The two founders of the clean energy startup Geo2 Technologies came to our DLEO class. GEO2 was founded by Bilal Zuberi, who has a PhD from MIT and spent later some time with BCG (I also had dinner next to him about 2 months ago) and by Rob Lachenauer, HBS graduate, who was previously a partner at BCG where he spent 17 years. They both met at BCG. Geo2, which provides the technology to reduce the polluting exhaust produced by automobiles, was founded in 2004 and raised $10M last year in its third round of funding.
GEO2 has an enabling technology with applications in many industries. One piece of recommendation they gave is that every week, somebody would open a door saying "you can use your technology in this market" but if you followed all recommendations you would get lost. You need to stay focused.
When they were asked what kind of people you need in a startup they mentioned:
- Good people: but not necessarily deep expertise into one topic because you need multipurpose people
- Risk takers, for whom compensation is different (and they understand it)
- Doers, not advisors close to retirement
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