Latest / Deep Tech Germany – AI, Robotics & Frontier Innovation by Startuprad.io™ / Cleantech Hardware: AQON PURE's Salt-Free Water Softening
Transcript
- WEBVTT 1 00:00:00.160 --> 00:00:03.960 What if I told you there's a German greentech startup 2 00:00:03.960 --> 00:00:07.680 that's disrupting a hundred year old water treatment industry, 3 00:00:08.240 --> 00:00:11.760 growing triple digits every year and has 4 00:00:11.840 --> 00:00:15.400 even caught the attention of Arnold Schwarzenegger? Today 5 00:00:15.400 --> 00:00:19.200 we're diving into the story of Akwan Poor, the 6 00:00:19.200 --> 00:00:23.000 salt free water softener that's saving energy, protecting 7 00:00:23.000 --> 00:00:26.800 the environment and scaling fast across Europe. If you care 8 00:00:26.800 --> 00:00:30.170 about sustainability, cleantech hardware and and startup growth 9 00:00:30.330 --> 00:00:33.850 strategies, this episode will change the way you think about 10 00:00:33.850 --> 00:00:37.090 water and how startups can dominate overlooked 11 00:00:37.090 --> 00:00:37.770 markets. 12 00:00:43.610 --> 00:00:46.650 Welcome to startup Rad IO, 13 00:00:47.210 --> 00:00:50.810 your podcast and YouTube blog covering the German 14 00:00:50.810 --> 00:00:54.410 startup scene with news, interviews and 15 00:00:54.410 --> 00:00:55.090 live events. 16 00:00:59.480 --> 00:01:03.120 Hello and welcome everybody. Welcome back to Startup Rate IO, your 17 00:01:03.120 --> 00:01:06.680 deep dive podcast into the world of startups and technology. 18 00:01:07.240 --> 00:01:10.520 Today we're talking about a startup that is shaking up 19 00:01:10.760 --> 00:01:14.600 an overlooked yet vital sector. Water treatment and 20 00:01:14.600 --> 00:01:18.360 clean technology. My guest is Maximilian Wilk. 21 00:01:18.360 --> 00:01:21.720 Hey, welcome. Thank you very much for your invitation, Jan. 22 00:01:22.510 --> 00:01:26.270 My pleasure. You are the co founder and COO of Akwanpur, 23 00:01:26.510 --> 00:01:29.630 one of Europe's fastest growing green tech startups. 24 00:01:29.630 --> 00:01:32.990 Akwanpur's salt free water treatment systems 25 00:01:33.230 --> 00:01:36.830 are helping thousands of households and businesses to 26 00:01:36.830 --> 00:01:40.510 reduce lime scale, cut energy costs and protect the environment. 27 00:01:40.990 --> 00:01:44.670 All while scaling triple digit revenue growth in a legacy 28 00:01:44.750 --> 00:01:48.470 industry. We'll unpack how Maximilian and his brother turned 29 00:01:48.470 --> 00:01:52.230 their family business roots into a sustainable hardware 30 00:01:52.230 --> 00:01:55.850 startup, how they caught the the mention of Arnold Schwarzenegger himself, 31 00:01:55.850 --> 00:01:59.370 and why water might be the next big clean 32 00:01:59.370 --> 00:02:03.170 tech frontier after energy. This is going to be an inspiring 33 00:02:03.170 --> 00:02:07.010 one for founders, investors and anyone passionate about sustainability 34 00:02:07.010 --> 00:02:10.610 and disruption. Maximilian, let us 35 00:02:10.610 --> 00:02:13.210 dive in with some core questions. 36 00:02:15.530 --> 00:02:19.130 You guys. Aquapor are actually family business that 37 00:02:19.130 --> 00:02:22.960 turned into green tech startup. You co founded Akron Poor 38 00:02:22.960 --> 00:02:26.640 with the Fadas water solutions company. Can you walk us 39 00:02:26.640 --> 00:02:29.800 through that transition from like a family owned 40 00:02:29.960 --> 00:02:33.520 industrial supplier to a hardware startup tackling household 41 00:02:33.520 --> 00:02:36.120 water treatment? Sure. 42 00:02:37.239 --> 00:02:40.840 So we actually have gone through a very 43 00:02:40.840 --> 00:02:44.280 different story compared to many other startups. As you said, we are 44 00:02:44.680 --> 00:02:47.720 not a freshly founded startup from scratch. 45 00:02:48.280 --> 00:02:51.830 We took our father's business and 46 00:02:52.150 --> 00:02:55.750 transformed it in some kind of a startup or we call it 47 00:02:56.070 --> 00:02:59.790 the family startup. The reason behind our history is 48 00:02:59.790 --> 00:03:03.310 that our father already started many, many years ago, before 49 00:03:03.310 --> 00:03:07.110 aconpure to work in the water treatment industry. So he had a 50 00:03:07.110 --> 00:03:10.750 very, very deep and broad knowledge about different branches, 51 00:03:10.750 --> 00:03:13.350 about different technologies and 52 00:03:14.230 --> 00:03:17.110 what's the need in different sectors. 53 00:03:18.800 --> 00:03:22.200 So the thing was back then in 54 00:03:22.200 --> 00:03:25.920 2016 or 2017, he was, as you said, focusing on 55 00:03:25.920 --> 00:03:29.600 industrial solutions. He was cleaning water 56 00:03:29.680 --> 00:03:33.200 in the metal industry, for example, 57 00:03:33.840 --> 00:03:37.320 cleaning washing processes, cleaning the Water of 58 00:03:37.320 --> 00:03:39.920 washing processes and trying to 59 00:03:40.880 --> 00:03:44.560 regain the washing detergents, for example, or 60 00:03:44.560 --> 00:03:48.000 save oil and fats from waters and 61 00:03:48.960 --> 00:03:52.060 put it back into the different processes and try to 62 00:03:53.420 --> 00:03:57.220 clean the wastewater as much as possible. That 63 00:03:57.220 --> 00:04:01.020 you have a very, very low level of substances 64 00:04:01.180 --> 00:04:04.860 in your wastewater. And limescale 65 00:04:04.860 --> 00:04:08.540 always has been, let's say, a 66 00:04:08.540 --> 00:04:12.180 very, very tiny part of these different technologies, 67 00:04:12.180 --> 00:04:15.900 of these industrial water treatment technologies. But it was 68 00:04:16.790 --> 00:04:18.230 an important part. And 69 00:04:21.270 --> 00:04:24.950 I think we saw the chance in 2017 70 00:04:25.350 --> 00:04:28.950 when we said together with our father that we can actually 71 00:04:29.190 --> 00:04:32.630 use his knowledge instead of just founding a company 72 00:04:32.870 --> 00:04:36.590 from scratch. So we 73 00:04:36.590 --> 00:04:39.670 tried to convince him that our 74 00:04:40.470 --> 00:04:44.230 solution to focus on private households 75 00:04:44.630 --> 00:04:48.270 is a more suitable solution for my brother 76 00:04:48.270 --> 00:04:51.870 and me because we have to lead the company in the 77 00:04:51.870 --> 00:04:55.670 future. Our father was already, I think he was 65 78 00:04:55.670 --> 00:04:58.669 years old during that time. So he was looking into 79 00:04:58.669 --> 00:05:02.470 retirement and he was, yeah, 80 00:05:02.550 --> 00:05:05.430 he already knew that he couldn't do this forever. 81 00:05:06.150 --> 00:05:09.510 So my brother and me were convincing him, okay, we 82 00:05:09.920 --> 00:05:12.640 actually, we would do it, we would like to do it a bit different. 83 00:05:13.440 --> 00:05:17.240 And the problem was to shift a 84 00:05:17.240 --> 00:05:20.760 small family business which is focusing on just 85 00:05:20.760 --> 00:05:22.640 a hand of customers, 86 00:05:24.000 --> 00:05:27.680 industrial customers, to thousands of private households of 87 00:05:27.680 --> 00:05:31.200 private customers that you have to change the whole 88 00:05:31.200 --> 00:05:34.600 structure of the company. So one example, our 89 00:05:34.600 --> 00:05:37.760 father didn't even have a modern 90 00:05:37.920 --> 00:05:41.590 CRM system, an IT based CRM system 91 00:05:41.820 --> 00:05:44.860 where you have an overlook about all the customers. 