Alameda, California, United States
Throughout my career I've had the honor and excitement of bringing new technologies from the laboratory to large scale in several industries. Rondo Energy recently secured $22 million in Series A funding from Bill Gates’ climate investment fund, Breakthrough Energy Ventures, and utility-backed investment firm Energy Impact Partners. Rondo is a core climate solution to decarbonize the global economy, making decarbonization not only possible, but profitable, for the world's most challenging sectors. The Rondo Heat Battery provides zero-carbon, low-cost, 24/7 industrial heat to heavy industry. It does this by capturing low-cost renewable electricity, providing on-demand delivery of high-temperature heat in the form of hot air, steam, or hot water. Rondo helps customers lower their operating costs while continuously powering operations with zero-carbon energy.
Energy-intensive industrial processes power our economies and produce our commodities. But the high temperature heat they require is the world’s largest source of CO2 emissions. Rondo Energy has a new, surprisingly simple solution to the critical need for low cost, zero-carbon heat. Intermittent wind and solar power charge the Rondo Heat Battery, which supplies continuous heat to industrial processes making food, fuels, water, metals, chemicals, and cement. The Rondo Heat Battery leverages the plunging costs of wind and solar power to deliver deep emissions reductions and big cost savings - simply, safely, and without process changes.
I work with our industrial partners to transform their energy costs and processes, and develop new markets for solar energy. GlassPoint Solar is the leading provider of solar thermal energy for industry worldwide. I have developed GlassPoint's markets and applications, exploring and working with industry on innovations in processes, technologies, and financial structures to improve their production and economics. We now deliver more than 50% of the world's solar heat for industrial processes. GlassPoint delivers zero-carbon energy for producers of oil, metals and minerals, food, and water. We develop products, projects, strategies, and business and financial structures to meet customer needs.
I joined VenEarth group to explore innovative approaches to reducing CO2. VenEarth's portfolio and interests included biochar, an agricultural technique capable of large-scale carbon sequestration in soils. I worked with stakeholders from farmers to governments to build support for biochar technologies. I also continued focus on the solar industry, and developed a pipeline of breakthrough solar technology companies as investment candidates.
I cofounded Ausra to deliver large-scale solar electricity, using a new solar-to-steam technology which held the potential for significant cost reduction. I brought together capital from Silicon Valley, a technology team from Australia, and a development team from the US electric power industry to create a Solar Independent Power Producer. Ausra became a global leader in the design, manufacture, and development of large-scale solar thermal energy and solar electricity systems, securing contracts to build large-scale projects in the US and abroad. Ausra was acquired by AREVA in 2009, becoming AREVA Solar.
After Pixelworks' acquisition of Equator, I led technology and business development for the Advanced Media Processors group. We delivered high performance flexible platforms for networked digital media systems which powered the world's first IP-TV (Sony) as well as market-leading products by Xerox, Polycom and Samsung in high-speed imaging, videoconferencing, and network media delivery. I identified and developed markets and assembled technology platforms and entry strategies.