Electrified - Issue 50
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Electrified - Issue 50
With a hammer, everything is a nail
Hi friends,
I hope all of you are finding ways to connect with your loved ones and taking time to relax this week.
Let’s dive in.
Can you build a venture investable business selling to energy utilities?
The question above, asked on Twitter, is worth exploring in detail.
But, before we do, consider this: "to the man with a hammer, everything looks like a nail." Not all businesses fit the venture model and we shouldn't try to force them into it.
There are over 4,000 utilities in the US and each spends hundreds of thousands to millions on software per year. The elephant in the room is the sales cycle which can run from 9-18 months.
Long sales cycles slow the slope of growth in the early stages. Multiple pilots can often make revenues appear uneven. Deployment of new software to utilities often requires services that compress margin.
The result is an unfamiliar business model for most venture firms. It’s not conducive to the typical 12-month fundraising cycle early-stage VCs push on startups to get quick markups on their portfolio. Incentives matter.
Early-stage startups focused on selling to any legacy industry like energy should raise AT LEAST 20 months of capital in each of their first two raises.
Sales will take longer than you expect, and if you only raise 12 months one slow quarter will kill your business.
Today, the most prominent examples of successful startups who sold software to utilities raised little capital and took decades to come to fruition.
But, the map is not the terrain - at least not for the latter. The map of these routes to success began before the age of connectivity and the cloud.
The pace of company building has accelerated with technology and utilities are adapting to a new world brought on by the energy transition.
Much like the railroad revolution laid the groundwork for the industrial revolution, cleantech 1.0 and cloud computing have laid the groundwork for this industrial revolution.
There's also a matter of diversifying revenues - both as a startup and as a venture investor who manages a portfolio.
Startups can build solutions that sell across verticals with utilities being one. Venture investors can leverage portfolio theory to limit exposure to slow adopting industries.
Is it the right option for everyone? Definitely not.
Can it be done? Absolutely.
Electrified Podcast
Last week, we had the pleasure of speaking with Patricia Schouker of King and Union. Our conversation covered cybersecurity and the geopolitical landscape surrounding threats to our infrastructure.
Links
Policy
Public Relations
Economics
Decarbonizing Energy with Innovation Leadership and a Demand-Driven Mindset
Too cheap to keep: How throwing away power is the best way to balance the grid
Electric Vehicles
Spread of Electric Cars Sparks Fights for Control Over Charging (WSJ subscription required)
Recent Investment Activity
Kyklo, a five-year-old, Buffalo, N.Y.-based startup that helps wholesale distributors of electrical and automation products launch e-commerce stores, has raised $8.5 million in seed funding, Felicis Ventures and IA Ventures led the round, joined by Jungle Ventures and others.
Form Energy, a Somerville, Mass.-based startup seeking to make battery systems to better store wind and solar energy, said it has raised $70 million in Series C funding. Investors have not yet been disclosed
Tibber, a Norwegian digital electricity supplier, raised $65 million in Series B funding. Eight Roads Ventures and Balderton Capital co-led, and were joined by return backer Founders Fund.
Yotta Energy, an Austin, TX-based energy tech company, closed a $5M seed funding for its disruptive panel-level, PV-Coupled™ energy storage technology. The investors for this round included Fiftysix Investments, EDP Ventures, Skyview Ventures and other undisclosed investors.
Lavle, a US-based developer of battery technologies and energy storage systems for the renewable energy, marine, rail transportation, aviation, defense, and other markets, received a round of funding from Ocean Zero.
💰Any deals we missed or you would like us to share? Submit them here.
Exits
C3.ai, a Redwood City, Calif.-based company developing ways to deploy AI applications, filed for an $100 million IPO. TPG and Baker Hughes back the firm.
Lightning EMotors, a fleet electrification startup, is in talks to go public via a reverse merger with GigCapital3 (NYSE: GIK), at a valuation of between $700 million and $1 billion, per Bloomberg.
Upside Energy, a developer of cloud-based platform to connect clean energy technologies such as electric vehicles (EVs), heat pumps and batteries, allowing them to be managed to match real-time energy demand and supply has been acquired by Octopus Energy. Terms were undisclosed.
What I’m thinking about
The true spirit of conversation is bringing out the cleverness in others.
See you next weekend,
Kevin