business for good podcast episode 55 - susan stone

Ubiquitous Energy’s Susan Stone Intends to Power Our Cities with Invisible Solar Panels

Susan Stone: [00:00:00] As we think about building in cities where we're building vertically, and the rooftop area is so much smaller than the glazed area on the, uh, walls of the building. We did a quick analysis on Salesforce Tower and we calculated that if you glazed all of the glass on Salesforce Tower in San Francisco, you have 700 times the surface area that you would have.

Available to you for Rooftop Solar.

Paul Shapiro: Welcome to the Business for Good Podcast, a show where we spotlight companies making money by making the world a better place. I'm your host, Paul Shapiro, and if you share a passion for using commerce to solve many of the world's most pressing problems, then this is the show for you.

Welcome friends to the 55th episode of Business for Good. Thanks so much to everybody who contacted the show via our website, business for good podcast.com to tell us about how inspired you were by the last episode with Chris Bryson, the entrepreneur, turned investor, and [00:01:00] philanthropist after his successful exit from his own company.

So if you didn't listen to that after listening to this one, go back and check out Chris Bryson's inspirational Tale. I can assure you, it is worth the time to listen now. Onto this episode. We may hear a lot these days about solar power and renewable energy, but sadly, our civilization is still voraciously addicted to fossil fuels.

Even in a technologically advanced country like America, nearly all or about 90% of the energy that we use still comes from non-renewable sources. This not only causes serious environmental damage to extract all of it from the earth, but it's also a leading cause of climate change. It's just driving countless species to extinction, including possibly even our own species.

If we don't get our act together, the effort to collect energy from the sun's rays has come a long way, but it's still marginally dependent on finding roof space or large tracks of land to put pretty frankly unappealing blue gray solar panels there. But what if we could collect solar energy through crystal queer film that we could affix to [00:02:00] virtually any surface, including the windows of your.

Or even a skyscraper by making it possible to invisibly turn outdoor objects like windows into solar energy collecting devices. We could transform the ways our cities and homes get their power, and that is exactly what ubiquitous energy is seeking to do. This startup has raised 30 million so far to commercialized technology that started in an mit.

And it uses invisible film placed on windows to harvest solar energy, and we've got their C E O Susan Stone on this episode to tell us all about it. I'm particularly excited about this innovation since it doesn't look like humanity's energy needs are gonna subside anytime soon. If anything, we're gonna need more power, not less.

That's why innovations like ubiquitous energies are so important since they allow us to have our energy and eat it too, or maybe to have our energy and heat our homes too. With that, I now bring you Susan Stone, c e o of ubiquitous energy. [00:03:00] Susan Stone, welcome to the Business for Good podcast.

Susan Stone: Thanks, Paul.

I'm really happy

Paul Shapiro: to be. It is my pleasure to have you. In fact, uh, I'm not sure if you're aware of this, but you are actually not our first episode about glass. You know that we did an earlier episode, about 50 episodes actually, on Lux. Have you heard of them? They're the bird friendly glass.

Susan Stone: You know, I have, I've heard of bird friendly glass, but not of orna lux, but that gives me lots of joy that you already have talked about glass.

So we're not starting from the. We are not

Paul Shapiro: starting from the beginning, but this is now the second way in which glass may end up saving the world. So yeah, Orex is a, a really cool company. It's a division of, um, Arnold Glass, this German company that, uh, has developed a glass with a uv, um, spray at on the exterior of it that birds can see, so they won't fly into it.

and, um, you know, it's a big problem. Uh, there are literally billions of birds who perish by flying into windows every year. So it's not, um, it's not a small issue, but there's lots [00:04:00] of other ways that Quest might end up saving the world. And we're gonna talk about one today. So before we do that though, Susan, before we get into what ubiquitous energy is doing, um, Let's first talk about just how conventional solar panels work, because at least before this episode, I, I really didn't know how they worked, so I knew it's like this blue gray panel that allegedly is like harvesting the sun and doing something with it.

But h how does it work? And then afterwards we can talk about why what you're doing is better.

Susan Stone: Sure. Um, I think the simplest way to think about how conventional solar works, when we talk about conventional solar, we talk about opaque solar because our solar is transparent. When you think about those typical solar panels that you see out in, you know, these utility scale solar farms or on your roof, for folks that have install installed solar at their houses, that opaque solar is harvesting as much of the light as possible.

across the visible and non-visible spectrum, taking that, typically it's using silicon and turning that into [00:05:00] electricity. I mean, that's the, that's the fundamental basic of it. Um, what we do that's different is we selectively harvest only the non-visible light. Other than that, the technologies are virtually identical.

Um, we're still using the sunlight to make electricity, and we're just doing it by harvesting a little bit less of the spectrum.

Paul Shapiro: So tell us about the spectrum. For somebody who doesn't know, you're talking about non-visible ways, so, you know, just pretend I have no idea what that even means. What are the types of light that are in the sun ray that are hitting our eyes?

