Great to chat with Ameen Saafir, CEO & Co-Founder at Tynt Technologies, Tynt is developing the next generation of smart windows, based on proprietary reversible metal electrodeposition technology! We discussed the fun and challenge of commercializing new technologies, finding the right startup partnerships, how cleantech homes are more comfortable homes, advice on raising capital and more!

https://carbotnic.com/tynt

Download Podcast Here: https://plinkhq.com/i/1518148418

Remember, If you want to support the podcast there are two amazing ways!

  1. Subscribe to the Carbotnic patreon  
  2. Rate 5 stars on Apple

Thanks so much! 

James

The unedited podcast transcript is below

James McWalter

Hello today we’re speaking with Amin Saafir CEO and co-founder at Tynt technologies welcome to podcast I mean great I suppose to start could you tell us a little bit about Tynt technologies.

Ameen Saafir 

Um, thanks James thanks for having me.

Ameen Saafir 

Yeah, so Tynt Technologies we’re making smart windows these are windows that will go in your home push a button and they go from a clear state to a completely dark opaque privacy state. The reason that we’re doing this is essentially to save Energy. You can save up to 30% of your. Energy costs while increasing comfort in your home like.

James McWalter

And I guess what drove the initial decision to start tynt least.

Ameen Saafir 

Yeah, so I guess to get to there I have to tell you a little bit about where I started right? So my background’s a material science I studied that at Stanford with a guy named Mike Mcgee for my master’s degree. We were working on oleds back then I went and worked on oleds for about 8 years and then about ten years ago I started thinking about sustainability and climate and how it can make a bigger impact on the world. A lot of people with my background were going into things like solar batteries and other types of energy storage and I saw smart windows as an opportunity to take everything I learned in. Flat panel displays and how to make them and scale them up and do something that was you know good for the environment. So I joined a company called Kestol they’re now called Hao I spent 8 years there was ultimately our chief engineer responsible for scaling up that technology and about a year and a half ago I got a call from Professor Mcgee my old professor saying hey I’ve got this new technology. We’ve been developing. It’s in the smart windows space. But it’s fundamentally completely different than what you’ve been working on and everything else out there. We help us figure out what to do with this and then you know we spent a couple months going back and forth and. You know I ultimately flew out to boulder from California saw it in person for the first time and was like okay, let’s start this company right? It just was clearly the the leap in technology that’s needed to really bring this technology on this product to the mass market and really have the environmental impact that. You could potentially realize from smart windows.

James McWalter

And in that I guess that basically 10 year time period like how has that technology changed right? What what was the I guess state of the art ten ten years ago compared to what tint is doing today. So.

Ameen Saafir 

Yeah, so but the first company to really hit the market was a company called Vue originally called soladyme they recently they’re not publicly traded and they have a technology that’s based on we call it electrochroic it’s based on 2 oxide materials that when they. Absorb or des absorb lithium. They change colors and so every other smart window company out there today uses some version of that technology whether it’s sage blast what we did at Choestsol and others and the differentiator between those different companies. Is essentially the way that material is applied and the way it’s processed so the advancement that we had at choeststerol was instead of using you know, big vacuum chambers to sputter to deposit these materials. Everything was processed out of solution right? and that was my expert expertise was how to solution process things on. Big piece of glass. So that’s how that wasn’t fit for me and there’s other companies out there now that are doing different processing techniques. But they’re all using these metal oxide films. What tint does is fundamentally different in that we actually have a electrolyte material that’s based on a polymer and there’s metal ions inside. And those metal ions when you apply a voltage to the window. So when you apply charge to the window. It actually creates creates a metal film inside the window on a piece of glass that metal then blocks the light directly and a couple of the fundamental advantages. This technology 1 were able to achieve complete. Total blackout privacy. The other technology only gets down to about 1% transmission in the dark state and the other is that our color is completely neutral just based on the metals that we’ve chosen. So it’s a leap in the technology as opposed to. And evolution in the technology. It’s like comparing oled to lcd. It’s really fundamentally different. Although at the end of the day we’re still all making smart windows.

James McWalter

And and so when you were kind of having those conversations which are now now cofounder you know you’d been at the previous company for 8 years I’ve in my career been out of a company for exactly that amount of time as well. You have all those deep relationships. You know how it all works. You know, taking that leap into you know a startup world. You know that’s quite a. Very early start of world is quite quick to leap and so what was kind of your thought thought process that this is yeah your next kind of step in your career who.