92 00:05:45.820 --> 00:05:49.580 Our father didn't use many 93 00:05:49.980 --> 00:05:53.780 sources for marketing like online marketing, Google Ads, 94 00:05:53.780 --> 00:05:57.180 affiliate marketing, whatever. He didn't use none of them. 95 00:05:59.500 --> 00:06:03.300 He didn't even do a lot of offline marketing. He was one of 96 00:06:03.300 --> 00:06:07.140 these like vitamin C businesses that he knew a lot of 97 00:06:07.140 --> 00:06:10.940 people in the market because of his experience. So 98 00:06:11.260 --> 00:06:15.040 he knew how to contact people, who to contact 99 00:06:15.200 --> 00:06:18.720 them, who to contact and what are the 100 00:06:18.720 --> 00:06:22.480 problems in the current situations today we would say 101 00:06:22.480 --> 00:06:26.320 it's network sales. Exactly, exactly. It's network 102 00:06:26.320 --> 00:06:30.000 sales. And at the beginning it was 103 00:06:30.400 --> 00:06:34.080 quite difficult to tell him what kind of 104 00:06:35.120 --> 00:06:38.880 marketing strategies we were focusing on, what it 105 00:06:39.600 --> 00:06:43.260 we need. And yeah, 106 00:06:43.260 --> 00:06:47.060 for example, I remember the first discussion in 2018 where 107 00:06:47.060 --> 00:06:50.460 I was asking him for can I have a thousand 108 00:06:50.460 --> 00:06:53.780 euros to invest in Google Ads? And he said to me, 109 00:06:54.180 --> 00:06:57.820 well, I never invested a single euro in Google Ads or 110 00:06:57.820 --> 00:07:01.580 somewhere else. But okay, after a couple 111 00:07:01.580 --> 00:07:05.220 of days I had the goal. So 112 00:07:05.700 --> 00:07:09.500 I tried to spend them as wisely as possible. And I made 113 00:07:09.500 --> 00:07:13.320 from a thousand euros, seven to eight thousand euros with two 114 00:07:13.320 --> 00:07:16.840 months. So meaning return on your ad 115 00:07:16.840 --> 00:07:20.640 spending. Exactly, exactly. The return on the ads was from 116 00:07:20.720 --> 00:07:24.560 the multiple was seven to eight times, which was very good 117 00:07:24.560 --> 00:07:28.400 for us in this situation. So it was not only 118 00:07:28.560 --> 00:07:32.080 that you have to convince your father during that time, 119 00:07:32.240 --> 00:07:35.360 it's also very beneficial to show him the results 120 00:07:35.760 --> 00:07:39.600 very, very fast, that you are possibly on 121 00:07:39.920 --> 00:07:43.500 the right track. I see. 122 00:07:43.740 --> 00:07:47.460 And so basically you set up this company next to 123 00:07:47.460 --> 00:07:51.140 the existing company. Exactly. One of the 124 00:07:51.140 --> 00:07:54.860 interesting pieces, because I do get a lot of pitches, 125 00:07:55.660 --> 00:07:59.500 we accept less than 1% of the incoming pitches. 126 00:07:59.580 --> 00:08:03.100 What caught my eye was you talked about 127 00:08:03.100 --> 00:08:05.780 Arnold Schwarzenegger. You first encountered him in 128 00:08:05.780 --> 00:08:09.090 2009 water 129 00:08:09.090 --> 00:08:12.690 softener band while writing your master thesis in Silicon Valley. 130 00:08:13.010 --> 00:08:16.610 How did that moment spark the idea for Arkwan Poor 131 00:08:16.610 --> 00:08:19.890 and shaped your mission driven approach to sustainability? 132 00:08:21.570 --> 00:08:25.090 I think that was a great help. So I was writing my 133 00:08:25.090 --> 00:08:28.890 master thesis in the Silicon Valley from 2016 to the 134 00:08:28.890 --> 00:08:32.600 beginning of 2017 and I was living together with, 135 00:08:32.750 --> 00:08:35.870 with some local students of the Stanford University. 136 00:08:36.350 --> 00:08:39.630 And they were also very interested in 137 00:08:39.630 --> 00:08:43.070 entrepreneurship, founding their own companies, doing their own 138 00:08:43.070 --> 00:08:46.910 businesses. And during a dinner they were asking, hey 139 00:08:46.910 --> 00:08:50.630 Max, what are you doing beside your studies, beside writing your 140 00:08:50.630 --> 00:08:54.390 master thesis? And I told them, well, my father has a 141 00:08:54.390 --> 00:08:58.110 small company which is focusing on water treatment, on industrial 142 00:08:58.110 --> 00:09:01.910 water treatment during that times. And so we 143 00:09:01.910 --> 00:09:05.530 were talking about filtration and all that stuff. One guy suddenly 144 00:09:05.530 --> 00:09:08.970 said, actually, do you know, we some kind have of 145 00:09:09.130 --> 00:09:11.930 weak, some kind have of a saying here which says, 146 00:09:12.570 --> 00:09:15.850 Arnold has terminated the salt based water 147 00:09:15.850 --> 00:09:19.290 softener and that's based on a law 148 00:09:19.370 --> 00:09:23.130 which bans iron exchangers. So 149 00:09:23.530 --> 00:09:27.290 in the first moment I thought it was, or it might be 150 00:09:27.290 --> 00:09:31.130 a joke because it sounded very different to what people 151 00:09:31.610 --> 00:09:34.930 used in Germany to the iron exchanger. The salt based water 152 00:09:34.930 --> 00:09:38.670 softener is very common technology you are using when 153 00:09:38.670 --> 00:09:42.510 you have hot water. So at the first moment my reaction was, 154 00:09:42.510 --> 00:09:45.430 okay, oh, it sounds interesting. But I try, 155 00:09:46.230 --> 00:09:49.750 I try to be a bit, let's say serious because 156 00:09:50.310 --> 00:09:52.789 I didn't know in that moment that 157 00:09:53.910 --> 00:09:57.510 how truth, how, how true it was what that 158 00:09:57.510 --> 00:10:01.350 guy was saying. So after the conversation, after the dinner, I went 159 00:10:01.670 --> 00:10:05.470 online, I googled it and I could find this law signed 160 00:10:05.470 --> 00:10:08.850 in 2009 by Arnold Schwarzenegger, which 161 00:10:09.490 --> 00:10:12.850 enabled local authorities to ban the salt based water 162 00:10:12.850 --> 00:10:16.530 softeners when the level of chloride in lakes and 163 00:10:16.530 --> 00:10:20.090 rivers is too high. Because the wastewater of these 164 00:10:20.090 --> 00:10:23.570 systems of the salt based water softeners, they are 165 00:10:24.770 --> 00:10:28.490 increasing the chloride levels because as you know, salt 166 00:10:28.490 --> 00:10:32.130 consists of sodium chloride and the chloride cannot be, 167 00:10:32.290 --> 00:10:35.810 cannot get filtered out by sewage water treatment plants. So 168 00:10:36.220 --> 00:10:40.020 they get into rivers and lakes. So it 169 00:10:40.020 --> 00:10:43.860 was some kind of an Eye opening moment 170 00:10:43.860 --> 00:10:47.660 when someone was telling me about this law. And 171 00:10:47.660 --> 00:10:51.380 the more interesting fact was Arnold Schwarzenegger signed this law. 172 00:10:51.380 --> 00:10:54.620 So I thought, okay, if, if there is a law in 173 00:10:54.620 --> 00:10:58.300 California, whether it's signed by Arnold Schwarzenegger or 174 00:10:58.780 --> 00:11:02.300 whoever else, there must be a serious 175 00:11:02.300 --> 00:11:05.650 topic about this kind of salty 176 00:11:05.650 --> 00:11:09.490 wastewater, about this threat of high chloride levels. 177 00:11:10.450 --> 00:11:14.050 So I just called my father the next day and said, 178 00:11:14.050 --> 00:11:17.890 hey, have you heard about this kind of environmental 179 00:11:17.890 --> 00:11:21.490 issues with salt based water softeners? And he said, yes, 180 00:11:21.730 --> 00:11:24.770 it's true. For example, a one family household 181 00:11:25.010 --> 00:11:28.450 uses about 100 kg of salt every year, 182 00:11:28.770 --> 00:11:32.370 which gets then into rivers and lakes. So we are talking 183 00:11:32.370 --> 00:11:35.710 about probably hundreds of thousand tons 184 00:11:35.790 --> 00:11:39.470 alone in Germany who get into rivers 185 00:11:39.470 --> 00:11:43.310 and lakes every year. And the salt in there 186 00:11:43.950 --> 00:11:47.390 makes it, makes it damaging, makes it difficult for 187 00:11:47.710 --> 00:11:51.390 the local environment. Plus, my understanding 188 00:11:51.390 --> 00:11:54.910 is the water softener is mostly to 189 00:11:54.910 --> 00:11:58.750 reduce lime scale, which then makes difficulties with all the 190 00:11:58.750 --> 00:12:02.390 pipes and all the machines the water go through because it 191 00:12:02.390 --> 00:12:06.130 leaves those white residues. Yes, it's exactly, it's 192 00:12:06.130 --> 00:12:09.090 two sides of the same metal. So on the one hand, 193 00:12:09.810 --> 00:12:13.570 water softeners with salt are used to solve the 194 00:12:13.570 --> 