Sunbase is a horizontal contractor platform with embedded PV design; Solar Spine is built specifically for Indian solar-EPC sales and delivery.
In short
Sunbase integrates CRM, native PV design, proposal generation and project management into one system across three trades (solar, roofing, construction). Founded in Florida in 2011, it claims 8,000+ daily users and 1,500+ contractor teams. The CRM, design and proposal tooling are integrated (not point tools stitched together), which cuts handoffs common in narrower solar-only systems.
For an Indian solar EPC, Sunbase hits a hard limit immediately: it is built as a general contractor platform with no DISCOM workflows, no net-metering steps for BRPL/BYPL/TPDDL/PVVNL/NPCL/DHBVN/UHBVN, no PM Surya Ghar tracking, no GST-compliant invoicing, and no WhatsApp integration despite Sunbase's own India blog naming WhatsApp as essential for Indian customer communication. Pricing is per-user in USD ($59/month list, ~$100-300/month in practice), sales-assisted with no self-serve quote or INR price.
Solar Spine's 57 conditional checklist items (appearing only where loan, subsidy or DISCOM status apply) do work Sunbase cannot do. Sunbase's stage-based task automation is generic and unbranching; a Sunbase user configures stages from scratch, then assigns generic tasks. Sunbase also cannot gate material dispatch on payment thresholds, lacks PIN-code serviceability checks, has no native AI telecaller, and does not write lead outcomes back to Meta for ad optimisation. Moving from Sunbase means re-mapping a generic pipeline, re-creating proposals (Sunbase's design data has no confirmed structured export), back-filling compliance history, and moving to flat unlimited-user INR billing.
Where Sunbase wins
- Sunbase genuinely integrates CRM, PV design and shading analysis, proposals and project management into one system, so sales handoff to design carries data with no re-entry and a proposal flows from design output automatically. Most solar-only CRMs bolt on design or leave it to a separate tool; Sunbase built it in.
- The platform serves three trades (solar, roofing, construction) as one connected system, which means a contractor doing mixed-trade work pays for one platform, not three separate ones. Solar-only CRMs do not offer this.
- Sunbase is a mature, 15-year-old platform with real category investment: six dedicated vs-competitor pages, a steady ~2–3 posts per month blog cadence, and self-reported 8,000+ daily users and 1,500+ contractor teams show category credibility and resources.
Where Solar Spine wins
- Solar Spine's 57 conditional checklist items branch automatically by loan status, subsidy status and DISCOM. Sunbase's stage-based task automation is generic and unbranching; a Sunbase user must configure stages from scratch and assign generic tasks. Sunbase cannot gate a project on compliance conditions Solar Spine enforces.
- Solar Spine gates material dispatch on payment thresholds you set (the default is drawn from a working Delhi-NCR EPC: 25% before structure, 65% for loan or 95% for non-loan before material, 100% before net meter and completion). Sunbase has no payment gate; money and work are decoupled.
- Solar Spine writes lead outcomes (qualified, converted, disqualified) back to Meta's Conversions API so your Meta ads optimise for buyers, not form-fillers. Sunbase ingests Meta leads one-way and has no writeback.
- Solar Spine includes an optional AI telecaller running 9 am to 9 pm IST that qualifies leads, books visits on a named salesperson's day and hands off with notes. Sunbase has none; call summaries and lead scoring exist in a blog post, not the product.
- Solar Spine's flat unlimited-user INR pricing at ₹10,000/month or ₹99,999/year (plus 18% GST) never punishes a large field team. Sunbase's per-user USD pricing ($59+/month per person list, ~$100–300/month reported) scales poorly for a 20-person field team and requires a sales call for any quote.
Best for
Contractors across solar, roofing and construction who need integrated PV design, proposals and project management in one platform and are based in the US or similar markets where compliance is generic.
Not for
Indian solar EPCs where DISCOM and net-metering and PM Surya Ghar tracking are compliance gates; nor teams with large, unlimited field or telecalling staff (per-user USD pricing scales poorly).