Susan Stone: Well, if you go back to kind of the classic way that you learn about colors and light, when you're a kid, you learn about the colors of the rainbow. And I remember learning that Roy Dbiv, uh mm-hmm so that we would remember all of the different colors within the spectrum. When you get to. End of the spectrum, we talk.

Violet, and then you start to go to ultraviolet and infrared and near infrared. Those are the [00:06:00] non-visible light in the spectrum. Uh, the rest is the colors, red, yellow, blue, uh, green. Those are the, the colors of the visible light spectrum, um mm-hmm. . But what we talk about and what we harvest are in. Beyond the end of the rainbow, uh, beyond Violet when we get to ultraviolet and, um, and infr.

Paul Shapiro: You know, it's funny, Susan, this is, uh, Roy Gi bv virtually never comes up in my life, but this is the second time this week it has come up because I was actually talking with a colleague of mine who is, uh, grew up in Israel. And so he, you know, was never taught that since he didn't learn in English, obviously.

Um, and I was telling him about Roy GI biv, so I'm glad that you are bringing it up here. Um, but so basically what ubiquitous energy is doing is harvest. That light, which the human eye can't see. And before we get into that, which is a, a very, uh, interesting invention and really cool to think about, let's just talk about solar and, [00:07:00] and renewables in general because I, I think a lot of folks, when they consider renewables, they think that we're further along than we actually are in terms of.

You know, what percentage of the energy that we are using in America or even in the world is coming from them. So can we talk a little bit about that first? Like how much energy are we using that's coming from so, or other renewables right now?

Susan Stone: You know, that's a great question and I wish I had less specific answer for you on, you know, what percentage of the us um, that's a statistic that I should have and I don't.

Um, it tends to be really regional and I think that's something that is a really interesting. Unique problem here in the United States is that we have a, a patchwork of energy sources and depending on who your, if you are taking energy from the grid, depending on who your provider is, you can get some information from your utility about how much of your.

personal electricity is coming from renewables, and it depends on the region. Here in [00:08:00] California it tends to be higher than in some other places, and that's mm-hmm. cause of legislation and, um, that has its pros and cons. Um, but unless you are someone who has installed solar, perhaps at your own house, you're really limited to the renewable energy portfolio that your particular utility has.

And that varies across the.

Paul Shapiro: Well, since you don't have it at the tip of your fingers, I do. Of the luxury of having Google in front of me. And so I'll tell you that according to the US government, um, this is from the website of the US Energy Information Administration, which I didn't even know existed. But it is a real federal agency.

It appears, um, Renewable energy accounts for 11% of total energy consumption in the US and about 17% of electricity generations. So we're talking about a very small amount still. You know, 89% of all the energy that we're coming that we're getting is coming from fossil fuels. Um, and so, you know, in order to switch to an entirely [00:09:00] renewable energy, uh, uh, system, you know, you're requiring.

Uh, 10 Xing our current system, which of course takes any enormity of resources to do. I mean, you just think about, uh, you know, every single gas station that's on, you know, almost every block of every major urban area and so on. Um, and, and the numerous other ways that we have to, uh, transform our grid in order to do that.

And so that takes a lot. And so we're gonna need some really inventive. Innovative solutions to figuring out how we can do that. So let's talk now about how ubiquitous energy can be a part of that solution. So I know, um, that the company has been around now for nearly a decade, is that That's right, Susan.

Susan Stone: That's right. Yeah. I think the founding was in 2012. Um, so yeah, almost a decade. Developing this te.

Paul Shapiro: And during that time, before we start getting into how the technology has evolved, how much money has the company raised? We've

Susan Stone: raised, uh, just about [00:10:00] 30 million so far. Um, and that's from seed investors all the way through to, um, we've, we completed our last equity financing was a series A.

Paul Shapiro: Congratulations on that. And I, I believe that you got some money from the National Science Foundation, uh, as well, correct? Oh,

Susan Stone: yeah. Support from the National Science Foundation and also support from, uh, the California Energy Commission. We have a Oh, great. A grant with them. And we've got, uh, a great relationship there.

So we've, we've gotten some nice support from, um, a few government agencies, which has been always helpful. .

Paul Shapiro: Right? And so it's helpful for other, uh, potential entrepreneurs or other entrepreneurs to recognize that not all of the money that you have to, that you'll raise will necessarily be dilutive. That there may be grants from state or federal sources that are just given to you, uh, because you're doing something cool.

Susan Stone: That's exactly right. And our experience with these agencies has been that they've been incredibly flexible in working with us to make sure that. Grant the plans [00:11:00] around the grants, push our business forward as much as they do the research, and to really help us tailor the use of funds for those grants to make sure that it's exactly what we wanna be doing to make sure that our product gets to market.