00:12:17.330 problems caused by hard water. Hard water means you have a lot of 195 00:12:17.330 --> 00:12:21.050 limescale in the water, which consists of mainly 196 00:12:21.050 --> 00:12:24.690 calcium and magnesia. And hard water, 197 00:12:24.770 --> 00:12:28.530 as you said, causes limescale deposits in 198 00:12:28.530 --> 00:12:32.180 pipes, in machines like washing 199 00:12:32.180 --> 00:12:35.620 machines, dishwashing machines, on your shower head, 200 00:12:35.860 --> 00:12:39.700 on faucets, on any surfaces. And on the one hand 201 00:12:39.700 --> 00:12:43.420 you can clean your surface, you can descale like the kettle in the 202 00:12:43.420 --> 00:12:46.979 kitchen. But after a while, for example 203 00:12:46.979 --> 00:12:50.700 pipes, they start to clog and you have to descale them 204 00:12:50.700 --> 00:12:54.180 or you have to renew them, which means a lot of cost. And 205 00:12:54.180 --> 00:12:57.820 furthermore, every millimeter of limescale increases 206 00:12:57.820 --> 00:13:01.260 or decreases the energy efficiency because it's like an 207 00:13:01.260 --> 00:13:04.640 isolating surface. The lim scale deposits, every millimeter 208 00:13:05.280 --> 00:13:09.040 increases this energy inefficiency. So 209 00:13:09.040 --> 00:13:12.720 you need more energy to get to the same level of hot water. 210 00:13:13.840 --> 00:13:17.600 So on the one hand, yes, salt 211 00:13:17.600 --> 00:13:21.120 based water softeners is reducing these kind of problems because 212 00:13:21.200 --> 00:13:24.480 the, the limescale is pulled out of the water and 213 00:13:24.480 --> 00:13:28.240 exchanged against the sodium of the, of the salt. 214 00:13:28.480 --> 00:13:31.970 However, the chloride is flushed into the 215 00:13:31.970 --> 00:13:35.570 wastewater which then gets into rivers and lakes. 216 00:13:35.570 --> 00:13:39.050 And one very famous example is the, the 217 00:13:39.130 --> 00:13:42.210 crisis of the high amount of salty 218 00:13:42.210 --> 00:13:45.450 wastewater which got into the river Oder in 219 00:13:45.450 --> 00:13:49.090 2022 or 2023. I just don't remember the exact 220 00:13:49.090 --> 00:13:52.570 year. But it's some, some years ago and 221 00:13:52.890 --> 00:13:56.170 there was high, high levels and amounts of 222 00:13:56.490 --> 00:14:00.210 salty wastewater flushed 223 00:14:00.210 --> 00:14:03.890 into the into the Oder river. And as you could see, 224 00:14:05.490 --> 00:14:09.170 some, let's say plants, they start to grow 225 00:14:09.250 --> 00:14:13.050 like a certain algae was growing. But 226 00:14:13.050 --> 00:14:16.890 due to this growth of the algae, many fishes 227 00:14:16.890 --> 00:14:20.650 died. So high levels of chloride, they 228 00:14:20.650 --> 00:14:23.330 heavily affect ecosystems 229 00:14:24.210 --> 00:14:28.050 mostly at a certain level. Plants have problems to grow, 230 00:14:28.130 --> 00:14:31.350 animals have problems to live and certain levels of 231 00:14:31.350 --> 00:14:35.070 chloride. But what research has found out that 232 00:14:35.550 --> 00:14:39.310 high levels of chloride. Yeah. Damage 233 00:14:39.310 --> 00:14:43.070 ecosystems and that the current, let's say law, 234 00:14:43.230 --> 00:14:46.670 which regulates the limit of chloride, which is allowed 235 00:14:47.070 --> 00:14:50.710 to be in rivers and lakes, are not low 236 00:14:50.710 --> 00:14:54.430 enough to actually protect, for example. 237 00:14:54.510 --> 00:14:58.230 Yeah. Fishes or plants. So we have a 238 00:14:58.230 --> 00:15:01.150 serious problem, problem with salt. Salt is 239 00:15:01.470 --> 00:15:03.950 globally an increasing threat to 240 00:15:05.230 --> 00:15:08.830 freshwater systems. So it's not only the salt based 241 00:15:08.830 --> 00:15:12.030 weights, waste salt based salt, salt based 242 00:15:12.350 --> 00:15:13.950 water softeners who are 243 00:15:15.950 --> 00:15:19.470 creating this problem. We, we have a serious problem 244 00:15:19.550 --> 00:15:23.150 overall with the increasing salt levels in 245 00:15:23.230 --> 00:15:27.020 freshwater systems. That already takes 246 00:15:27.020 --> 00:15:30.660 care of my next question because I was wondering how you discovered this 247 00:15:30.660 --> 00:15:34.460 gap and that's basically already the story from 248 00:15:34.460 --> 00:15:37.940 our audience. I would be curious, what would you do 249 00:15:37.940 --> 00:15:40.580 differently if you could go back to 2017? 250 00:15:41.220 --> 00:15:45.060 What's the one decision you change in 251 00:15:45.540 --> 00:15:49.340 your startup scaling journey? Let's talk a little bit 252 00:15:49.340 --> 00:15:52.950 about disruption and scaling as a hardware startup, because you're 253 00:15:52.950 --> 00:15:56.430 basically a hardware startup. Hardware is notoriously 254 00:15:56.430 --> 00:16:00.070 hard. Right. Especially in scaling. What were the 255 00:16:00.070 --> 00:16:03.390 biggest go to market challenges you faced during a physical 256 00:16:03.790 --> 00:16:07.230 product to market and how did you overcome them? 257 00:16:08.430 --> 00:16:12.230 I think it connects very well to the question before, what 258 00:16:12.230 --> 00:16:15.990 would you do different? And the plumbing 259 00:16:15.990 --> 00:16:19.630 industry is a very conservative industry. And a normal 260 00:16:19.630 --> 00:16:23.450 sales strategy as a manufacturer of water treatment systems would be 261 00:16:23.610 --> 00:16:27.370 that you sell to a wholesaler, the wholesaler sells to a local 262 00:16:27.370 --> 00:16:31.130 plumber and the local plumber then sells to the 263 00:16:31.130 --> 00:16:34.490 customer. So you have a multi level or 264 00:16:34.650 --> 00:16:38.010 multi tier sales process. 265 00:16:38.810 --> 00:16:42.650 And the first one and a half years from 2017 266 00:16:42.730 --> 00:16:46.530 on, we tried to go to the same sales funnel. We 267 00:16:46.530 --> 00:16:49.930 were cold calling, for example, wholesalers, we were 268 00:16:50.170 --> 00:16:53.900 visiting them, we trained, really tried to get into their 269 00:16:54.620 --> 00:16:56.940 catalogs, into their stocks, 270 00:16:58.940 --> 00:17:02.580 which was very hard because our, our product is cheaper and it 271 00:17:02.580 --> 00:17:05.340 doesn't need any, doesn't create any 272 00:17:06.060 --> 00:17:09.580 reoccurring revenue for let's say salt or 273 00:17:09.580 --> 00:17:13.380 maintenance. And we then tried to go one 274 00:17:13.380 --> 00:17:17.060 step ahead. We tried to reach out to local plumbers and it was 275 00:17:17.060 --> 00:17:20.800 the same. Our product, depending on which manufacturer 276 00:17:20.800 --> 00:17:24.520 look at, is depending on the size of the product, 277 00:17:24.520 --> 00:17:27.920 nearly half as cheap as a normal salt based water 278 00:17:27.920 --> 00:17:31.400 softener or even cheaper. And as I said, no 279 00:17:31.400 --> 00:17:34.760 reoccurring revenue for maintenance or Salt. 280 00:17:36.280 --> 00:17:40.120 And so plumbers also didn't show a lot of interest. 281 00:17:40.520 --> 00:17:44.360 Interest. And we lost one and a half years 282 00:17:45.000 --> 00:17:48.760 focusing of this established sales 283 00:17:48.760 --> 00:17:52.600 channel. So after one and 284 00:17:52.600 --> 00:17:56.160 a half years, we did some kind of a recap where we 285 00:17:56.320 --> 00:18:00.120 were talking about, okay, what can we do better? What did 286 00:18:00.120 --> 00:18:03.720 work well? And we saw we had a very small website during 287 00:18:03.720 --> 00:18:07.400 that time, but every time a customer went to that page 288 00:18:07.400 --> 00:18:09.760 and did an inquiry via the website, 289 00:18:12.560 --> 00:18:16.400 they could contact us. We had not a 290 00:18:16.400 --> 00:18:19.660 professional sales hotline, but many people called us and 291 00:18:19.980 --> 00:18:23.780 asked for some consultancy and we talked to them how it works, how it 292 00:18:23.780 --> 00:18:27.580 would be installed, and people 293 00:18:27.580 --> 00:18:31.300 started buying it from us directly. So we thought, 294 00:18:31.300 --> 00:18:34.979 okay, if no wholesaler wants to buy it, if not a 295 00:18:34.979 --> 00:18:38.820 plumber wants to buy it, we can sell it directly to the customer, 296 00:18:38.820 --> 00:18:42.540 which has even the advantage that we are not giving away any margin. 