Pricing
Sunbase
Sunbase is per-user, custom-quoted, and USD-only. The published starting price is $59/user/month (approximately ₹5,575/user/month at the 2026-09-08 market rate of ₹94.50 per USD). Real-world deployments are estimated by third-party reviewer heavengreenenergy.com to cost $100–$300/user/month. The vendor publishes no fixed tier grid, no INR pricing, and no free trial; every quote depends on the number of users, modules selected (CRM, proposals, project management, inventory, financial, reporting), industry workflow, and implementation and training scope.
| Tier | ₹ / user / month | Notes |
|---|---|---|
| Starting price (custom quote, no fixed tiers) | ₹5,575 | Converted at ₹94.50/$1 (2026-09-08 market rate from tradingeconomics.com, corroborated by xe.com and Wise) from the $59/user/month listed at https://www.sunbasedata.com/sunbase-pricing. Every deployment is individually quoted; no published ceiling tier. |
| Reported real-world range (unverified, third-party) | Not published | Independent reviewer heavengreenenergy.com estimates roughly $100–$300/user/month (~₹9,450–₹28,350/user/month at ₹94.50/$1). Not confirmed on Sunbase's own pricing page; included for context only. |
Read from https://www.sunbasedata.com/sunbase-pricing on 8 September 2026
Solar Spine
Solar Spine price list, the same numbers Razorpay charges
Feature by feature
| Capability | Sunbase | Solar Spine |
|---|---|---|
| Solar-specific | ||
| Solar sales and install stages out of the box | Partly. Solar CRM page frames pipeline stages as user-configured ('create stages around your sales process, from new enquiry and consultation through design, proposal and contract'), not a fixed out-of-the-box solar stage set. | Yes. 7 sales stages and 17 project stages seeded on day one, all editable. |
| Stage checklists that change with loan, subsidy and DISCOM | No. No mention anywhere of checklists that branch by loan type, subsidy status or DISCOM. Only generic 'stage-based actions' and task assignment. | Yes. 57 checklist items; loan, subsidy and DISCOM-specific tasks appear only where they apply. |
| DISCOM net-metering steps tracked | Partly. Project-management page tracks generic 'utility interconnection submission' and PTO status (the US net-metering equivalent) but nothing DISCOM-specific. | Yes. Net-meter paperwork branches for BRPL, BYPL, TPDDL, PVVNL, NPCL, DHBVN and UHBVN. |
| PM Surya Ghar and subsidy tracking | No. No mention anywhere, including the dedicated India-market blog post, which discusses subsidy paperwork only generically and does not name PM Surya Ghar. | Yes. PMSG submission, DCR certificate, GBI and central subsidy redemption as dated tasks. |
| Roof design, shading and proposal generation | Yes. Create PV designs, assess shading and estimate energy production; proposal-generation workflow ties design, production estimate and pricing together. | No. Solar Spine does not do roof design. Use a design tool and track the job here. |
| Execution | ||
| Tasks written automatically with due dates when a stage opens | Yes. Task assignment with due dates and ownership clarity; automate assignments, reminders, follow-up tasks and stage-based actions. | Yes. Nobody types the checklist; each task carries the date it was given when the stage opened. |
| Overdue work escalates up the org chart on its own | Partly. Overdue task and blocker identification gives visibility into stuck work, but no automatic escalation up an org or management chain described. | Yes. Every night a late task climbs one rung and keeps climbing until someone acts. |
| A stage cannot be advanced with open checklist items | No. No mention of a hard block preventing stage advance while checklist items remain open. | Yes. The advance button is unavailable until the stage's items are closed. |
| Documents verified by ops before work proceeds | Partly. Documents are stored per project and missing document identification exists, but not stated as a progression gate. | Yes. A document is done when ops marks it correct; a rejection goes back to the person who photographed it. |
| A different first screen per role | Yes. Create personalised dashboards that cater to specific roles and departments with role-based access and permissions. | Yes. Nine roles, nine first screens, from telecaller to director. |
| Field use on a phone: photos, tasks, call outcomes | Partly. Record installation progress, photos, notes and issues from the project record (field photo capture confirmed). Call-outcome logging specifically from field not confirmed. | Yes. Every screen works on a phone; documents are photographed at the customer's house. |
| Money | ||
| Instalment schedule per project | No. Financial-management page covers quote and invoice generation and collections, but no milestone-based instalment schedule (such as 10/70/20) per project. | Yes. 10/70/20 or whatever you agreed, with due dates and outstanding balance visible to all. |