So we've just had a great

Paul Shapiro: experience. Great. Well, let's talk about that product and when it might get to market. So conventional photovoltaic, they, they seem to harvest about a third of the sunlight that is hitting it. Um, you are making something that, as you say, is not opaque, but is actually a transparent, uh, uh, and absorbing just the nonvisible or non-visible to human light.

So how much, uh, like what percent of that sunlight are you capturing? If conventional was 33%, what are you guys. Well,

Susan Stone: I think it's important to remember that conventional is about 33%. That's, you know, we're talking about theoretical maximum. The panels that if you or I were to put solar panels, opaque, conventional, and picked solar panels at our homes, we're talking in kind of the low 20% for, um, [00:12:00] efficiency.

The percentage of the sunlight that's being converted, our theoretical maximums, because we avoid that spectrum. Visible to the human eye. Our theoretical maximums are about half, uh, where opaque solar is. There's, even though we're talking about only UV and fared and near infrared, there's quite a bit of power in those spectrums.

So, um, we, we max out at, you know, kind of mid-teens. Theoretically our best, currently our best performing solar cell has been. Verified, um, at a third party institution at 9.8%. So just under 10%. Okay. So when you think about, you know, the, the panels I just actually had solar specked out for, for my house here in Truckee, and the panels that they quoted us are, uh, 21% as the, you know, kind of nameplate our conversion efficiency.

So we're, yeah, we're

Paul Shapiro: getting there . Cool. What company are you, are you deciding to go with for your own. Um,

Susan Stone: it's a, we're working with an installer [00:13:00] here, um, a local installer, which for us is, is really, really valuable because they can really put the whole package together. And we were interested in, in Tesla power walls and they know how to work with Tesla power walls.

So that's, uh, that's a big part of it for us.

Paul Shapiro: So you're not doing just panels. You, you wanna do the battery storage too? Oh, we

Susan Stone: want storage too. I mean, look, I live in this world where for. We work with this problem every day, right? We create power via our transparent solar. We create power at windows, and then what are you gonna do with it?

Mm-hmm. , I mean, the, the sun isn't shining all day, every day, and we need to store power. So storage is on my mind pretty frequently. So, So I don't think, I don't think I put in solar without

Paul Shapiro: storage and, and living in Northern California where uh, you know, utilities shutoffs to prevent wildfires seem, are seemingly only gonna become more and more frequent.

It probably is a good idea to have, uh, to have that battery storage. Also, there is

Susan Stone: that side benefit. You're right.

Paul Shapiro: So let's talk about, then you, you say it's [00:14:00] about, uh, capturing about half of the power, so to speak, of the sun as a conventional, but the ability, like the surface area where you can put these, is much, much greater than double, right?

So if you think about, let's say, like a skyscraper building, How, like if you compare how many solar panels you can fit on the roof compared to having all of the windows that are on the side of the building, capturing energy, you're talking about something that is, you know, orders of magnitude greater in terms of the power captured.

Right.

Susan Stone: Exactly, and especially as we think about building in cities where we're building vertically, and the rooftop area is so much smaller than the glazed area on the, uh, walls of the building. We did a quick analysis on Salesforce Tower and we calculated that if you glazed all of the glass on Salesforce Tower in San Francisco, you have 700 times the surface area that you would have available to you for rooftop solar.

and we [00:15:00] would never suggest that someone avoid rooftop solar and just use solar glass and use ubiquitous energy's product because they're complimentary solutions and they should work together. Mm-hmm. so it, you know, you should think of it as 700 access surface area for glass plus the rooftops space available to use for opaque.

Paul Shapiro: That's really cool. That's really cool. So you're talking Susan, about this being a glaze. So, uh, help me understand, this is something you're putting on the exterior of glass. You don't have to be there at the moment of the glass fabrication and put it like somehow inside of the glass, right? We actually

Susan Stone: do.

So when you think about the way that glass is manufactured, um, it. It's quite a long supply chain from when the actual, that flat piece of glass is made to when it gets put into a window construction. And what, where we like to be is right after the glass is made. We coat the glass, we call the glass or substrate because by the way, we can talk about this later.

We don't [00:16:00] have to coat glass. We can coat other substrates. Right now we're coating. We put a coating on the glass, um, that is very, very thin. I mean, we're talking about nanometers thick. Um, it's very similar to the way that that glass is already typically coded. Most glass that goes into windows today is coded with a low emissivity coating, people call it low e coating, which helps to reject the energy.

That the sun is producing reduce, reduce the solar heat gain that comes into your home from the sun that's already being put on glass. Our coating is applied in a really similar way and in the same place within the supply chain. So we coat the glass and then it's constructed into. Those double-paned glass units that we think of as windows, and we like to be on the inside there.

So we're on the inside of the exterior piece of glass in most product constructions.