297 00:18:43.660 --> 00:18:47.440 And one of these customers also was asking 298 00:18:47.440 --> 00:18:50.960 us, can you also do the installation of the product? 299 00:18:51.280 --> 00:18:55.120 And as a startup you say, very brave, yes, of course we can. 300 00:18:55.280 --> 00:18:59.040 But we didn't have any install and 301 00:18:59.040 --> 00:19:02.879 any plumber at hand to install the product before, but we had 302 00:19:02.960 --> 00:19:06.480 many contacts from our sales activities the 303 00:19:06.640 --> 00:19:10.240 month before. So we called some of them and we said, hey, 304 00:19:10.320 --> 00:19:13.800 we already have a customer who just bought the product. Would you do the 305 00:19:13.800 --> 00:19:17.390 installation? Ten of them said, no, not interested. It's my 306 00:19:17.390 --> 00:19:21.110 customer, by the way. And one said, yeah, I 307 00:19:21.110 --> 00:19:24.550 can do the installation. Just send me a photo of the 308 00:19:24.550 --> 00:19:28.310 pipes and the material. And we asked the customer then, 309 00:19:28.310 --> 00:19:32.030 can you send us a picture? Can you send us the material? And he 310 00:19:32.030 --> 00:19:35.550 sends us the pictures and we forwarded it to the plumber and he said, yeah, 311 00:19:35.550 --> 00:19:38.990 I can do the installation next week. It's all done, just give me the number, 312 00:19:38.990 --> 00:19:42.650 I make the call and I make the appointment. And it worked 313 00:19:42.650 --> 00:19:43.890 very well. So 314 00:19:46.530 --> 00:19:49.970 after one and a half years of disappointments and many hurdles, 315 00:19:50.050 --> 00:19:53.490 we tried to learn much faster, which was, okay, 316 00:19:53.490 --> 00:19:56.890 what's the customer? The customer is not the plumber, it's not the 317 00:19:56.890 --> 00:20:00.450 wholesaler, it's the end customer. And how can we 318 00:20:00.450 --> 00:20:03.890 also offer or streamline the whole process? We just offer 319 00:20:04.370 --> 00:20:08.090 the installation as well by asking for a simple picture 320 00:20:08.090 --> 00:20:11.770 which you can take from your smartphone and the material 321 00:20:11.770 --> 00:20:14.910 and integrated it on the website to 322 00:20:15.390 --> 00:20:18.870 explain the whole process very clearly to the, to the 323 00:20:18.870 --> 00:20:22.350 customer. And that was then the biggest, 324 00:20:22.830 --> 00:20:26.630 the biggest step we had to take as a hardware startup. So 325 00:20:26.630 --> 00:20:30.470 it's not like a software startup where you press a button and the customer 326 00:20:30.470 --> 00:20:33.550 can use it. You need to send the product to, 327 00:20:34.190 --> 00:20:37.870 to the, to the customer. So we had to establish some kind 328 00:20:37.870 --> 00:20:41.690 of a logistics process which was still okay, manageable. 329 00:20:42.170 --> 00:20:45.770 But the much more difficult process was to 330 00:20:45.770 --> 00:20:49.490 find hundreds of plumbers in Germany which would 331 00:20:49.490 --> 00:20:52.890 follow or which would be interested in our 332 00:20:53.450 --> 00:20:57.210 fully integrated sales funnel from selling the 333 00:20:57.210 --> 00:21:01.010 product, from offering the installation, to actually install 334 00:21:01.010 --> 00:21:04.730 the product. And that took another one and a half years to find 335 00:21:04.810 --> 00:21:08.370 these plumbers which are interested in it and which 336 00:21:08.370 --> 00:21:12.140 are now very well aware of the advantages because it 337 00:21:12.140 --> 00:21:15.540 saves them a lot of time and also a lot of, 338 00:21:15.700 --> 00:21:19.340 let's say, stuff, because stuff in the 339 00:21:19.340 --> 00:21:23.060 plumbing industry is very rare. So with us they save, 340 00:21:23.140 --> 00:21:26.420 let's say 80% of time for one installation work. 341 00:21:27.060 --> 00:21:30.700 And it was, let's say one and a half years 342 00:21:30.700 --> 00:21:34.180 of doing many calls and reaching out to many 343 00:21:34.180 --> 00:21:37.940 plumbers to set up this network of installation partners. 344 00:21:39.740 --> 00:21:43.420 That would be my next question. Because you grew your partner network 345 00:21:43.420 --> 00:21:47.060 of certified partners from 100 to 400 plumbers in 346 00:21:47.060 --> 00:21:50.260 five years. What's the playbook for building such a strong 347 00:21:50.260 --> 00:21:53.820 disruption and install the network in a fragmented market? 348 00:21:54.620 --> 00:21:58.220 The playbook consists of a lot of hard work. So 349 00:21:58.380 --> 00:22:02.060 at the first moment, it's all about reaching out to 350 00:22:02.060 --> 00:22:03.660 them, calling them, 351 00:22:05.670 --> 00:22:09.510 dealing with, let's say 80% of well, I'm not 352 00:22:09.510 --> 00:22:12.150 interested, thank you very much. But 353 00:22:13.990 --> 00:22:17.510 also finding the right way of communication when you contact 354 00:22:17.510 --> 00:22:21.110 them. And it was not about, hey, we have the latest 355 00:22:21.270 --> 00:22:24.990 technology of limescale treatment here. We have, which 356 00:22:24.990 --> 00:22:28.750 turned out to a fully new sales pitch. It 357 00:22:28.750 --> 00:22:31.350 was like we have a fully, 358 00:22:32.580 --> 00:22:36.380 say turnkey contract. Not a contract, a 359 00:22:36.380 --> 00:22:40.220 turnkey customer for you. You just have 360 00:22:40.220 --> 00:22:43.940 to call them. You just have to make the appointment. You can 361 00:22:43.940 --> 00:22:47.460 calculate your work to us, what you actually do. 362 00:22:47.460 --> 00:22:48.420 It's not like 363 00:22:51.140 --> 00:22:54.180 a fixed sales price we are offering you. 364 00:22:55.780 --> 00:22:59.470 You can calculate your work as you actually do. 365 00:23:00.030 --> 00:23:03.550 And you have then 366 00:23:03.550 --> 00:23:07.150 also afterwards a customer who can call you if the 367 00:23:07.150 --> 00:23:10.870 customer needs, for example, the maintenance of a heating system, a new 368 00:23:10.870 --> 00:23:14.430 bathroom, a new heating system at all. So they 369 00:23:14.509 --> 00:23:18.110 saw, okay, from a paid work can 370 00:23:18.590 --> 00:23:22.270 create. Can there can be created many, many more opportunities 371 00:23:22.430 --> 00:23:26.270 for my business. And the plumber has a very, very easy 372 00:23:26.270 --> 00:23:29.710 work and a very, very profitable way to 373 00:23:30.570 --> 00:23:34.250 customers. So basically they getting paid 374 00:23:34.250 --> 00:23:37.690 for generating a lead, a new business contract. Okay, 375 00:23:37.930 --> 00:23:41.690 exactly, exactly, exactly. That was our reach out 376 00:23:41.930 --> 00:23:45.530 after half a year to our plumbers who are working with us. 377 00:23:46.570 --> 00:23:49.610 But yeah, it was just like 378 00:23:50.090 --> 00:23:53.690 I said, a lot of hard work in little, little 379 00:23:53.850 --> 00:23:57.610 small steps, reaching out as many plumbers as possible 380 00:23:58.270 --> 00:24:01.790 with the right words. I see. 381 00:24:04.270 --> 00:24:07.950 I was wondering, how did you educate your customers 382 00:24:08.350 --> 00:24:11.590 on why limescale prevention matters. I mean 383 00:24:11.590 --> 00:24:15.310 everybody who had to redo the pipes in the bathroom 384 00:24:15.470 --> 00:24:18.870 or the washing machine or 385 00:24:18.870 --> 00:24:22.190 dishwasher broke down due to limescale nodas. But 386 00:24:23.310 --> 00:24:26.790 how did you educate your customers there? Especially when 387 00:24:26.790 --> 00:24:30.270 competitors are pushing like the traditional salt based system. 