Ameen Saafir 

Yeah, you know I’ve always wanted to start like a hard tech company I’ve started a couple of you know app companies and I started something in college that didn’t go very far but um, you know so it was always a thought that I might do this at some point. Um. Frankly to be totally honest here. I was always a little bit you know afraid of the fundraising part right? It seems very daunting that you have to go out and raise eight and a half million dollars to get something started. Um and and again my first conversations with Mike where I’m absolutely not going to do this man I just spent 8 years scaling up a technology and building a factory and delivering product and you know why would I want to start over and again when I when I saw it it was just it was so compelling. You know that in order to really have the impact on the world that you want have you have to have something people want you have to be able to deliver it. At scale you have to be able to deliver it at low cost and the first time I saw it again having seen all these other technologies. It was like oh man this is it. You know we’ve got to do this regardless of like I might want to go work for Apple and just like collect the paycheck for the next ten years or retire like this is what I have to do and you know we. We we got started I picked up my family and moved from California here to boulder to to make this happen and it was just again such a compelling technology and a way to really achieve the impact that we want to achieve with with smart windows. Yeah.

James McWalter

Yeah, absolutely love that you know taking those kind of big bets when you see that you know massive upside that massive opportunity right? I think is is like so so many founding relationships have been based on that where somebody has made this advance and maybe you know. Want to bring in other skillsets. Yeah, the business side or whatever it may be to kind of figure out those kind of next steps and so you know when you um, you know it’s 1 thing I guess you seeing something very very cool in the lab right? But yeah, typical kind of next step is like some sort of kind of plan for commercialization. Um, what was it that kind of process and thought process like right.

Ameen Saafir 

Right? Yeah, and so there’s 2 parts of that right? There’s the technical side which is getting the the technology from something in the lab to something that can be a product and again I had a lot of experience with that and that was why professor mcgee called me. Ultimately you know. Did it in oleds did it in smart windows and so we felt like bringing me out to the team really helped kind of mitigate that risk right? If anyone’s going to be able to figure out how to do this I felt like I could bring that to the table. The other side of it was you know, do people want this version of the technology and. professor mcgee had done a great job over the four or five years developing this cultivating relationships with different companies in the industry and again a lot of people had the same reaction that I did where they’ve seen everything right because they’re already interested in smart windows and I can’t really name a lot of these companies but they’re well-known companies and. When they saw his technology they’re like oh wow like this is fundamentally different. It’s a game-changer again being able to give the blackout which is really big, especially for residential and some other applications. Um the low cost the easy processibility of it have a neutral color. So. It was clear to me when I came in that while we were starting from scratch. He’d done a great job as a professor of not just pushing the technology but starting you know to to grow some of those roots into the market and make some of those relationships so when I came in you know it’s kind of like the ball is already in the air and I just had to you know dunk it through the hoop right? so. Um, you know meetings already set up with some of these big companies. We had our pick between several to you know, kind of have our first partnership with and he laid a lot of groundwork for that.

James McWalter

And so what? what are those kind of early partners like where is I guess tynts kind of today in terms of distribution.

Ameen Saafir 

Yeah, so we’re you know we’re still early right? We’re still developing the technology. We don’t have a product yet. We have signed ah a joint development agreement with ah with a major player in the industry and along with that a plan to commercialize with them. So we have someone that’s going to help us bring our technology to market and we’re working very closely with them again. This is a you know multi-billion dollar company that has been looking at these technologies for a very long time and and so that’s that’s kind of our first kind of foray into the market is to jointly. Release a product with this company unfortunately can’t share their name today but we’ll be able to do that you know in the coming months here.

James McWalter

Yeah, it’s kind of this i’ talked to a few people who are working on everything from you zero carbon cement to other materials and there’s this kind of decision to be had around kind of self-branding versus you know, relying the distribution of existing kind of partnerships right? So you know vertically integrating to try to.

Ameen Saafir 

And then.

James McWalter

Got all the way to to delivery and and own the relationship with the person literally installing the window you know at the out of somebody’s home or at an office building. Whatever it may be Um, how do you think about? you know the tradeoffs between those different kind of approaches. You know Partnerships licensing versus kind of full vertical integration all the way down to the install cloud.

Ameen Saafir 

Yeah, what I like about the partnership approach especially in windows. So there’s a trust factor here right? So it’s not like you know buying a smart watch or even a cell phone where you know this thing breaks in a year to okay you know you’re out. You know a few hundred bucks you know you’re installing this in your home you expect it to last you know. 2030 years and so going to market with a partner who’s got a trusted name that people recognize I think really helps with that. It. Also it raises the bar for us. We know we’re going to have to meet these requirements that they’ve had for you know, many decades and so there’s a big advantage there we think in terms of the trust factor getting into people’s homes. Um, the the downside of that is that you know obviously you’re you’re sharing margins there. You’re sharing revenue with this other company and so we’ve actually developed a a way to go to market while we start with a partner that helps us get to market and then we branch out on our own when the time is right? and so. Deal is structured to enable us to do that. They’re very supportive in that that you know the first product first product lines will be with them and then the way the market segmented that that will be certainly you know one one product with them and then there’s a different product line that would be a tint product or whatever you know trade name. We come up with between now and then but something that we do. Go to market with and again I think the advantage there is once you’ve built that trust now you can capture more of the value. A big part of again. Why I’m doing this is is the energy management the energy impact and and I firmly believe that that should start with the window if you look at the most efficient way to heat your home. It’s with energy from the sun.