Paul Shapiro: Got it. So [00:17:00] really it's not, uh, it's really like if you're gonna take the Salesforce building as an example, they would have to replace all of their windows in order to accomplish what we were just talking about.

Susan Stone: Yes, that's absolutely right.

In a, in a commercial construction, uh, framework. We are the, we're a great fit for new buildings. It's got it. It's more of a challenge for retrofit, which is not to say that, uh, you know, building owners won't do it. Uh, quite a bit of the building stock here in the US and around the world is still single panel monolithic glass, even for some of these bigger skyscrapers.

And there's a real opportunity if those buildings are going to be reglazed anyway, to reglaze them with ubiquitous glass. Um, it's, we need, we need wires, right. We're producing power, so the power has to go somewhere. And so we, our wiring needs to take that power out of the glass facade or the window unit, um, and feed it into the balance of systems, into the storage like we've been talking [00:18:00] about, or back into the grid.

Um, so it's, it's less of a, a retrofit product for commercial. Um, Than it is a new build product. Now we do have some residential products that we're, um, that we're working on and that we're hoping to launch here really soon. And those are the opposite. Uh, those products, we use the power right at the window, and so we're able to enable some really interesting functions right there at the window wirelessly.

Produce and store the power right there at the window and it's installed just like a window would be. If you needed to replace one of your windows in your home, no electrician, no, absolutely no different than installing just a, a new window because you got a crack or you're seal broke or you're just ready for something different.

So for residential, we're a retrofit product, but for commercial, uh, it's a better fit for a, for new build, at least to.

Paul Shapiro: Hmm. Okay. Well that's, uh, very interesting to me, especially as a homeowner. But [00:19:00] let me just ask you then, Susan, so if, if I'm, let's say a commercial property owner and I'm, you know, I'm gonna build a building and I'm thinking about getting ubiquitous energy glass on there, am I gonna be paying more than I would for, um, for conventional glass?

And if so, is that offset by the energy savings I'm gonna to enjoy later?

Susan Stone: Yes and yes. Um, our. Our product adds about 30% to the cost of the glass, and the, the glazing is a, a big component to building costs. So it is not without cost, but it's not. Two x three x five x, I mean, it is, uh, 30% cost, uh, on the high end that can be offset by tax credits.

Uh, depending on your location, there are tax credits available, as you know, for renewable energy. Um, and instead of having passive. Glass that doesn't do anything for you other than allow you to see the world around you. We are producing electricity so you get a payback [00:20:00] from the electricity. Um, the building, location, size, all of those things really drive the payback period.

Um, but we just ran two, uh, energy simulation models for two buildings in Asia and we were yielding payback periods of anywhere between two and a half and four years. So I think those are pretty compelling economic.

Paul Shapiro: Sure. So just to be clear, it's two and a half to four years after the new building is is up and running, you have total payback and then everything else is just base of profit after that.

Susan Stone: That's right. Then you've paid back the in, you've paid back the increment, incremental cost of having added our technology to your glazing, and now you're just enjoying the free electric.

Paul Shapiro: Sounds like a pretty short time, uh, two to four years. It doesn't seem like that long to recoup the costs of something that will provide you with so many benefits.

And frankly, that has such environmental benefit too. We agree . I'm sure you do. I'm sure you do. So where are these [00:21:00] glass, uh, where, where is this being used right now? Um, I read that your office, your headquarters is using this. Is that.

Susan Stone: We are our, we have an installation, which was the very first installation at our office in Redwood City, which once we're through our Covid purple tier, hopefully you'll come and see us.

I'd love to show you that in person. Um, we, right now what we do with that installation is we power our lights in our conference room. Um, that's, we power a battery that powers our lights in our conference room because one of the things that we've found, talking to really anyone about this technology is the, the first question that people ask is, what, what should I do with the electricity?

What, how much power can you produce and what will it do? And so being able to really link what are we powering? We're not just feeding back into the grid. It's not a, uh, numbers game. What are we powering? We're powering our lights in our conference room with our facade. We also have an installation in Toledo, Ohio at the Research Center for Pilkington, which is one of the primary glass manufacturers, one of the [00:22:00] largest in the world.

They have an installation at their place, uh, which we put in Cool in the first half, and we're getting some really interesting data off that. They're, they've been a great partner to us and so we. We've been working with them to gather data and, and track the performance of that facade. So those are our two biggest installations so far.

And that probably gives you a sense for, for where we are here in the process. We have a prototype manufacturing facility in Redwood City that makes our. Prototype windows. Those are 14 inch by 20 inch panels that's currently our size, and we are just gearing up right now to go into manufacturing mode.

So we're gonna have a really busy 2021 as we go out and raise some capital and do the completion of our planning activities so that we can hopefully break ground on our first manufacturing facility in early 2020.

Paul Shapiro: Oh, that's exciting. Well, I'll, I'll have to talk with my wife about what size our windows are to [00:23:00] see.