| Material cannot dispatch until payment is collected | No. No link found between payment collected and material dispatch. | Yes. Thresholds per stage, set by the workspace; the default is the one the first customer ran. |
| Daily overdue payment alerts to owner and manager | Partly. Sales Boards with Aging Triggers and late-stage collections management imply overdue visibility, but not a daily alert routed to owner and manager specifically. | Yes. 7 am every day, to the person who owns the collection and their manager. |
| A bounced cheque reopens the instalment | No. Not a concept present anywhere on the US-built site. | Yes. Yes |
| GST invoices and quotes from the same record | No. Invoicing and quote generation exist but no GST or India-tax-compliance language found. | Yes. Invoice creation is a stage in the pipeline; the subscription itself is GST-invoiced too. |
| Leads and calling | ||
| Meta lead ads land in the system within minutes | Yes. Push leads directly into the CRM from providers, Facebook and Google. | Yes. Ad leads arrive marked hot at the top of the calling queue inside five minutes. |
| PIN-code check on incoming leads | No. No PIN or ZIP-code serviceability check described on the CRM or marketing and sales pages. | Yes. Leads outside the PIN codes you serve are kept out of the AI caller's queue. |
| AI caller that qualifies leads and books visits | No. AI direction is discussed in a blog post (call summaries, predictive lead scoring) but no shipped AI voice caller product found that qualifies leads and books visits. | Yes. Optional. Calls 9 am to 9 pm IST, books the visit on a named salesperson's day, hands off with notes. |
| Built-in telecalling queue with daily batches and outcomes | No. Marketing and sales page logs calls against the customer record but describes no telecalling queue with daily batches and outcomes. | Yes. Queues built and ordered before the caller sits down; one outcome vocabulary for humans and the AI. |
| Lead outcomes written back to Meta | No. Meta and Facebook ingestion is one-way (leads flow in); no mention of writing outcomes back to Meta for ad optimisation. | Yes. Qualified, converted and disqualified statuses flow back through the lead sheet into Meta's Conversions API, so the account optimises for buyers, not form-fillers. |
| WhatsApp messaging and automation | No. Sunbase's own India-market blog post says WhatsApp matters for Indian customer communication, but no Sunbase product page lists WhatsApp as a shipped integration. | Partly. Click-to-chat and logged WhatsApp interactions. No automated messaging. |
| Reporting | ||
| Owner dashboard: kW against target, cash due, stuck projects | Partly. Role-based, real-time, drag-and-drop dashboards exist generically, but no solar-specific owner view combining kW vs target, cash due and stuck projects confirmed. | Yes. Yes |
| Per-person monthly targets and attainment | No. Dashboard and reporting page has no per-person monthly target and attainment feature described. | Yes. Yes |
| Ask the business a question in plain English | No. No natural-language or plain-English data-query feature found on the dashboard and reporting page or elsewhere. | Yes. Director and GM only. Finding, evidence, table, caveat, next step, from live data. |
| One-click export of everything | Partly. Automated Reporting with scheduled report distribution via email exists, but no one-click export of everything stated. | Yes. Excel export any time. No lock-in. |
| Pricing and support | ||
| Pricing model | No. Per-user, custom-quoted pricing ($59+/user/month list; ~$100–300/user/month in practice). Not flat per-company or workspace pricing. | Yes. Flat per company: ₹10,000 a month or ₹99,999 a year plus GST. Unlimited users. |
| Prices published in INR | No. All pricing language on the site and in search results is USD-only ($59/user/month). No INR figures published anywhere. | Yes. Yes |
| Free trial without a card | No. Neither the pricing page nor the contact page mentions a free trial; both funnel to Book a Demo or sales quote. | Yes. 30 days, no card, no call. |
| Setup or onboarding fee | Partly. Pricing page names Implementation & Training as one of four factors in every custom quote, implying onboarding cost is bundled or charged. | Yes. None. Send the filled setup form and the workspace configures itself. |
| India-based support in IST | No. Only US phone numbers (Florida) and a generic contact form found. No India office, IST support hours or India support line. | Yes. Email, replies within one business day, from Mumbai. |
Switching from Sunbase
- Sunbase holds leads, opportunities, PV designs, proposals, projects, tasks, documents and financial records (quotes and invoices) in one system, but no export-format or API-documentation page exists publicly. Data portability from Sunbase is unverified from the public site; you would need direct vendor confirmation or an active account to test what formats export.