James McWalter

Right.

Ameen Saafir 

And the most efficient way to cool your home is to block out that energy from the sun when you don’t need the light and so you start with the window letting in the right amount of light to heat your home or keep your home cool then you let your thermostat you let your smart vents and you let your lights. Kind of makeup for what’s needed in terms of heating cooling and lighting and so the only way you can really manage that and own that relationship is if you’re delivering that product to the customer right? It’s hard to do that If You’re a component supplier. Um you know through a window company and so ultimately, that’s what we’re looking at doing is we want to help manage energy manage comfort in the home. And do that by selling the product to the customer.

James McWalter

Yeah I guess one thought that comes to mind is you know the toad addressable market. It’s like everything we do to cover our windows today right? like you know shutters blinds you know all these different things are because we don’t have ah like an easier off- the-shellf way to have that you know ability to kind of adjust the light that comes in in and a. Windows. You know, yeah and want to think about like windows themselves and like you know the the kind of evolution. You know we had single paned glass. We. We started having um you know double pain. Maybe a few decades ago now we’re kind of triple glazed etc. Um I guess why has there been like so. Little I guess innovation in the last hundred years and and you know this is like the first I guess big leap forward since you know double glazing right.

Ameen Saafir 

Yeah, um, that’s that’s a good question and it’s a great opportunity for us and I think it really comes down to like selling windows is a really good business right? You know there’s five hundred Million Square feet of of windows or 130000000

James McWalter

The great.

Ameen Saafir 

Windows that get sold every year between the us and europe and it’s a great business and people don’t expect innovation from their window right? They really just want to be able to see outside energy efficiencies only really become important residentially in the last decade or so and people still don’t want to pay too much for it. So a lot of the innovation that you’re seeing today. Even you know you mentioned triple glazing there’s vacuum insulated glass. You now have this transparent solar it really is towards increasing energy efficiency and and we’re in that that game too. But we think the comfort aspect of light management really sets us apart there. But yeah, a lot of these companies. Also that dominate this space are they’re very big and they’re very conservative and they’re happy with where they are right? and so a lot of the conversations we have are you know this is a great technology but it might cannibalize some other solution we have out there right? And so. There’s sort of the innovators dilemma there right? where it’s just it’s been slow. The market hasn’t really asked for it. People don’t really know what’s possible. You know if you look at science fiction though you look at I mean go back to kimmer. It was the first or second ironman where you know they wake up on the overlooking the the coast in Malibu and the the windows are dark and then they you know. Jarvis ah clears the window. So the sun comes in and you got the news like that’s the future right? But someone’s got to actually do that and it’s not coming from. You know the window companies. It’s going to come from either startups like us or maybe other technology companies you know display companies and things like that.

James McWalter

Yeah I think in general people working on these kind of large scale replacements of the existing built and built world have done a we’ve collected. We’ve done a bad job of describing how much better that future could potentially be right? You know I’ve this kind of line that like you know often we say it’s It’s basically now but a few more solar panels on the roof.

Ameen Saafir 

With.

James McWalter

But it’s like no like a electrified home is just like genuinely just like a massive advancement over what we’ve had before you know when you have like you know, passive home heating when you have you know electrified kitchen when you have like yeah like what tint is building. You actually have a lifestyle that is just categorically better than what we have today and I think you know we. People working on these projects working on these products need to do a you know a collective better job of like just showing how much better that life is. It’s not just sustainability is important but it’s actually just the lifestyle is also dramatically better as well.

Ameen Saafir 

Yeah, it is about you know for us. The mission is about sustainability but the value add to the customer is about making your life better making your life more comfortable right? and having that right amount of light come in when you need it and you know never having glare. You know, always having lots of natural light. You think about people that. Build these homes with big windows and then they put window treatments over him and they just leave them closed because it’s just too much effort to go and and and open them every day right? because they’re going to get glare at six thirty and so they just leave it closed and so actually enjoying your home enjoying your view and and and having comfort we think is a big. You know a selling point to to homeowners.

James McWalter

Yeah, and just on the kind of full blackout is and like that alone honest like it’s very exciting to Me. You know my wife um has a you know strong positive obsession with like sleep hygiene that now has kind of hit me and so you know if we do not have complete blackout lines where we’re staying like we have our eye masks and all that kind of thing. And it genuinely had on like a massive improvement in you know health and well-being and you know you think about so many times you’ll say in a hotel health doess are usually all right? but like Airbnbs Etc. We’re just like a very very faint. You know sheet basically over over a window and you know you have a street lamp right outside and you’re basically you know trying to fall asleep in like.