A 14 by 20 is gonna be compatible to be one of your first customers here. So Susan, if the glass is capturing some of the light that is coming from the sun, if I have plants indoors that are accustomed to getting light through the glass, presumably all of the sun's raised, I would presume. Now, are they gonna suffer?

Are they missing anything out? Like if they're not getting infrared, um, or, or UV light, uh, exposed to their weave. Well,

Susan Stone: the short answer, Paul, is no. And, and I think we, we mentioned earlier that what we harvest is what's non-visible to the human eye. I think it's a really interesting thing to think that's just visible to humans.

So what does plant vision look like and what is what, what pieces of the spectrum are important to plants? I dug into this a little bit because when you and I spoke, uh, a couple weeks ago just for a little prep session, you asked me this question and my, my answer was pretty rudimentary to start, which is [00:24:00] to tell you, most windows, as we said before, they have that low e coating, which is rejecting a lot of the infrared and UV light anyway, so it.

Basically no change between our windows and what you think of as a typical modern window, but I decided to dig a little bit deeper. One of our co-founders is a professor at Michigan State. His name is Richard Blunt, and he and his team are doing work using our panels, um, amongst a few other, um, experiments that they're running.

To learn more about plant vision and to learn about how we can tune our formulations at ubiquitous, our formulations are tuneable to capture different pieces of that spectrum. Um, how can we tune those? to not just be more beneficial to plants and not take away spectrum that they need, but could we tune them to encourage growth?

And so we could even envision in the future being able to enable dual use land where [00:25:00] plants are growing underneath a solar array that. allows exactly the right spectrum to pass through in order to encourage those plants to grow while using the balance to harvest electricity. Mm. So stay tuned on that.

Richard and his team are doing a lot of work on plant vision so that we can learn how much of that spectrum did the plants really need, and which pieces are important to them, and are there pieces of the spectrum that we could block that could even help plants? You know, provide a little sunscreen for plants or sunglasses for them, for the pieces of the spectrum that don't quite work as well for them.

Paul Shapiro: Wow. All right. So we're gonna improve upon evolution here and, uh, and, and create some type of a filter that's gonna make plants even more productive, which would also be a, a great gain to get, uh, increasing agricultural productivity from each acre of land. So we have to farm less land. So that would be pretty amazing, uh, to, it's possible to happen.

All right. I'm, I'm gonna, I'm [00:26:00] gonna keep looking, uh, for that announcement. , in addition to Windows you mentioned you can, you can put this on other, um, other devices. I have a very old iPhone that runs out of energy almost immediately upon using it when it's not plugged in. Can I put this on my iPhone screen as well?

Susan Stone: Someday you might be able to, I mean, mobile phones are so interesting, right? They're, they're such power hogs and the screens are really important to us. But let's also think about the use case. I think one of the, one of the things that for me is fundamental about getting new technology adopted is, We can't ask people to change their behavior or we really shouldn't if we want it to be widely adopted.

And I would ask you how often your iPhone is in your pocket, um, and how often it's actually exposed to sunlight, which solar might not be the best solution. Mm-hmm. for extending battery life for, for mobile phones. But the good news is we can do it and if it, if it [00:27:00] is a good solution, and if the use case makes sense, we can absolutely do it.

Um, I think one of the things that's really important for consumer electronics is very high transparency to be appropriate in these display stacks. And, and that's something that we can offer. So we don't have a current project for your iPhone yet. Uh, but don't count us. .

Paul Shapiro: I'll keep it plugged in for now, but, uh, what about the white that's just coming from the ceiling of the room that I'm in?

I mean, obviously that's different from sunlight, but is anyone out there, even if you are not, is anyone out there working on harvesting any of that energy?

Susan Stone: We harvest it today. Um hmm. You know, light is light. We harvest it today. It's not as powerful as the sunlight. And I think it's really, it's just about the math.

You know, how much surface area does that? Piece of glass or, or substrate have, how often does it see light and does that have a meaningful offset to the battery drain? Mm-hmm. . Um, and I, I think, you know, mobile phones are a pretty unique case. We really, we carry around virtually super computers in our pockets.

[00:28:00] Um, and they, they just really have a, a pretty intense power draw. So it we're, I think the best way to answer it is that we're working on it. But I, I still don't think we're a great solution for mobile phones today.

Paul Shapiro: Hmm. Okay. Um, well, uh, I, I will leave mobile phones to rest then, but as aside from glass, what other surfaces are there that you think would benefit from this, that are being, you know, presumably outside and constantly exposed to the sun?

Sure.

Susan Stone: Well, I mean, we're really focused on building products right now. Uh, and that's because we're, our first products are in Windows. And I would say I, I really love what Tesla's doing with their solar roofs because it's a truly integrated product, rather than having a roof that then has to have solar on the top.