388 00:24:31.710 --> 00:24:35.430 What we found out that our customers in 389 00:24:35.430 --> 00:24:38.510 our industry, they are really looking for a lot of information. 390 00:24:39.230 --> 00:24:42.430 Of course it has to be understandable, 391 00:24:42.830 --> 00:24:46.430 very easily understandable. But they are really 392 00:24:46.430 --> 00:24:50.070 willing to learn more about what you are publishing, for 393 00:24:50.070 --> 00:24:53.790 example on your website. So when they are on your website and 394 00:24:54.030 --> 00:24:57.370 you know, okay, are they there is this disadvantage of energy 395 00:24:57.370 --> 00:25:01.010 efficiency. You have to show them how this kind 396 00:25:01.170 --> 00:25:04.770 of energy efficiency problem is solved 397 00:25:05.010 --> 00:25:08.370 by our product. And of course to make it very, 398 00:25:08.610 --> 00:25:12.450 very clear, also for very critical customers, you have to 399 00:25:13.650 --> 00:25:17.290 explain it with a lot of serious sources. And you're not 400 00:25:17.290 --> 00:25:20.850 talking about, I'm referring to decented web pages. You are probably 401 00:25:21.470 --> 00:25:24.270 willing to publish or refer to a lot of 402 00:25:25.150 --> 00:25:28.190 journal articles, scientific journal articles that 403 00:25:28.670 --> 00:25:32.430 customers can even dig deeper. And 404 00:25:34.270 --> 00:25:38.070 then you reach at least the customers who are already searching for 405 00:25:38.070 --> 00:25:41.470 these kind of products. But we also 406 00:25:41.550 --> 00:25:45.150 then saw, okay, there is the even bigger part 407 00:25:45.230 --> 00:25:48.750 of, let's say, potential customers in Germany, which are 408 00:25:49.230 --> 00:25:53.000 millions, millions of house owners. We have 19 409 00:25:53.000 --> 00:25:56.120 million buildings, residential buildings in Germany. 410 00:25:56.600 --> 00:26:00.360 They are not aware of the possibilities that there are salt based 411 00:26:00.360 --> 00:26:04.200 water softeners or even our technology. So we had to 412 00:26:05.160 --> 00:26:08.440 create some kind of awareness. And what we saw that 413 00:26:08.920 --> 00:26:12.600 during that time the topic of limescale treatment was 414 00:26:13.960 --> 00:26:17.720 very rare in the press, in public 415 00:26:17.720 --> 00:26:20.920 media, like big newspapers, magazines, 416 00:26:21.320 --> 00:26:24.960 hardly no one has ever written about limescale 417 00:26:24.960 --> 00:26:28.040 treatment, about water treatment, except very, very 418 00:26:28.040 --> 00:26:31.640 focused branch magazines for 419 00:26:31.640 --> 00:26:35.320 plumbers. So we tried to sum up 420 00:26:35.560 --> 00:26:39.080 the whole knowledge about these problems about energy 421 00:26:39.080 --> 00:26:42.280 efficiency. What does limescale do with your pipes? 422 00:26:42.600 --> 00:26:46.400 And what actually is the current solution? The lime, the salt 423 00:26:46.400 --> 00:26:50.080 based water softener. And what is the problem? We added the 424 00:26:50.080 --> 00:26:53.600 story of Arnold Schwarzenegger that he has signed in 425 00:26:53.600 --> 00:26:57.340 2009, the law in Californ. And then we reached 426 00:26:57.340 --> 00:27:00.820 out to the newspapers. And then in 2021, I remember 427 00:27:01.220 --> 00:27:04.620 there was the first big newspaper article and the Sutdeutsche 428 00:27:04.620 --> 00:27:08.460 Zeitung. And from that 429 00:27:08.460 --> 00:27:12.180 beginning the topic was much clearer to a broader 430 00:27:12.180 --> 00:27:15.940 audience. It was not only the interested people or the people 431 00:27:15.940 --> 00:27:19.060 who are working in the plumbing industry, but you could 432 00:27:19.860 --> 00:27:23.380 really see that the topic is now 433 00:27:23.380 --> 00:27:26.420 getting more and more understandable for a broader 434 00:27:27.590 --> 00:27:30.870 audience. And if you can explain it very, 435 00:27:31.270 --> 00:27:34.710 very clearly, then you 436 00:27:35.270 --> 00:27:38.310 could see that they are also, let's say Getting 437 00:27:39.190 --> 00:27:42.909 doing an inquiry on our website and yeah, finally buying the 438 00:27:42.909 --> 00:27:46.630 product. I see. Last, 439 00:27:46.710 --> 00:27:50.230 last question before our our little ad break. 440 00:27:50.390 --> 00:27:54.200 With triple digit growth rates and seven figure 441 00:27:54.200 --> 00:27:58.040 revenues, how do you balance this operational scaling with 442 00:27:58.040 --> 00:28:01.880 maintaining a product quality and a very low 2 to 3% 443 00:28:01.880 --> 00:28:05.560 complaint rate? I think 444 00:28:05.560 --> 00:28:09.400 the most important sentence you always have to 445 00:28:09.400 --> 00:28:13.240 remember as a hardware startup is grow slower than 446 00:28:13.240 --> 00:28:16.200 you actually want to because 447 00:28:17.000 --> 00:28:20.440 as you say, the product has to be built. You have to have the product 448 00:28:20.440 --> 00:28:24.200 in stock. You have to have the product in the right quality in stock. 449 00:28:24.990 --> 00:28:28.670 And in our case you need to have the installation network that 450 00:28:28.670 --> 00:28:32.390 once the product is sent to the customer, the 451 00:28:32.390 --> 00:28:36.110 plumber calls the customer and makes 452 00:28:36.110 --> 00:28:39.950 the appointment for the installation and then fulfills the installation. 453 00:28:39.950 --> 00:28:43.790 So there are many, many more steps to be aware of 454 00:28:44.270 --> 00:28:47.990 compared to a software startup. And the 455 00:28:47.990 --> 00:28:51.090 easiest way is to solve 456 00:28:51.490 --> 00:28:54.210 the danger of, 457 00:28:55.650 --> 00:28:56.530 let's say 458 00:28:59.090 --> 00:29:02.690 demanding more from your company than it actually can do. 459 00:29:02.690 --> 00:29:06.130 Is being a bit on the brake and 460 00:29:06.530 --> 00:29:10.330 always looking, checking every month, what's the stock level? Is 461 00:29:10.330 --> 00:29:13.930 the quality good? How is the appointment rate of the 462 00:29:13.930 --> 00:29:17.570 plumbers, Is the installation work good? And 463 00:29:17.810 --> 00:29:21.570 you have to be very, very close to your final customer and checking 464 00:29:22.350 --> 00:29:25.390 internally to your, to your staff, to our 465 00:29:25.550 --> 00:29:29.310 salespeople, to our technical engineers who are planning the installations. 466 00:29:30.270 --> 00:29:33.870 What do customers say? Is there other appointments still on 467 00:29:33.870 --> 00:29:37.150 time? And if you are 468 00:29:38.029 --> 00:29:41.630 getting the, not the feeling, but if you can see that 469 00:29:42.110 --> 00:29:45.950 it's taking too long for the installation or something happens to 470 00:29:45.950 --> 00:29:49.750 the return rate, you really have to stop. You 471 00:29:49.750 --> 00:29:53.440 have to turn down, let's say the, the marketing budget. 472 00:29:53.440 --> 00:29:57.200 You have to reduce the amounts of leads you're 473 00:29:57.200 --> 00:30:00.920 getting every month. And if you see that it's 474 00:30:00.920 --> 00:30:04.320 all stable, the return rate is 475 00:30:04.320 --> 00:30:08.040 stable, then you can start to grow again. But 476 00:30:08.040 --> 00:30:11.840 it's always a constant process of checking what 477 00:30:11.840 --> 00:30:15.680 can your organization do? And how 478 00:30:15.680 --> 00:30:18.400 happy are customers? And we implemented for example, 479 00:30:19.600 --> 00:30:23.240 a call one week after the installation. How happy I was the product. 480 00:30:23.240 --> 00:30:26.700 How happy are you with the, with the plumber, for example? And 481 00:30:26.700 --> 00:30:30.300 these inputs are used for our monitoring 482 00:30:30.300 --> 00:30:33.980 still. They are still used for our monitoring. And 483 00:30:33.980 --> 00:30:37.660 then we can see, okay, is there still room for, for more growth? 