Ameen Saafir 

Huge.

James McWalter

Bright Light and just it’s very difficult to do so and so the ability to add a but you know at a click just eliminate that as as a problem I think is massive. Yeah.

Ameen Saafir 

Yeah I mean you look at the other side of that right? which is naturally waking up with the sun instead of an alarm clock. So your alarm can now be letting the sunlight come into your room right? You can set it to. Clear the windows at six thirty in the morning if that’s what you want, but that’s the best way you know from a health and wellness standpoint to wake up and and really as you said you know regulating regulating that circadian rhythm and health that’s another big point that we think will willll be attractive for for homeowners.

James McWalter

Yeah I literally have a lamp right over there if I saw my bed that is a light lamp to wake up in the morning for that Very reason. Um because we don’t have that other yeah tint is not available for for where we are yet. Um, and I guess you know in terms of the like obviously tint is like this premiere product that is doing like things and. Nothing else is doing.. How do you think about the kind of the production side from a expense point of View. You know you can obviously charge premieer you know premium prices. Um, but you know also you want to kind of get to scale and how do you think about that balance.

Ameen Saafir 

Yeah, um, and and again one of the things that I learned in my previous role is people are willing to spend a lot for these features right? and so we we could charge a ton of money for this, you know, kind of like you know putting a Tv in your wall if if we wanted to do that. But again ultimately with the target towards. Impact and sustainability. You’ve got to get the cost down to a point where everyone can afford this and that’s really the ultimate goal is we want to be you know, competitive with if you look at your your average window that you go buy from you know home depo lows or from your contractor. Add some decent window treatments and then a slight premium on top of that. And that premium that you pay you’re going to get back an energy savings right? So long term we really want this to cost about the same as a window plus window treatments and again one of the things that attracted to me to this version of the technology is that it really is a very simple technology. It’s very low cost to manufacture. It’s um, about an order of magnitude cheaper than anything else out there in terms of the manufacturing projected manufacturing cost. So it’s it. Yeah.

James McWalter

Yeah, and what about I guess you know combining it with other types of you know windows. So like we we mentioned you know double glazing etc. Um, you know and and and these other kind of types of technology from.

Ameen Saafir 

This.

James McWalter

You know to additional kind of heating attributes and so on is is it possible to kind of you know, mix and match those different attributes.

Ameen Saafir 

Yeah, absolutely you know we we can absolutely combine this with double and triple glazing. There’s some other technologies that are coming out or in development like I mentioned vacuum insulated glass and we have Aero Gelels and we’re also looking at like how we might be able to combine with those technologies. For us if I think about the ultimate window. It is something that darkens and and and enlightens dynamically but also has very very high insulation. So taking our you know what’s what’s special bot tint and then combining that with something like a vacuum insulated glass a triple glazing. An arrow gelel and then you get the ability to now change the way we design homes and give people what I think they ultimately want which is lots and lots of glass right? You want to have this you know, expansive views but not have to take an energy hit for it right? and not have too much light in your home when you don’t want it and. And we’ve got some other ideas about you know you could your whole roof could be glass and you know you could start start star gazes at night and then when the sun comes up you can darken it and have that insulation that you need so absolutely looking at how we can combine with these other energy saving technologies to create like the ultimate window for the home.

James McWalter

And then in terms of let’s say you know if you’re trying to get tint to every you know every let’s say every window in the United States every window in the world right? takes takes a while and then that’s yeah, ah, this wonderful kind of big big challenge and when I was looking at a bit of research and department energy mentioned that dynamic windows. Ah, you have the potential to reduce us greenhouse gases by up to 4% Annually which seemed very very high. Um, you know, relative to me kind of going in and you know at first glance, um, but a lot of the problem when we’re trying to kind of replace these elements of the home is that these things last a long time as you mentioned you know like your windows should last you know I guess five 1015 years about depending on where you are and so somebody just installed. You know, regular windows yesterday they may not be a potential customer for for quite a while. Um, how do you think about you know ways or levers that could be used to kind of accelerate the replacement cycle of you know, traditional windows with technologies like yours.

Ameen Saafir 

Yeah I think you got 2 routes there 1 is through you know legislation right? Credits things like that just like we did for solar and we do for evs that could be a potential route but ultimately in terms of things that we can control. Um, it’s developing a solution that would be an aftermarket retrofit type of solution that would get added on to an existing window and so again, what’s really exciting about this technology. Another thing is that you know it’s it’s a low temperature process. We can make these devices on plastic films and ultimately you know, deliver something that looks like getting your car window stinted. But getting your house windows tinted and then having them be electrified right? So the the challenge with that part is that the energy savings isn’t quite as great as replacing the window but the comfort aspect and all of all of those value propositions that the homeowner wants you can still achieve that we’re still. Um, trying to figure out the best way to deliver better energy savings in ah, a aftermarket retrofit solution. But that’s certainly something we think about a lot right? If you think about again those you know one ah 20000000 windows sold every year between us and Europe there’s 10000000000 existing windows.