Um, we can, we don't currently, but we can, uh, coat other substrate. Make them [00:29:00] transparent. So if you think about a flexible substrate, for example, that could be applied on top of roofing material, on your existing roofing material, uh, or on current roofing materials. Um, That could replace OPA solar panels on the roof.

So that's something that is, you know, kind of deep, deep pipeline for us. Um, but really interesting and I think could help solve some of the problems of put having, um, you know, very heavy solar arrays on mm-hmm. residential roofs. So that's, that's what I'm thinking about when we, you know, when we talk about coding other substrates, um, I, you know, I would like to go back to consumer electronics for a second.

We talked about iPhones mobile. Uh, as a unique case, there are plenty of other consumer electronics devices that could really benefit from solar, transparent solar. And you know, one of them is an Amazon Kindle that's a very low power draw device. Mm-hmm. . So we could take that off. Interesting. A grid [00:30:00] today.

Um, that would be real easy for us to take off the grid. So I think it's, uh, it's less. What would we coat and more about where are some really good use cases for transparent solar? We're making that electricity in. Aesthetically beautiful, invisible way is, uh, a good value proposition.

Paul Shapiro: That's very cool. Um, I, I have a, um, a bird bath to bring it back to birds.

Here I have a bird bath, uh, that is like hooked up to one solar panel that's probably like six inches by six inches. So when it's, when it's sun is shining on it, the bird. Bath is like more like a fountain. Um, but maybe there's something in like home and garden use as well for you there, whether it's bird baths or other things that are outside that could be, uh, that could benefit from having something like that too.

Susan Stone: Yeah, absolutely. I mean, I think that's one of the most fun things about what we do is that there are so many potential use cases and our technology just [00:31:00] captures people's imagination. And so literally had I thought about bird baths, absolutely not. And every single time, , I talked to someone about what we do, there's another new and really interesting idea of how we could apply this technology, and that's just super.

Paul Shapiro: Yeah. So, uh, just briefly, you know, the most people listening probably are, are not really, uh, familiar, and I know certainly I'm not with the type of technology that you're talking about here. I mean, you're, you said you're talking like in, in nanoscale, right? And I, I think that the film that you're applying here, it's like less than one 1000, one less than one, one 1000th of a millimeter thick, right?

I mean, we're talking about something so small, so, so like what type of people? Have the expertise to be working at ubiquitous energy. Um, are these material scientists like molecular biologists, like what is it that you need in order to work there to advance the science? Well, you

Susan Stone: got it right, uh, with your first guess.

Uh, [00:32:00] material scientists. We have a lot of material scientists on the team, and that's at, at our core, that's what we do. We're a material science company. Um, organic chemists. We have quite a few people who come out of the solar industry. We are currently, uh, gearing up our electronics team because you make the power and then you've gotta do something with it.

Uh, so we have. Some electrical engineering expertise around the table. Uh, but you know, really the core team and where that intellectual property is generated is with via our material scientists, we are engineering molecules to selectively absorb different spectra of the light. And so those folks are, you know, the real engine of the new discovery to help.

Push our aesthetics and to push our power conversion

Paul Shapiro: efficiency. But that's not your background, right? I mean, you were not a material scientist. You're not engineer, not even a engineer. Yeah. You're, you're not engineering molecules, right? I mean, you are the [00:33:00] ceo, e o of ubiquitous energy, but you didn't start as the ceo O you're not a founder.

Right. You were, uh, a venture capitalist who invested in the company.

Susan Stone: That's right. I invested in the company's series A and joined the board at that time. Um, that was back in. The original series I was back in 2014. Um, that's when I met these, uh, this wonderful team That was, just to give you a sense, you've seen where we are now.

Back when I invested, uh, the team was still borrowing time at m i t, you know, kind of like nights and weekends around the grad student schedule and making postage stamp size solar cells. So we've really come a long way. Um, and I, no, I have virtually no. Science background and certainly no materials, science background.

Mine is, mine is a business and investing background. So I'm, uh, I'm the odd man out on the team, I would say .

Paul Shapiro: So what happened? Uh, why, uh, how did you go from being an investor and a board member to now becoming the c e o? Like, when did you become the ceo? E o And I know the, the original CEO is [00:34:00] still with the company.

He's now the C t o, the chief Technology Officer. Um, but when and why did that, uh, did that take.

Susan Stone: It really was, well, it happened about a year ago. I just celebrated my one year anniversary at Ubiquitous. And, uh, I think it was, uh, from the VC standpoint, it, it felt like a classic battlefield promotion. Um, the, the board needed at the time, the, the current c e o resigned and the board needed someone to step into that guy's shoes.

And that was me. It was as simple as I think being the right in the. Place at exactly the right moment. Um, and having had a long history with the company, I think, uh, the relationships are not to be underestimated. I mean, this is, uh, a very, very tight-knit team that's been working together really closely for a long time.