484 00:30:39.020 --> 00:30:41.900 I see. Guys, we will be back 485 00:30:42.780 --> 00:30:43.980 after short ad break. 486 00:30:49.420 --> 00:30:53.180 Guys, welcome back after our short ad break with a little 487 00:30:53.180 --> 00:30:56.440 bit more talking about sustain market awareness, 488 00:30:56.520 --> 00:31:00.040 celebrity and media impact and future growth and 489 00:31:00.040 --> 00:31:01.960 European expansion plans. 490 00:31:04.120 --> 00:31:07.760 Max Melvin Water scarcity and pollution are becoming bigger 491 00:31:07.760 --> 00:31:11.399 issues globally. Yet customer awareness is still 492 00:31:11.399 --> 00:31:15.240 low compared to for example, mobility or energy transitions. 493 00:31:15.720 --> 00:31:19.400 How do you shift public perception and make water the 494 00:31:19.400 --> 00:31:21.500 Next big sustainability topic. 495 00:31:23.090 --> 00:31:26.730 That's a very good point. Germany is in the 496 00:31:26.730 --> 00:31:29.570 European Union, one of the countries with the, 497 00:31:30.690 --> 00:31:33.810 with the worst surface water qualities. 498 00:31:34.370 --> 00:31:36.130 We, I think we are on 499 00:31:38.450 --> 00:31:41.490 16th place of 20. 500 00:31:42.370 --> 00:31:45.970 And furthermore, Germany is one of the countries with the 501 00:31:45.970 --> 00:31:49.570 highest rate, with the highest loss 502 00:31:49.650 --> 00:31:53.350 of water, of fresh 503 00:31:53.350 --> 00:31:57.070 water. So the problem has already 504 00:31:57.150 --> 00:31:59.550 become very, very real, as you say. 505 00:32:00.750 --> 00:32:04.590 However, I would admit that it's not yet such a big 506 00:32:04.590 --> 00:32:08.030 topic compared to mobility or 507 00:32:08.430 --> 00:32:11.630 energy. I think 508 00:32:14.990 --> 00:32:18.520 many, many cases have shown that 509 00:32:20.040 --> 00:32:23.680 many topics become just an important or big 510 00:32:23.680 --> 00:32:27.320 topic in media if it's nearly already too late. 511 00:32:27.880 --> 00:32:31.560 Too late. Let's say for example, during after Ukraine, the 512 00:32:31.560 --> 00:32:34.440 beginning of the Ukraine war, the energy prices 513 00:32:34.760 --> 00:32:38.360 increased dramatically and then all the people started to invest in, 514 00:32:38.360 --> 00:32:42.120 let's say solar panels and getting their own solar system 515 00:32:42.120 --> 00:32:44.930 to reduce energy costs. And 516 00:32:47.810 --> 00:32:51.330 of course solar technology has been around many, many years 517 00:32:51.810 --> 00:32:54.690 before, which could have been a great solution against 518 00:32:56.370 --> 00:32:59.970 making us more independent from for example gas. 519 00:32:59.970 --> 00:33:03.770 However, not many people were interested in it and as you 520 00:33:03.770 --> 00:33:06.930 can see now with the water we can already see the 521 00:33:07.250 --> 00:33:10.900 lakes and rivers are getting in a worse and worse 522 00:33:11.380 --> 00:33:15.100 shape and we have a reduction of fresh 523 00:33:15.100 --> 00:33:17.540 water, a loss of fresh water in Germany. 524 00:33:18.740 --> 00:33:21.700 So as a founder I would 525 00:33:22.020 --> 00:33:25.300 avoid to shout out all these 526 00:33:26.580 --> 00:33:30.340 worst case scenario messages. Okay, we are 527 00:33:30.420 --> 00:33:34.220 focused or we are steering ahead into a water crisis. 528 00:33:34.220 --> 00:33:38.060 We have within 30 years we won't have any 529 00:33:38.060 --> 00:33:41.900 drinking water left or something like this. It's on 530 00:33:41.900 --> 00:33:45.580 the one hand, of course, in Germany it's not credible at the moment and 531 00:33:45.580 --> 00:33:46.100 I think 532 00:33:49.060 --> 00:33:52.660 it's not the right way to work with these kind worst 533 00:33:52.660 --> 00:33:56.220 case scenarios. You have to find a moderate 534 00:33:56.220 --> 00:33:59.940 way, a clear way and a serious 535 00:34:00.020 --> 00:34:03.820 way to make it understandable for customers what is going on, 536 00:34:03.820 --> 00:34:07.410 what is happening with our water supply? And it's not something 537 00:34:07.410 --> 00:34:10.850 which will happen from this year to next year. 538 00:34:11.330 --> 00:34:15.090 It's something which probably takes five to ten years to 539 00:34:15.250 --> 00:34:18.930 reach. A shift from water is here, 540 00:34:19.010 --> 00:34:22.850 we have no problem with water to okay, we have to take care. 541 00:34:23.010 --> 00:34:26.050 We have to seriously take care with our water. And 542 00:34:26.770 --> 00:34:30.210 so we are seeing this as a long term project. And this 543 00:34:30.530 --> 00:34:34.370 mostly goes not through, let's say 544 00:34:34.370 --> 00:34:37.610 online marketing or website or something. It's 545 00:34:38.170 --> 00:34:41.410 getting, getting started a discussion, a 546 00:34:41.410 --> 00:34:45.010 conversation about our waters. This could mean getting started a 547 00:34:45.010 --> 00:34:48.730 conversation in newspapers, in media, in tv, 548 00:34:50.090 --> 00:34:53.690 within the conversation of people itself. 549 00:34:54.090 --> 00:34:56.650 That's the main goal that you're 550 00:34:57.530 --> 00:35:01.250 showing and making it understandable that you have to take care of 551 00:35:01.250 --> 00:35:04.150 this. But it's definitely a term 552 00:35:04.310 --> 00:35:07.910 transition before it takes 553 00:35:07.910 --> 00:35:11.190 serious action. And I'm also not a fan of 554 00:35:11.590 --> 00:35:15.030 going to into politics and saying we need a law which now, 555 00:35:15.990 --> 00:35:19.709 yeah, focuses on also forbidding the salt based water 556 00:35:19.709 --> 00:35:23.430 softeners, for example, like Arnold Schwarzenegger did in California. We also 557 00:35:23.430 --> 00:35:26.550 have seen with the heating law in Germany, which was 558 00:35:27.110 --> 00:35:30.630 mainly forcing or trying to force people investing in 559 00:35:30.790 --> 00:35:34.510 heating pumps, that it exactly led to the opposite. People 560 00:35:34.510 --> 00:35:37.890 were running into cheap gas powered heating 561 00:35:37.890 --> 00:35:41.610 systems before the law came into 562 00:35:41.610 --> 00:35:44.770 place and then the heating pump market 563 00:35:45.810 --> 00:35:49.650 broke together. So creating a 564 00:35:49.650 --> 00:35:53.370 sustainable demand goes hand in hand with a 565 00:35:53.370 --> 00:35:57.210 sustainable and serious understanding why these technologies are 566 00:35:57.210 --> 00:36:00.770 important. I see 567 00:36:01.090 --> 00:36:04.790 we already covered quite a lot of the questions 568 00:36:04.790 --> 00:36:08.190 that I would have here for you, how they reduce energy 569 00:36:09.070 --> 00:36:12.750 consumption. And we already talked about the German 570 00:36:12.910 --> 00:36:16.750 heating law. That is 571 00:36:16.910 --> 00:36:20.670 something we already covered. So let's go to the next questions and 572 00:36:20.670 --> 00:36:23.710 talk a little bit. The celebrity and media impact because 573 00:36:24.350 --> 00:36:27.950 Arnold Schwarzenegger, the governator, became one of your supporters. 574 00:36:28.030 --> 00:36:31.870 How did the relationship develop from the FT1000 575 00:36:31.870 --> 00:36:34.810 recognition to being invited to his climate conference? 