James McWalter

Right.

Ameen Saafir 

Right? And if you can figure out how to access that then that’s an enormous opportunity right? So yeah, we’re we’re thinking about that. That’s a little bit down the line. Um, but there there are ways to get us there.

James McWalter

And yeah I really like having those 2 tracks because obviously it’s great when you know policy or credits or whatever it may be gives you that you know tailwind for your business. But I think often in in climate tech or companies working on these kind of sustainable solutions are sometimes overdpendent on that and I think where you can you know be the owners for your own destiny and like.

Ameen Saafir 

Right.

James McWalter

Develop a product that fits the world as it is not the world that you know hopefully a lobbyist will will sort out in 2 years um I think you know is incredibly kind of powerful and I guess you know it sounds like we’re mostly talking about the residential side. How do you think about residential versus commercial and you know how those products might compare to.

Ameen Saafir 

Yeah I get that question a lot. Um, so I think a lot of people may be surprised to know that the volume of glass going into residential and the volume of glass going in commercial in the us at least on a yearly basis are nearly identical. It’s about five hundred Million Square feet of glass going into both. Um. So from an overall opportunity I think they’re they’re they’re equal in size. What I’ve seen again in in my own experience here is that the commercial market is really challenging to sell into for a number of reasons one. They’re very cost consciouscious right? So if you look at a lot of. Projects that have been done today. They’ve been done for Let’s just say much less than the company selling the glass would like to sell it for for for smart windows um two you have a lot of stakeholders involved in a commercial project. You’ve got someone financing it. You’ve got someone who’s a developer you’ve got your general contract. You’ve got your property manager. You’ve got the person who’s actually going to end up occupying the building and you’ve got to get all these people to sign off on spending a little bit of extra money to get this this technology into the building and then finally probably the most challenging for a startup like us is that to get into a good project with the types of revenue and margins that you want. You really got to be about 3 to 4 years ahead of when the building gets built when you’re in the planning and the budgeting stage right? So it’s a very very long sales cycle or you get stuck coming in in the last six to twelve months and then it’s basically whatever we can afford for this technology. So if I contrast that to to residential again. Um. Similar amounts of glass being delivered. You’ve got to just convince the homeowner. Ultimately, right to to put this technology and there is certainly you know an an early adopter part of the curve that’s willing to spend a lot more to kind of help you get your technology. Scaled up and mature enough and to get the cost out and and hit the rest of the market and then the sales cycle could be much shorter. This can be something that is a decision you make today and within three weeks you’ve got the windows and they’re going into your house so all of those things we think are more compelling about residential and then the final anecdote I’ll share. Is I’ve been working on some manner of smart windows for 10 years whenever people ask me, you know what? I do for a living and I tell them what I do a hundred percent of the response 100% of the time is when can I get that in my house. No one ever says.

James McWalter

So right.

Ameen Saafir 

That would be really cool in my office or it would be really nice to see that in the airport or the hospital. It’s like when can I get that in my house and maybe 10% of the people say when can I get that in my car because that’s kind of a cool idea as well and we’re thinking about that for for evs. There’s another way to help save in terms of range and cooling and things like that. But. But people want this type of technology in their home and I believe that tint is the first thing that people will see that they’ll be willing to spend money on a put in their home.

James McWalter

Yeah I think yeah, that makes a ton of sense. You know when I think about like commercial buildings. The people who have to actually operate within the building. It’s just different to the people building the building right? and so you know you have basically the owner and the operator are are different like that the owner intended are different. The home. It’s like I’m going to live in it I have to experience this every day you know for multiple decades potentially and so you know you you really care and often it’s a lot of the reason why a lot of people trying to you know disrupt homebuiling struggle because there’s you know so much. Ah.

Ameen Saafir 

Right.

James McWalter

You know customization that occurs at various parts right? But I guess when you’re you’re dealing with like a specific surface you’ specific material that is kind of open to like infinite customization like glass you can actually like adapt within the existing kind of home building structure in a way that still has that like high level of impact. So.

Ameen Saafir 

That’s right, Yeah, it’s important to us to be able to as you said operate within that existing structure and deliver a product that doesn’t need for example, special wiring or you know a high voltage electricity to come out but it’s something that can just be installed in the same opening as a regular window. And be self-powered and that’s something that we’re working on as Well. So be something to be very easy to install whether it’s in a new building or again to replace your existing windows. It’s very important if you’re going to access that that residential market.

James McWalter

So and I guess like people have become very used to you know voice automated assistance like Siri and alexa to say you know turn on music and so on and and people have started kind of fitting out you know, lower the blinds and and these other kind of elements. Um is that like a eventual plan as well. So you have that kind of connected to that automated home. So.