And there's, uh, some real magic to having a team that works that well together. Um, and so I think that was. I mean, you'd have to ask the board exactly, [00:35:00] but I think that was, uh, a lot of why they selected, selected me to come in and, and lead this team. Um, yeah. And yes, our, our founder, miles Barr is still with the company.

He's our cto and he is, he, he and I sit, sit virtually right next to each other right now, um, and work really well together. He's, uh, super passionate about what we do and very. big driver for our

Paul Shapiro: success. Got it. Okay. Well that's a, a fascinating history and it's always, uh, intriguing to me how startups evolve in their leadership.

And at what point, uh, does a c e o who is also a founder, uh, you know, what point are they maybe not the best person to still be running the company, even if they founded it? Um, that's not to say that always happens, of course, but it seems like sometimes it does, or at least sometimes the, the VCs determine it, so.

John Mackey, who is the, uh, co-founder and, and still ceo, E O of Whole Foods Market was on this show. And he had a really funny analogy where he said that, uh, venture capitalists are, are kind of [00:36:00] like hitchhikers with credit cards that, you know, you let them in the car and it's awesome. They give you a credit card, they buy all of your food and your gas and everything else that you need.

But eventually, if they don't like the way that you're driving, uh, they'll kick you out and they'll take over the car, and, uh, they'll start driving. And obviously it doesn't sound like that's what happened in this case since, uh, your c e o resigned and was, uh, you know, didn't, uh, eject himself. But, um, you know, it's, uh, it's always interesting, uh, uh, to see when an investor becomes the c e o and, uh, can help drive the company, uh, forward in whatever new direction it's gonna go.

Yeah,

Susan Stone: I think, um, I love that analogy from John Macia. I hadn't heard that before and it's, uh, it's so true. Uh, you know, I think in our case, the, the f our founder had already exited the c e o seat and there was, uh, another gentleman in the, had been c e o for most of, uh, 2019 before I joined. And it, it is still that, it's the classic story.

Similar to what John Mackey's analogy brings up. [00:37:00] I, I think we were as a company, in a situation where it was time to make a big change in the orientation of the company. And I think for material science companies especially, there comes a transition from maturing your technology to really needing to commercialize it and.

The, uh, you know, kind of beginning of 2019, that's when ubiquitous energy really was making that step and the management transition began. So it, it, it wasn't as, um, opportunistic as it might sound. It really was, you know, kind of well thought out by founders, board members, advisors, that it was time to start transitioning to a more commercial oriented management.

Paul Shapiro: Yeah, totally understood. Uh, sometimes, uh, sometimes, not always, but sometimes scientists who found companies may not be the best, uh, executive to actually lead the business, um, even if they're doing really cool science. Um, but of [00:38:00] course not, not always the case. But speaking of cool businesses, so, uh, obviously ubiquitous energy is doing some really, uh, great things to try to, um, enable us to wean ourselves off of our addiction to fossil fuels.

But let me ask you, Susan, are there any other company ideas, and as a VC and somebody who's involved, uh, with a, uh, company like this that's trying to do good in the world, I'm sure you think about and have seen lots of other cool companies and ideas to solve serious problems in the world. Are there any other companies that you would like to see, um, get formed or to advance something that would help solve a problem in the world, whether it's relating to energy or other.

Susan Stone: Well, there are lots of course. Um, you know, I think if selfishly, because we're so focused again on the built environment and on, um, on building materials, I would love to see technology companies sprout up to really help us as people living in [00:39:00] our, and we're. I'll go back. Our with Coronavirus, I think has really highlighted for all of us this aspect of spending more time at home, being more focused on the environment that we're in, because we're forced to spend so much time in our personal environments and I, I would love to see companies sprout up that.

Really make those environments work for us. And some of that is a, you know, in within the framework of renewable energy. Um, what could you do if you had unlimited information about the interior and exterior of every building? How could buildings. Become more autonomous in managing their own responses to the environment.

That is something that's really interesting to me. And I know there are a handful of folks thinking about it and, and you know, starting to tackle that. Um, but, you know, companies focused on really making our buildings work for us. Uh, that is fascinating to me. Um, and I think. [00:40:00] There's been a lot of noise lately.

This is, you know, off the building materials topic, but there's been a lot of noise lately, um, over the last couple of years about social media and you know, some of how the digital media companies are selling us as a product. And I think we've. As a society and a culture, we've fallen into a little bit of a trap where we work for technology.

And so that's a, a problem that I think I would love to see folks solve. And it's not a specific company that I'd like to see founded, but more of an orientation of technology should work for us rather than us working for technology. And when we spend our days posting on social media and sharing our lives, Technology companies that then profit from it, it really feels like the opposite is happening.

And so what, when I think about building new technologies and new products for the built environment, I take that framework with [00:41:00] us. It shouldn't be work to have technology. Make our lives better. And so that's, um, that's really important to me and I would just love to see that brought into the building environment.