576 00:36:35.770 --> 00:36:39.410 It's also a long way until 577 00:36:39.410 --> 00:36:43.050 we, we got in contact with him. So we even start, we even 578 00:36:44.170 --> 00:36:47.810 tried once to reach out to him directly before we 579 00:36:47.810 --> 00:36:51.530 got this award. I don't know the 580 00:36:51.530 --> 00:36:55.210 exact year, but we reached 581 00:36:55.210 --> 00:36:59.050 out to him, to his organizations with some very personal 582 00:36:59.130 --> 00:37:02.930 letters, also with some of the newspaper articles which 583 00:37:02.930 --> 00:37:06.570 were published and which were writing about his 584 00:37:06.570 --> 00:37:10.330 law in 2009. And yeah, there 585 00:37:10.330 --> 00:37:13.090 was no reaction, but 586 00:37:13.970 --> 00:37:17.610 maybe his organizations, 587 00:37:17.610 --> 00:37:21.170 they were like saving this information. When we 588 00:37:21.170 --> 00:37:24.530 reached out and when we got 589 00:37:24.530 --> 00:37:27.890 nominated for this FT1000 award, 590 00:37:29.390 --> 00:37:33.230 one of the persons which we reached out to the time before 591 00:37:34.110 --> 00:37:37.950 made contact to us and said, hey, I 592 00:37:37.950 --> 00:37:41.550 saw you got this award. Okay. It's a very important 593 00:37:41.630 --> 00:37:45.150 topic. We also see the connection to the law of Mr. 594 00:37:45.150 --> 00:37:48.950 Schwarzenegger. Would you be willing to tell us 595 00:37:48.950 --> 00:37:52.190 more about what you're doing? And then 596 00:37:52.750 --> 00:37:56.110 we first had a video call with 597 00:37:56.350 --> 00:37:59.470 one of his employees from the 598 00:37:59.470 --> 00:38:02.820 Schwarzenegger Institute from California. 599 00:38:03.700 --> 00:38:06.420 And after the call we had to send some 600 00:38:06.820 --> 00:38:10.660 documentation to him. And a couple of weeks 601 00:38:10.660 --> 00:38:14.340 later we got invited to Arnold Schwarzenegger's office 602 00:38:14.580 --> 00:38:18.260 in California, in Los Angeles or Santa Monica. 603 00:38:19.300 --> 00:38:23.060 But then we also didn't meet him. We met, 604 00:38:23.300 --> 00:38:26.980 let's say, the director of the Schwarzenegger Institute in Santa 605 00:38:26.980 --> 00:38:30.790 Monica. And then we had another, I wouldn't say it, it was a check. But 606 00:38:30.790 --> 00:38:34.230 of course they, they took, they really took a closer look before 607 00:38:34.710 --> 00:38:38.430 we could meet him. And we were having, let's say, a 608 00:38:38.430 --> 00:38:41.910 deep conversation of what we are doing. How's the technology working? 609 00:38:41.910 --> 00:38:45.270 Let's, they really wanted to see, okay, that's some serious 610 00:38:45.990 --> 00:38:49.670 thing here. And the good thing was we have already been, I think it 611 00:38:49.670 --> 00:38:53.350 was 2024 when we, when we went to the office. 612 00:38:53.670 --> 00:38:56.510 So we have, we had already a track record of 613 00:38:57.540 --> 00:39:00.260 six years on the market, seven years on the market. 614 00:39:01.140 --> 00:39:04.940 And then we were invited the first time to 615 00:39:04.940 --> 00:39:08.700 the Austrian World Summit in Vienna the next 616 00:39:08.700 --> 00:39:12.220 year. And so we met Mr. 617 00:39:12.220 --> 00:39:15.300 Schwarzenegger himself. 618 00:39:15.940 --> 00:39:19.500 And so also again, 619 00:39:19.500 --> 00:39:23.180 it's not something which happened overnight. It was like you really had to show 620 00:39:23.180 --> 00:39:26.680 that you're a serious player, that you're on, not like a company which 621 00:39:26.920 --> 00:39:30.600 is here the one day and the next day it's gone. And they 622 00:39:30.600 --> 00:39:34.240 wanted to see that you are really are standing 623 00:39:34.240 --> 00:39:37.400 behind your technology, behind the solution you're offering. 624 00:39:37.960 --> 00:39:41.720 And they want to see how clearly can you communicate 625 00:39:42.600 --> 00:39:46.120 and prove what you are, you are saying. 626 00:39:46.920 --> 00:39:50.640 And I think after one year 627 00:39:50.640 --> 00:39:54.400 later, we then were allowed to speak at the Austrian World Summit 628 00:39:54.400 --> 00:39:57.860 as one of the startups who are allowed to present their solution. 629 00:39:58.820 --> 00:40:02.020 And of course that was a very, very great honor because 630 00:40:02.740 --> 00:40:06.500 we are, we are also presenting a work 631 00:40:06.580 --> 00:40:09.780 which Arnold started to trigger in California 632 00:40:10.660 --> 00:40:14.380 more than 15 years ago and now swapped over 633 00:40:14.380 --> 00:40:17.220 to, to the European market. And 634 00:40:18.100 --> 00:40:21.540 I would say, of course it's not some, 635 00:40:21.700 --> 00:40:25.140 not something that they're looking for any startup to 636 00:40:25.540 --> 00:40:29.240 be on the stage. It has to show, okay, the relevance 637 00:40:29.320 --> 00:40:32.520 over, if possible, a certain period 638 00:40:33.080 --> 00:40:35.960 of time. You talked about 639 00:40:37.640 --> 00:40:41.440 being on this, Schwarzenegger's climate summit. How was it to 640 00:40:41.440 --> 00:40:44.920 stand on the stage as a speaker? I think it's 641 00:40:45.960 --> 00:40:49.680 the time before the standing on 642 00:40:49.680 --> 00:40:53.520 the stage is more demanding than actually being on 643 00:40:53.520 --> 00:40:56.760 the stage. The good thing about these conferences is that 644 00:40:57.360 --> 00:41:01.120 you're really, really thinking about what would you like 645 00:41:01.120 --> 00:41:04.920 to say, what is your message? What, what, what do you want to 646 00:41:04.920 --> 00:41:08.760 communicate? And that takes several days 647 00:41:08.760 --> 00:41:12.480 or weeks until you're very clear about 648 00:41:12.480 --> 00:41:16.200 what do I want to say. And these, let's 649 00:41:16.200 --> 00:41:19.880 say 15, 20 minutes you're on stage, then it's like you try to 650 00:41:19.880 --> 00:41:22.640 deliver this message on point. 651 00:41:23.560 --> 00:41:27.400 And of course in this case it was a great honor because 652 00:41:27.640 --> 00:41:31.160 I could see Arnold Schwarzenegger was sitting in the first row so he could 653 00:41:31.240 --> 00:41:34.920 again listen to our story while telling the story to thousands of 654 00:41:35.480 --> 00:41:38.520 other people. Which makes it also 655 00:41:39.560 --> 00:41:42.040 like achieving a very, very big goal, 656 00:41:43.160 --> 00:41:46.840 starting the company 2017, eight years later, 657 00:41:47.160 --> 00:41:50.950 standing on the stage, telling about the history, telling about 658 00:41:50.950 --> 00:41:54.150 the story, and telling what you are doing to 659 00:41:55.590 --> 00:41:59.270 one of the greatest heroes of also my personal career, but 660 00:41:59.270 --> 00:42:01.910 also to a person who means 661 00:42:03.350 --> 00:42:05.110 who is like a very 662 00:42:07.190 --> 00:42:10.950 the climate action hero, as Arnold always says to many 663 00:42:10.950 --> 00:42:14.270 other people in the world. And that's also something which 664 00:42:14.270 --> 00:42:17.830 definitely shaped our brand recognition, our credibility 665 00:42:18.070 --> 00:42:21.410 that we could have this slot on on stage and 666 00:42:21.650 --> 00:42:25.490 telling about what we are doing. Before we go into future and 667 00:42:25.490 --> 00:42:28.210 growth and your European expansion, I was wondering 668 00:42:29.090 --> 00:42:32.490 for our audience, what's your boldest prediction? What's your 669 00:42:32.490 --> 00:42:35.490 boldest prediction for the future of water tech and sustainability 670 00:42:36.130 --> 00:42:39.530 by 2030? Comment down here in the show 671 00:42:39.530 --> 00:42:42.850 notes or simply tag us on social media. 