaboration in South Africa, and it takes their cumulative partnership across the continent past 2 GWp. For a project still under a conditional EPC contract in June, the module order is the signal that counts: nobody reserves 1.2 million panels for a plant they do not intend to build.
What the structure says about the market
The deal illustrates the rise of platforms backed by regional sponsors. Infinity Power is targeting 10 GW of operational renewable capacity in Africa by 2032, aggregating solar, wind and storage across several countries.
This developer-investor model, sitting on Masdar's balance sheet, makes it possible to secure several-hundred-MW tickets where public auctions sometimes struggle to reach closing. The group announced three simultaneous signings at the Africa Energy Forum, one of them in Egypt, where local manufacturing is scaling up.
South Africa's utility-scale pipeline remains the deepest in Africa and sets the sizing standard for privately developed projects, against which programmes run by national agencies can be measured, such as the 225 MW of Morocco's NOOR Atlas programme.
FAQ
A joint venture between Egypt's Infinity and the UAE's Masdar, a renewable energy developer and investor active in several African countries. The group is targeting 10 GW of operational capacity on the continent by 2032.
The seventh round of South Africa's procurement programme for independent renewable power producers. Successful projects sign 20-year power purchase agreements with Eskom. Infinity Power won 1.28 GW of solar in that round, the largest allocation of the session.
No commissioning date has been announced. The EPC contracts signed in June were conditional; the module order announced on 12 October 2026 marks the move into execution.
What it means
For an investor: sponsor platforms such as Infinity / Masdar offer an aggregated, de-risked deal flow that reads more clearly than a standalone project, and the 10 GW trajectory becomes an anchor for sizing exposure to the continent. For the industry: 1.28 GW awarded to a single bidder in a single round shows the depth of South Africa's pipeline, and an order for 1.2 million modules shows that pipeline turning into construction sites.
Sources: SolarQuarter (24/06/2026), SolarQuarter (12/10/2026), Africa Energy Portal