- No self-serve migration or data-export tooling is documented. You would likely need to request a CSV export via support or arrange a custom API pull if Sunbase offers one.
- Your migration would mean re-mapping Sunbase's generic, self-configured contractor pipeline into Solar Spine's prebuilt solar sales (7 stages) and project (17 stages) workflow.
- Proposals stored in Sunbase (generated from PV design) have no confirmed structured export format, so you would re-create them in Solar Spine with the design data you have.
- Back-fill DISCOM and net-metering status, PM Surya Ghar subsidy tracking and loan status for every project Sunbase never tracked. Move off per-user USD billing onto Solar Spine's flat INR workspace fee.
Questions people ask
Can I use Sunbase and Solar Spine together?
Nothing prevents running both in parallel; Sunbase for proposal and roofing work, Solar Spine for your solar delivery. But you would track solar deals twice and reconcile outcomes manually, re-entering payment status and stage changes by hand in whichever system lags behind. Most customers migrating pick one system and move everything.
Does Solar Spine replace Sunbase's PV design tools?
No. Solar Spine does not do roof design, shading or production estimates. Use a design tool (Aurora Solar, OpenSolar, DesignBuilder, or Sunbase's own design module) and track the job in Solar Spine. Outcomes like layout, production estimate and material list flow into Solar Spine as reference fields or documents.
Is there an integration between Sunbase and Solar Spine?
Not today. Your path is to export data from Sunbase (via support if needed) and import leads and customer records into Solar Spine via CSV or the calling queue. CSV import carries over contact details, lead source and stage; PV design output and proposal documents need to be re-attached by hand.
Which is cheaper for a 12-person solar team?
Solar Spine at ₹10,000/month (₹11,800 with GST) is flat for 12 people or 200. Sunbase at $59/user/month list (~₹5,575/user/month, so roughly ₹67,000/month for 12 people plus GST, or ~₹79,000 all-in) or $100–300/user/month in practice (₹9,450–28,350/month per person, so ₹1.13–3.4 lakhs/month for 12 people) scales worse as your team grows.
Where is the data hosted?
Sunbase is US-headquartered (Florida) and hosts data accordingly, though their India-market positioning implies India customers exist. Solar Spine hosts data in Postgres in Mumbai (ap-south-1) with row-level security fencing every workspace; identity documents are visible only to the project chain.
Does Solar Spine support WhatsApp or telecalling?
Solar Spine includes click-to-chat WhatsApp (no automated messaging) with logged interactions. Telecalling is an optional AI agent running 9 am to 9 pm IST that qualifies leads and books visits on a named salesperson's calendar. Sunbase has neither; it positions itself as an alternative to teams working out of WhatsApp groups, implying WhatsApp is external.
Other comparisons
Run one real project through it this month. You will know by the end of it.
30 days free, no card, no call. Then ₹10,000 a month for the whole company, however many people you put on it.