672 00:42:43.410 --> 00:42:46.900 Now let's talk about future and growth and your European expansion. Here 673 00:42:47.370 --> 00:42:50.890 you set a goal to become Europe's market leader in 674 00:42:50.890 --> 00:42:54.250 landscape prevention by 2030. What's your roadmap for 675 00:42:54.250 --> 00:42:58.010 expanding beyond the dach region? As 676 00:42:58.010 --> 00:43:01.530 I said, we are born as a company who walks small 677 00:43:01.530 --> 00:43:04.970 steps and I think it's the same here. 678 00:43:05.130 --> 00:43:08.170 So we are not starting to enter 679 00:43:09.050 --> 00:43:12.810 many other European countries once at a 680 00:43:12.810 --> 00:43:16.140 time. We have focused on a soft 681 00:43:16.140 --> 00:43:19.780 relaunch last year on all the or 682 00:43:19.780 --> 00:43:23.220 many other EU countries and we found out okay, 683 00:43:23.540 --> 00:43:27.220 it might be Spain and Poland who might be very interesting 684 00:43:27.220 --> 00:43:31.060 for us to enter into the market. So at the moment we start 685 00:43:31.060 --> 00:43:34.020 to prepare the website, we start to hire 686 00:43:35.300 --> 00:43:39.140 sales teams for these countries and 687 00:43:39.140 --> 00:43:42.660 then we will start in a very, very small, 688 00:43:44.260 --> 00:43:48.020 let's say scale with a little bit of advertising in 689 00:43:48.020 --> 00:43:51.740 these countries. And parallel to that we are starting 690 00:43:51.740 --> 00:43:55.539 to build up also our installation network, our network of 691 00:43:55.539 --> 00:43:58.180 plumbers. And this also happens in 692 00:43:58.820 --> 00:44:02.620 regular or in small steps, regular checks, 693 00:44:02.620 --> 00:44:05.940 sitting closely together. How did it go? What are the results? 694 00:44:06.500 --> 00:44:10.090 And when we see okay, the sales pitch works, 695 00:44:10.330 --> 00:44:14.090 the plumbers are interested in it, we start to get this 696 00:44:14.090 --> 00:44:17.930 engine running and do bigger and bigger steps. But it's 697 00:44:17.930 --> 00:44:21.690 not the case that we have like a big, big partner who do the installation, 698 00:44:21.930 --> 00:44:25.650 big wholesalers or something. We really try to stick to our roots to 699 00:44:25.650 --> 00:44:29.170 build up this network from scratch, which has shown as a very 700 00:44:29.170 --> 00:44:32.970 stable network because these plumbers are very loyal, they stick 701 00:44:32.970 --> 00:44:36.730 to your business and they're very thankful for this kind of 702 00:44:37.210 --> 00:44:37.930 cooperation. 703 00:44:40.730 --> 00:44:44.530 I see greentech and clean tech 704 00:44:44.530 --> 00:44:48.330 investors are increasingly active in hardware because everybody knows 705 00:44:48.330 --> 00:44:51.810 hardware is hard. What kind of investor relationships or funding 706 00:44:51.810 --> 00:44:55.130 strategies is key for your growth phase, 707 00:44:55.930 --> 00:44:59.450 knowing that you are currently bootstrapped. 708 00:44:59.690 --> 00:45:03.490 But I would also be curious if you are open to 709 00:45:03.490 --> 00:45:05.850 talk to new investors and what do you think about that? 710 00:45:07.610 --> 00:45:09.290 We have the 711 00:45:12.250 --> 00:45:15.450 in our company we really try to grow 712 00:45:16.410 --> 00:45:20.050 with our own money as long as possible. As long 713 00:45:20.050 --> 00:45:23.050 we can finance the growth 714 00:45:23.690 --> 00:45:27.370 by ourselves. We will always try to 715 00:45:27.370 --> 00:45:30.970 go this very specific way because 716 00:45:31.290 --> 00:45:34.930 what we have seen, having the control about the 717 00:45:34.930 --> 00:45:38.370 company being able to make quick 718 00:45:38.370 --> 00:45:42.170 decisions, having as few people sitting 719 00:45:42.170 --> 00:45:45.890 on a table for these kind of decision making processes is very 720 00:45:45.890 --> 00:45:47.810 important to us. And 721 00:45:50.050 --> 00:45:53.850 if we see, for example could be the case in 722 00:45:53.850 --> 00:45:57.610 our internationalization process that 723 00:45:57.610 --> 00:46:01.330 we need more money than we are earning at the moment, then we would 724 00:46:01.330 --> 00:46:05.040 say okay, now we are ready for or 725 00:46:05.040 --> 00:46:08.880 we now really see the need, the urge for external 726 00:46:08.880 --> 00:46:12.240 investors. But we actually 727 00:46:12.880 --> 00:46:16.560 really try to avoid this kind of investment. 728 00:46:16.880 --> 00:46:20.600 Although we know, as you say, hardware cases are also very 729 00:46:20.600 --> 00:46:24.320 interesting for cleantech investors. Now 730 00:46:24.560 --> 00:46:28.120 let's put on your glasses looking into the future. I know forecasts are always 731 00:46:28.120 --> 00:46:31.730 difficult, especially concerning the future. That said, if you 732 00:46:31.730 --> 00:46:35.530 look five years ahead, how do you see water treatment 733 00:46:35.530 --> 00:46:39.210 technology evolving and what role will Akron poor play 734 00:46:39.210 --> 00:46:42.330 in building sustainable homes and infrastructure? 735 00:46:43.290 --> 00:46:47.010 That's a very interesting question. I 736 00:46:47.010 --> 00:46:50.170 have been looking on the water treatment market, 737 00:46:50.650 --> 00:46:53.450 especially for residential purposes for 738 00:46:54.250 --> 00:46:57.970 the last, let's say 10 years or even longer before I 739 00:46:57.970 --> 00:47:00.930 started to work at my father's company. And 740 00:47:01.970 --> 00:47:05.650 there are some startups, there are some companies who are 741 00:47:07.490 --> 00:47:11.010 offering new technology, new solutions, but compared to other 742 00:47:11.570 --> 00:47:15.090 branches like the energy sector, mobility sector, even 743 00:47:15.650 --> 00:47:16.530 IT sector, 744 00:47:19.570 --> 00:47:22.130 it's very, very small. And 745 00:47:23.730 --> 00:47:27.490 I'm a bit skeptical in that case. I'm a bit 746 00:47:27.490 --> 00:47:31.170 scared that they might not happening. More 747 00:47:31.570 --> 00:47:35.410 movement, more growth. I think there won't 748 00:47:35.410 --> 00:47:39.250 be many different or new technologies compared to the 749 00:47:39.250 --> 00:47:42.850 debt to compared to today as far as I can see. 750 00:47:43.090 --> 00:47:46.610 And of course bringing more 751 00:47:46.610 --> 00:47:50.330 movement into this market would maybe also bring the 752 00:47:50.330 --> 00:47:53.170 whole water treatment market on the next level for 753 00:47:54.370 --> 00:47:57.890 let's say for the public discussion on such technologies and the 754 00:47:57.970 --> 00:48:01.730 urge of such technologies. But at the moment I don't see it. 755 00:48:02.030 --> 00:48:05.790 So we really try to work 756 00:48:06.270 --> 00:48:09.630 in this field as good as we can, as much as we can, 757 00:48:11.070 --> 00:48:14.790 as fast as we can. And our 758 00:48:14.790 --> 00:48:17.310 hope is because we also 759 00:48:18.590 --> 00:48:21.630 don't see a lot of competition in specifically 760 00:48:21.710 --> 00:48:25.470 limescale treatment technologies that we are the 761 00:48:25.470 --> 00:48:29.160 major supplier of the salt free limescale 762 00:48:29.160 --> 00:48:33.000 treatment technology all over the European Union. 763 00:48:34.440 --> 00:48:38.000 I see. And the last question for this interview, as 764 00:48:38.000 --> 00:48:41.640 it traditional at Startup Radio, we 765 00:48:41.640 --> 00:48:45.480 already talked about your openness to new investors. Are you looking for new employees? 766 00:48:45.880 --> 00:48:49.360 Yeah, sure. We are regularly looking for new employees, for 767 00:48:49.360 --> 00:48:52.600 example, like a sales agent for the Spanish market. 768 00:48:53.000 --> 00:48:56.070 But I would be happy to share our 769 00:48:56.630 --> 00:49:00.390 website to give you a further look on who 770 00:49:00.390 --> 00:49:04.230 we are looking for. We will totally share this 771 00:49:04.390 --> 00:49:07.110 career website and only thing I can say Spanish. 772 00:49:11.510 --> 00:49:14.990 Maximilian. It was a pleasure talking to you. Thank you very much. Hope to have 773 00:49:14.990 --> 00:49:18.670 you back on an update down the road. Thank you very 774 00:49:18.670 --> 00:49:22.430 much. Joran. Thank you very much for the invitation. It was very nice talking 775 00:49:22.430 --> 00:49:24.500 to you. You. My pleasure. 776 00:49:30.100 --> 00:49:33.700 That's all folks. Find more news streams, 777 00:49:33.860 --> 00:49:36.180 events and interviews at 778 00:49:36.180 --> 00:49:39.140 www.startupradio. 779 00:49:39.700 --> 00:49:42.020 remember, sharing is caring. 780 00:49:48.750 --> 00:49:55.260 Sam.