Solazyme, an algae-based oil and fuel company, made its long-awaited stock market debut and it was worth the wait. The company once again exceeded expectations by raising $198 million, compared to previous estimates of $184 million and $100 million. The company priced its IPO on Thursday May 26, 2011, at $18 per share at a valuation just north of $1 billion.

This week, two Chinese companies changed their minds about IPO: Huaneng Renewable Energy, a state-owned power company subsidiary, restores its IPO plan while geothermal heat pump developer Nobao, which restored IPO plan just two weeks ago, pulled the plan for the second time.

French power equipment company Schneider Electric was again the corporation of the week in cleantech, highlighted by the $2 billion bid on Telvent of Spain, a provider of information technology software and services for energy, transport and infrastructure systems.

Solazyme, an algae-based oil and fuel company, made its long-awaited stock market debut and it was worth the wait. The company once again exceeded expectations by raising $198 million, compared to previous estimates of $184 million and $100 million. The company priced its IPO on Thursday May 26, 2011, at $18 per share at a valuation just north of $1 billion.

Venture investment activity continued to roll this week. We have seen numerous cleantech companies raise Series B funding or above during the past few weeks. Harvest Power and QD Vision were among the top names that attracted additional funding this week.

After the blockbuster acquisition of Landis+Gyr, Toshiba made another transaction in Asia: purchasing stake from a leading Korean wind turbine manufacturer. Also, it seems like funds dedicated to cleantech have become a fashion for the past few weeks, as three more transactions were announced in the past week.

Energy and power Corporations such as GDF Suez and RWE were making headlines in the past week. Both companies made transactions in regards to renewable energy project development. Meanwhile, it was also a good week for UK cleantech companies, as three of them received funding.

A few well-known North American cleantech companies received growth stage funding in the past week. QD Vision, Harvest Power and Morgan Solar all raised capital in Series B or later rounds.

Fisker Automotive, which just closed a $190 million round earlier this year, raised another $100 million to fund production of its vehicles. Meanwhile, several other marquee cleantech companies also received funding, rounding up a quite impressive week for cleantech VC investments.

Although cleantech VC activities have been somewhat missing-in-action in Asia and Pacific, there were still some interesting events going on. Several funds were in the headlines, as well as an IPO by a Chinese LED giant, Hongli Tronics.