Ameen Saafir 

Yeah, absolutely I think you have to have that we just got asked that question by someone yesterday and it’s like is it going to be a light switch. Is it going to be. You know an app is it going to be Alexa and I said yes, it’s going to be all of those things that it has to be all of those things right? So you hit that.

James McWalter

Everything.

Ameen Saafir 

And on the head you got to deliver that type of functionality people are going to expect that.

James McWalter

And you recently raised some capital. Um, what? what are you? you know I think you mentioned earlier 8000000 or so so what? what is the kind of plan for the deployment of that capital.

Ameen Saafir 

Yeah, so that that money is going directly towards building our first prototype window and we’re doing that in conjunction with this mysterious partner that we talked about and so yeah, but so everything has gone towards we have a new facility here in boulder.

James McWalter

Church.

Ameen Saafir 

Um, we’ve got 12 people on the team now and everyone is just working towards scaling up the technology from you know, something in the lab that was about a four inch size to something that’ll look more like ah about a two foot size window to really demonstrate what this might look like at scale. Some of the challenges with integrating not just our device but integrating as you you mentioned into that dual pane. We call igu and into the window and so it’s it’s making that leap from a cool technology in the lab to a product prototype and then that next round of funding within finance. Getting that thing to market scaling you know building the factory scaling it up and starting to sell product.

James McWalter

And and when you were kind of building out your team like who are you know what are the kinds of people that you’re kind of looking to to kind of add that value at this stage of the company. Yeah.

Ameen Saafir 

Yeah I really I really put a lot of emphasis on all all manners of diversity in the team and so there’s there’s kind of the obvious stuff in terms of you know, ethnic and and gender diversity but also in terms of the academic background and some of the professional background. So. You know if you’re to look at our team and look at the the list of degrees. You know you don’t have more than maybe 2 people with the same degree and the same background and I found in my career that that really helps with diverse perspectives when it comes to solving some of these technical problems right? You’ve got someone with a. Ah, biology background and someone with a chemical engineering background and an electrical engineering background and you know if you get all those people in a room. Someone’s going to have the perspective to help you figure out the best way to get through. You know, whatever challenge this is and you know I’ve seen teams built where you’ve got you know 5 or 6 people who all. Have the same degree and we’re all from the same research group and things like that and it’s like well you you all are trained the same and you’re all going to think about problems the same way and so I feel like you you get much better results and you’ve got a little bit more diversity different perspectives across the table. So if you look across our team I think you’ll see you’ll see all of that. Um, and we’re really proud of the the team that we’ve built so far.

James McWalter

Yeah I love that kind of concept. So yeah I come from a liberal Arts background Philosophy Ph D track type thing and I love being in technical spaces and a lot of the the kind of concepts that we would cover in like logic of philosophy and like even like you know doing analysis on English Texts and all this kind of thing.

Ameen Saafir 

Um, first.

James McWalter

Surprising a number of that will come up not directly but indirectly in conversations when you’re trying to you know plan and a sprint or whatever it may be and like having that kind of cross-pollination of approaches I think can really Add. Um and you know and I’m always learning as well, right? You know when people are coming from a very specific you know Cs or you know machine learning background or whatever it may be.. It’s absolutely Fascinating. Kind of also he see how their brains Function. So um, and then I guess you know as part of that kind of raising that funding. You know you’re out there pitching you said earlier that you’re a little bit. Yeah, maybe I don’t want to start a startup because the the pitching side is something that you you.

Ameen Saafir 

Yeah, absolutely it is fascinating.

Ameen Saafir 

It’s scary.

James McWalter

Yeah, it’s scary and so yeah, what would that process like um and yeah, any any I guess advice I’m actually right now I’m raising funding for something else right now. So I’m like deep in it myself and so yeah I’d love to hear your kind of process and any advice you might have.

Ameen Saafir 

Yeah, getting through the other side man I think um, it’s like any big hard scary thing you do in life. You just got to take the first step you know and I think and also you’ve got to really want to do it. You know because it’s hard. It’s it’s really hard. It’s exhausting. It’s going to take longer than you like. Um, it just is and everyone will tell you that no matter how quick it’s seemed on the outside like it’s exhausting and so you know it was it was taking that first step and for us that was um, talking to people that I knew and just getting their feedback on like is this something that I should be doing with the next you know 101520 years of my life. Um, and then as we started talking more and more you know those same people were like well if you’re going to raise the money I’d like to participate you know and so started with the angel investors and um, you know a couple really good friends of mine wrote some really nice checks I got to say that I’m very fortunate to have friends. Ah, that I do to help me get started and another mentor of mine. She was also very instrumental and you know helping us kind of craft the story put in a little bit of money and and and move it forward and so um, as you start talking to the friends and family and then they start introducing you to people and you just start doing it more. Start getting more and more comfortable with you know the version of the story that you’re going to tell and who you are and what you’re going to put forward and start getting that momentum and it just over the course of you know four or five six months we just started getting more and more and then by the time it came to talk to venture capitalists. It wasn’t so scary anymore.

