Trying to break in to the utilities field? Check out these words of wisdom from energy experts from our latest podcast mini-series, energenius! 

Emek Sadot, CEO of FSIGHT

“It’s really about the combination of two things: You need to have a deep understanding of the market and its pain point, and you need to have the right technology to address the pain point and its perceived value. Once you have that, you can found a startup, build and motivate a team — the whole nine yards. But you need to understand what is really needed, and bring the technology that makes the difference.”

Listen to FSIGHT’s full podcast episode here. 

Chris Law, Founder & CEO of Future Grid

“You have to be a bit crazy. We are in a very big, regulated, and slow-to-move market. You have to have a strong vision for where the market is going, and you have to have a plan that’s going to sustain you for when the market is ready. The trick in energy, since the cycle is so long, is that you need to have an idea that you can sell now, even if that’s not your end-game, in order to make money and sustain you, and then plan for the market to be ready for your product.”

Listen to Future Grid’s full podcast episode here. 

Bert Lutje Berenbroek, Founder & CEO of NET2GRID

“You need a passion to make this place a better world and make sure we are tackling all of the challenges that the energy transition brings us. We are just trying to deliver our piece of the big puzzle that it is. It is all about cooperation. We can do only so much, and you need to interact with many different partner companies, many different customers, many different stakeholders to make this happen. And it takes a lot of creativity, discipline, and flexibility to work together, but in the end, that’s the recipe to success.”

Listen to NET2GRID’s full podcast episode here. 

Oliver van der Mond, Co-Founder & CEO of Lemonbeat

“What is actually necessary is that you can think beyond just energy-related applications. You are using what the energy industry brings to the table, like large networks and a large asset base, but I think what is necessary that you then have the vision or the creativity to think outside of pure energy-related use cases. Let’s say with Amazon, they started with selling books online, but that was not the vision. If they would have just said ‘OK — we are the biggest dealer for books online, and all of the stuff we want to offer our customers has to do with selling books,’ I don’t know if we would have the Amazon Echo today. You need to be courageous and forward-looking enough to think what kind of data you can get out of this.”

Listen to Lemonbeat’s full podcast episode here. 

Florian Kaiser, Co-Founder & CTO of OXYGEN TECHNOLOGIES

“No matter whether it’s in the energy industry or not, the important thing is that you don’t just take it as it is and think you can’t change anything. It’s important to realize that you can make a change and if you try hard, you will get the opportunity to change the status quo. There is a huge transition in the next 15–20 years in the utilities industry, I think it needs more people with IT skills or engineers that will really sit together and imagine the future energy system and how it could work with those millions of devices. And it needs good partners! The energy transition is a huge challenge, and we need to partner and put our forces together.”

Listen to OXYGEN TECHNOLOGIES’ full podcast episode here. 

Michael Waldner, Co-Founder & CEO of Pexapark

“To be open to new things, to be positive-minded and see the glass half-full, and for every problem, to see there will be a solution. Maybe it’s my naive optimism, but that is how I think. You need to stay connected with the market. Be in continuous exchange with other clients and providers. Also, you need to stay up-to-date; there is a lot of cool innovation outside of our company in the market, and you should discuss with these companies what could change in the business. We actually developed an app called :, where all the renewable energy players can get a track record in the market and connect with other like-minded people.”

Listen to Pexapark’s full podcast episode here. 

Mike Goldstein, Co-Founder and Chairman of Raycatch

“Anybody can become an energenius! We have been active in the solar energy for the last ten years, building projects, designing and developing electronics and equipment. But, five years ago, we saw an interesting phenomenon — that even though people had the data, they didn’t know to appreciate the value or the gold they had in their own hands. So, we decided that was our opportunity. This is just one example. We believe that if you pay attention and keep your focus, you’ll find enough opportunities within the growing solar energy, where you can be an expert in the domain that you choose to focus on.”

Listen to Raycatch’s full podcast episode here. 

The most interesting graduate from the latest cycle of SAP.io – the accelerator from SAP Global – is Trendemon. At Trendemon they have created a platform for companies designed to improve their ability to understand and accelerate the impact of their marketing efforts on sales. Trendemon has developed a platform that maps the customer’s journeys, ranks the impact of the company’s various content on business goals and personalizes the content on the site.

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According to Gartner researchers, live commerce is one of the hottest digital selling trends as retailers and even B2B companies engage customers with personalized sales through streaming video. To be clear, these are not yesterday’s social brand ambassadors. TVPage has pioneered this latest trend, offering an AI-based, cloud platform that brings together store associates, approved influencers, and products for the most dynamic online e-commerce machine to date.

“We are at the forefront of social e-commerce, using video to put virtual yet personalized salespeople directly in the online store,” said Allon Caidar, co-founder and CEO at TVPage. “It’s a full cycle marketing engine for customer engagement and online shopping, turning companies into their own social media destination that pops up as people search for products.”

Bustling virtual storefronts

Large retailers and other companies worldwide are using TVPage to replicate the kind of expert selling consumers crave. For example, when a retailer signs up, they gain a virtual storefront for their own sales associates, as well as independent influencers, all of whom serve as social brand ambassadors. Using a mobile app or web browser, these ambassadors keep consumers engaged by uploading videos, photos, and other information about products on the retailer’s website. They use social media to share their content, answer customer questions, and invite interested consumers to special online events.

“Consumers can chat with social brand ambassadors anytime to find out if a product comes in a different color or size,” said Caidar. “Ambassadors might decide to schedule beauty makeovers based on the questions they’ve received, or spotlight gaming releases that reflect breaking trends. Customers can purchase products directly from their videos.”

Companies can set and monitor social ambassador metrics from one dashboard, paying their own employees based on individual performance goals. TVPage also helps its customers find and manage independent influencers, including sourcing and paying freelance social ambassadors.

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