Bringing Solar Sales Online Before It Was the Norm

For years, buying residential solar began with a home visit.

A salesperson would travel to the property, inspect the roof, gather measurements, estimate production, and return days later with a proposal. The process was expensive, time-consuming, and limited how many homeowners a company could serve.

Sungevity set out to change that.

The goal was ambitious: give homeowners an accurate, interactive solar proposal online—complete with rooftop visualization, system design, energy production estimates, and financial projections—without sending anyone to the home.

At the time, this represented a fundamentally different customer experience.

As a Software Engineer, I contributed to the development and evolution of iQuote, one of Sungevity's flagship products.

Over several years, I helped build two generations of the platform: the original implementation in CakePHP and a next-generation application built with AngularJS on a Scala backend.

Working across multiple iterations of the product gave me firsthand experience balancing new technology adoption with the realities of maintaining and evolving software used by real customers every day.

The application combined technical calculations, geographic visualization, financial modeling, and customer communication into a single experience.

Homeowners could review a proposed solar installation directly on their roof, explore projected energy production, understand long-term financial savings, and move confidently toward purchasing a system—all through a web application.

The challenge wasn't simply rendering data. It was presenting sophisticated engineering and financial information in a way that felt approachable and trustworthy.

Every design decision had to help customers understand a significant financial investment without overwhelming them.

As the product matured, so did its architecture.

The first generation of iQuote was built using CakePHP and a custom database architecture, providing the foundation for the company's early online experience.

As frontend applications became richer and customer expectations evolved, we participated in developing a second-generation platform using AngularJS with a Scala backend. The newer architecture supported a more dynamic user experience while creating a stronger separation between frontend and backend responsibilities.

Working through both generations reinforced an important lesson: successful software isn't rebuilt for technology's sake. The architecture should evolve because it enables better products and a better experience for customers.

iQuote helped transform how residential solar could be sold.

Instead of waiting days for an on-site consultation, homeowners could begin evaluating solar from anywhere, exploring both the technical and financial aspects of a proposed installation through an interactive experience.

For the business, this reduced friction in the sales process and allowed the company to reach more customers more efficiently.

For customers, it made a complex purchase significantly easier to understand.

Working on iQuote shaped many of the principles that continue to guide my work today.

Innovative software isn't just about introducing new technology. It's about identifying friction in an existing process and designing a better experience around it.

I also learned the importance of evolving architecture thoughtfully. Building both the original application and its successor showed me that long-lived products require continual investment—not just in features, but in maintainability, scalability, and developer experience.

Those lessons have carried through every major product I've worked on since.