James McWalter

Right.

Ameen Saafir 

It was like look. We’ve already got um you know one and a half million dollars in commitments from angel investors you know from all over the place and we know we’ve got something here and so then it was just about being you know, true to who we are and um, and and who I am and what we’re trying to do and so. Yeah, that that whole process though it it took a good Let’s see it was about eight months from the time we had our first conversation until we closed that seed round and again it was a very successful round for what we were trying to do but it was it was ah it was a lot it was eight months right smack dab in the middle of the pandemic.

James McWalter

It rides.

Ameen Saafir 

Think that was an additional challenge. You think about the product we have right? No one could see our product right? I couldn’t bring people to a lab and show them and and ultimately the the 2 lead investors we got did take that trip. Um, you know before they before they signed the term sheet and and came to see us but they were the only two people that came to see us and they got very deep in the process and. And I can’t help but wonder you know what that might have been like if we were able to do a more typical roadshow and bring our technology around and let people you know touch it and hold it. But in any case I would say um you know to people that are thinking about taking that journey. It’s a lot of hard work. Um. But if you’re passionate about it just go for it. You know, put one foot in front of the other get some good advisors around you that can really tell it to you like it is right? give you good feedback and and help you get moving but you got to get that first one 2 3 people to believe in you and and put there. Their their name on the dot of line on the check and and then go from there once you get those first 2 or 3 and then gets a lot easier everyone after that.

James McWalter

Yeah, and I would add to that expect a hundred noses to 200 noses to 300 nos it’s just you know it’s the nature and a lot of lot lot lot of the Nos are just being no responses. You know it’s just the nature of the space.

Ameen Saafir 

Oh yeah for sure. Yeah, yeah, I think we pitched. Um we we pitched 65 people I think half of those were angels. We pitched about 35 vc funds and got yeses out of 3 of them. So we we did really well is as hard as those 30 something nos were you know we did really well. But yeah, you get used to hearing no in 32 Nos and 32 different ways right? and again not to mention all the people that never even returned the email or the call or anything those are only. The ones we actually got in the front door of right? So there’s probably another and I know lost track of how many people we reached out to that just you know weren’t interested in taking a call. So.

James McWalter

Yeah, and that’s such an interesting point on covid. Um, yeah, my my general kind of bias because most of what I’ve ever worked on has been like software and database was that you know covid is actually this was this fascinating time to raise money and it was like this great leveler and so people I knew all around the world who wouldn’t typically have access to you know. Silicon Valley like investors was like oh everybody’s just the other end of ah like a Zoom call or whatever it may be but absolutely if you have any sort of hardware and like you know, especially if they are kind of familiar with the kind of status quo you know, overly ah poorly colored glass like alternatives and and all this kind of thing being able to show them that you know. What you have sitting in in the lab is like so powerful and I think it’s also similar to some of the other companies you’ve talked. We’ve talked to you know materials companies working on you know, algae replacements for plastics and so on like you really want to say show them. It’s like oh this feels the same as.

Ameen Saafir 

Right.

James McWalter

Plastic coming in your box today. But it’s made of algae and like is not going to have that same negative effect on the planet or whatever it may be so.

Ameen Saafir 

Yeah,, that’s right and I think again ultimately the people that are interested enough. They’ll they’ll they’ll go make that trip right? and and they’ll figure it out but you know you can’t help but wonder if there was someone who was maybe on the fence if they had sought and they really got it. You know immediately as opposed to like trying to imagine it through slides. But. Anyway, we’re happy with where we are um and you know we’ll see what happens with the next round and hopefully we can do a little bit more traveling but let’s see what happens when the time comes.

James McWalter

Yeah, and and I was looking in your background. Um, you’re involved in you know a bo as advisoror or kind of with a couple different organizations like 12 and silicon climate and so on ah, can you tell us a bit about that and I guess your kind of general review on this is a you know community trying to solve problems and and ways we can potentially improve it.

Ameen Saafir 

Yeah, so silicon climate is interesting. This was a couple of my buddies from Stanford and you know we started this and ultimately I think we were too early and so our thesis was basically that there’s lots of entrepreneurs out there that are trying to.

James McWalter

Ah roll. Okay.