Um, we have some technology available to us in, in Smart Home, and that's a, a really, really quickly growing segment. Um, but. To me, there's not enough yet, and I'd love to see that more mainstreamed and just, um, more functionality built into our homes that is obvious and easy and seamless.

Paul Shapiro: Yeah, I'm with you.

I would, I too would love to see that. And I also would very much like to see the robots working for us rather than us working for them. . So , uh, we're good. Our robot

Susan Stone: overlords are not coming for us. Yeah. Yet we won't allow

Paul Shapiro: it. . Yeah, indeed. Um. . And then finally, Susan, uh, you know, you have seen this from both sides of the table, right?

Like you have been a VC investor [00:42:00] in companies and now you are running your own startup as well. Are there any resources that have been helpful to you that you would recommend to others, whether they be books or speeches, or anything else that you've found useful or informational or inspirational that, uh, you wanna recommend to anybody else who wants to also try to use business to do some good in the.

Susan Stone: Yes, absolutely. Um, there is a book that I recommend to almost, I've recommended to almost every c e o in my portfolio, and it was recommended to me by a c e O that I invested with, um, who's, who's become a, a really terrific peer and mentor to me, uh, called Play Bigger. Um, it is, uh, I would say it's.

Blueprint for launching a new category. And a lot of the things that we wanna do to change the world, like introduce transparent solar windows are introducing new categories into the business world. And it's a really different [00:43:00] thing than an incremental improvement on a products that already exists. So I just, I love it as a, a framework.

How to launch a new category, how to, how to form the language around a new category and even how to create a culture within your company that, uh, creates momentum around a new category. So I love play bigger, um, and I would recommend that to anyone and everyone who is thinking about starting a new business.

Um, and then I'd, I'd love. Also recommend an article I read in Fast Company a couple weeks ago, and I will find you the title. It was an interview with the C M O of Electric, I think, and talking about hiring nice people and how to hire nice people. And I think that is something that gets lost frequently when we're thinking about how to scale businesses and how to get your startup off the ground.

[00:44:00] And there's this intense focus on performance, and I would posit that a group. Well connected, well connected to each other, nice people within a culture where we're doing good for each other and for the world is a really, really powerful asset. And so this, uh, this article was not just making that point, but also giving specific interview, um, questions to ask.

When you're doing, you're hiring to really suss. Not cultural fit. The way that, you know, VCs and startup entrepreneurs think about cultural fit is, is this person gonna sit at their desk and, you know, until the middle of the night, but cultural fit? Like, do these people that we're hiring share our ethics, our values, and our morals, that, and, and would they fit into our culture in that respect?

And so I, I think that is really cool and really powerful in building a [00:45:00] company. So, That's, uh, that's something else that I would recommend. And now I'm checking my notes cuz I did write this down. It's called Ask the Questions to find out if you're, if you are hiring a good human. And it was published in Fast Company, I'm gonna say two weeks ago.

And it, I've, I've said it to so many people because we don't talk about that enough. We don't talk about being nice

Paul Shapiro: people enough. Yes, it's a, a great suggestion. We'll certainly include a link to that fast company article, um, in the show notes along with a link to play bigger. Uh, the article came out on, uh, November 13th, 2020, and it was written by a journalist named Andrea Kale.

So, We'll include her article There, it looks good. Ask these questions to find out if you're hiring a good human, not just a smart one. Of course, that presumes that the person asking the questions is also a good human , which you hope, you hope that is the case. Um, not just the person who's being interviewed, but the interviewer as well.

But, uh, Susan Stone, I, well, if they're

Susan Stone: not, they probably don't wanna read that article, Paul. So that's probably the, the [00:46:00]

Paul Shapiro: threshold aggression . Very good, very good. Well, I, I hereby declare you as the host of this show to be a good human. And I'm glad that you are the one who is going to be asking those questions for future hires at Ubiquitous Energy.

And I'm really grateful to you for what you're doing to, again, as I said, try to wean us off of our addiction to fossil fuels, that it couldn't be more urg. More urgent and more pressing, uh, than what you're doing. So thank you so much and I will be rooting for your success and looking forward to putting your soar glass, uh, to work in my house so that I can continue to, uh, read o on my Kindle with, uh, with v with ease and without fossil fuels.

So I appreciate it.

Susan Stone: That sounds wonderful. Thank you so much for having me. And I can't wait to install our glass in your house in Sacramento.

Paul Shapiro: I can't wait. All right. Thanks again, Susan.

Susan Stone: Thanks Paul.

Paul Shapiro: Thanks for listening. We hope you found use in this episode. If so, don't keep [00:47:00] it to yourself. Please leave us a five star rating on iTunes or wherever you get your podcast.

And as always, we hope you will be in the business of doing good.