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.

The much-anticipated Landis+Gyr sale finally happened last week as Toshiba emerged as the buyer. ABB, following the acquisition of Mincom last week, also made another acquisition in the smart grid sector.

North American cleantech community has experienced a loud week in terms of VC activities. Prominent names like Fisker, Bridgelux and Hara occupied the headlines. In other news, Solazyme upped its IPO fundraising projection to $184 million, adding to the anticipation created by the biofuel company when it first announced IPO plan earlier this year.

It has been quite a lively week in worldwide cleantech community. Numerous North American companies received funding, European cleantech companies and investors celebrated a successful Cleantech Forum in Amsterdam, and Asia saw significant amount of funding committed to cleantech sectors for the near future.

Although Asia has been somewhat quiet on cleantech investment and M&A front, all the fund announcements still made it an outstanding week for cleantech in Asia. Five out of the six fund-related announcements were all either Asia-based or Asia-focused.

Swiss electric equipment company ABB continued its recent wave of acquisitions by acquiring mining software company Mincom, broadening its operational technology offerings. This move followed ABB’s recent acquisition of Novatec Solar, a German concentrated solar thermal technology provider.

Among all the venture and M&A deals of this week, the one company that stands out would be General Fusion, the nuclear fusion technology developer. Though this seems like a dubious time for a nuclear technology company to be funded because of what happened in Japan lately, General Fusion claims that its fusion technology is safer, cleaner and even cheaper than the fission-based technologies used in most plants today.

This week’s top highlight belongs to French energy conglomerate Total, which made a giant acquisition of American solar company SunPower for more than $1 billion. Total has been quite active lately in the solar sector, having completed the takeover of French solar company Tenesol SA just two weeks ago.

British companies seemed to be gaining some momentum with the Royal Wedding. Enecsys, in particular, completed the largest venture deal in Europe this year.

This week’s highlight features several interesting venture deals and a few corporate transactions in the M&A front. Fallbrook Technologies’ change of plan in IPO also grabbed some attention.

After months of speculation, California-based solar thermal technology developer BrightSource Energy finally filed for an initial public offering, expecting to raise $250m. This news represents an exclamation mark on BrightSource’s eventful fundraising journey after it raised $201m at the end of last quarter.