Ameen Saafir 

Fight climate change. There’s a lot of people out there with money and they can’t find each other right and so we kind of wanted to sit in the middle and and make those connections happen and we found that to be challenging and again we started this I think about six years ago what we ended up actually doing was turning into sort of a nonprofit accelerator and so we just served as advisors for these companies that would apply 12 was one of them. That’s how we met them and so we would help them. You know with go-to-market strategies fundraising strategies building out their team. All the typical things you’d get from an accelerator. Um, but you know we we couldn’t give them any money because we didn’t have a bunch of money but we spent a lot of time with them and so myself and kind of my my very close friends. We’ve been really passionate about this problem for a while and now we fast forward 6 years it’s great to see so much money and energy. Going into solving this problem and I think the the rest of the world has finally caught up to what we’ve seen which is that this is ah this is the biggest problem of our generation and our smartest people need to be working on these problems and they are going to need the funding to do that to get us out of this mess right? And so. That’s all that all started most of those advisor ships that I’ve done were through silicon climate. So they’re all as you see they’re they’re mostly people that were trying to you know 12 there was nanohydrophobics in there. It’s company called suntap in there that are you know, just trying to improve the world through their own innovations.

James McWalter

I and I guess if you know let’s say I’m somebody who looks at your career and I’m say okay that that seems pretty cool I’d I’d love to kind of get to where I mean is today. Um, any advice you’d give to that person starting out you know, maybe they’re coming out of high school. Maybe they’re coming out ah of college.

Ameen Saafir 

Um, wow um I think the thing that I did that I’m very um, proud of looking back is I wasn’t afraid to take risks and I think that’s the case if you want to be successful on anything right is like you got to be you got to be willing to take risk and I look at like. You know, leaving the south side of Chicago to go to California you know at 17 and go to college that was a big one you know and um and then my first job after grad school I went to South Korea and I worked for samsulung for 2 years you know and um and I you know I went to Santa Barbara and I worked for Dupont and. Couldve stayed there forever. You know it was. It was a great job with with good salary and then it was like no I want to do something bigger. Um, and then I moved to the bay area and started this a ipad thing and then came back and and worked for cannestro and now you know moving again here to Colorado and start tint and I think all of the successes that I’ve had has really been about. You know, not being afraid of the risk part of it and we talked about this a few minutes ago overcoming that fear around fundraising that was the big risk to me but like you just have to do it and and move forward and you know not be afraid to take a different path right? A lot of not a lot of people. Come out of grad school and go straight overseas to work for you know, a big korean electronics company. Um, and so I think you know doing those things that set you apart a little bit make you appear unique on paper and my reality of meeting people is those people tend to be pretty unique, right? The people that I met. Overseas are some of the most interesting people I know you know to this day. So I think you know not being afraid to take risk and really just follow your passion.

James McWalter

Yeah I completely echo that you know if I look up back at my career and similar jumping around to to what you defined across multiple countries and so on and I still think I didn’t take enough risks right? You know like I still spent multiple years in some companies and had a great old time. But um, you know I’m only my of late thirty s now and. Look back at like yeah, could it could ah could have been even riskier and so it’s definitely what I tell 50 people in their twenty s who I’m kind of you know mentoring or or giving advice to is like you know,? whatever you want to do um like you know you got to try to create some opportunities for yourself and the only way to do that is like take a chance and it might not work out. But. You know you’re young, you’ve got lots of you got lots of bites to cherry right? when you’re you know in your mid 20 s so.

Ameen Saafir 

That’s right, you’re so on. That’s right, right? So my I was I was going I like telling a story when I was trying to decide do I go to Korea and work for Samsung or do I go work for am b and Sunnyvale right? and. Ultimately, it came down to I like to tell stories you know at parties and things like that I’m like man I’m going to have so many great stories that start with oh this one time when I was in Korea and like that was the thing that got me on that plane you know it’s like all right this is going to be this unique interesting experience that I’ll stay with me for the rest of my life and.

Ameen Saafir 

Probably be good for my career and all those things were true. So yeah, you got you got to take that risk whenever it might be doesn’t mean moving over you know, halfway around the world but taking risk I think is is the way to um, achieve the most that you can to realize your your biggest potential.

James McWalter

But I mean it’s been great, Really enjoyed the conversation. Um, is there anything I should have asked you about but did not.

Ameen Saafir 

Ah let’s see. Um I think you probably could have asked about you know what? we plan to do next in terms of fundraising. So I know we just closed ah around in August but we’re already we’re making so much progress right now both on the commercial side and the technical side that we’re going to be. Looking to kick off our series a rays in and the next couple of months here. We’re still buttoning a couple things up, but that’s gonna be the next big thing that we’re working on this year so definitely looking forward to taking that next step and you know putting myself out there all over again and trying to get us capitalized move forward.

James McWalter

Okay.

James McWalter

And maybe a bit of a road show this time now that you know thankfully.

Ameen Saafir 

I certainly hope so man I certainly we were talking about that this morning you know we’ve got some great demos planned here for people to come by and see us and so we’ll be announcing that relatively soon. But thanks James thanks for for having me this has been fantastic.

James McWalter

Thank you

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *