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Google Cloud wants to make it easier for data scientists to share models

Published November 8, 2018

Today, Google Cloud announced Kubeflow pipelines and AI Hub, two tools designed to help data scientists put to work across their organizations the models they create.

Rajen Sheth, director of product management for Google Cloud’s AI and ML products, says that the company recognized that data scientists too often build models that never get used. He says that if machine learning is really a team sport, as Google believes, models must get passed from data scientists to data engineers and developers who can build applications based on them.

To help fix that, Google is announcing Kubeflow pipelines, which are an extension of Kubeflow, an open-source framework built on top of Kubernetes designed specifically for machine learning. Pipelines are essentially containerized building blocks that people in the machine learning ecosystem can string together to build and manage machine learning workflows.

By placing the model in a container, data scientists can simply adjust the underlying model as needed and relaunch in a continuous delivery kind of approach. Sheth says this opens up even more possibilities for model usage in a company.

“[Kubeflow pipelines] also give users a way to experiment with different pipeline variants to identify which ones produce the best outcomes in a reliable and reproducible environment,” Sheth wrote in a blog post announcing the new machine learning features.

The company is also announcing AI Hub, which, as the name implies, is a central place where data scientists can go to find different kinds of ML content, including Kubeflow pipelines, Jupyter notebooks, TensorFlow modules and so forth. This will be a public repository seeded with resources developed by Google Cloud AI, Google Research and other teams across Google, allowing data scientists to take advantage of Google’s own research and development expertise.

But Google wanted the hub to be more than a public library — it also sees it as a place where teams can share information privately inside their organizations, giving it a dual purpose. This should provide another way to extend model usage by making essential building blocks available in a central repository.

AI Hub will be available in Alpha starting today with some initial components from Google, as well as tools for sharing some internal resources, but the plan is to keep expanding the offerings and capabilities over time.

Google believes if it provides easier ways to share model building blocks across an organization, the more likely they will be put to work. These tools are a step toward achieving that.

There’s a new PS4 Pro and it’s much quieter than the original

Published November 8, 2018

There’s a new Sony PS4 Pro and it’s much quieter than the original. Right now, it’s only available in a Red Dead Redemption bundle, but eventually, it will likely be available as a standalone product, too.

The new CUH-7200 version reportedly dropped the console’s noise from 50 decibels to 44 decibels, though, as EuroGamer notes, it can still top out at 48 decibels. The noise reduction is reportedly thanks to improved cooling, which in turn, reduces the strain on the cooling system within the PS4 Pro. The original PlayStation Pro came out two years ago, and at times, it can roar like a jet engine.

The revised model looks the same as the original, so check the model number on the box to ensure you’re getting the quieter option.

Zopa, the UK P2P lending company, closes £60M round on path to launching a bank

Published November 8, 2018

Obtaining a banking license and then launching an actual new retail bank requires capital. A lot of capital. Enter Zopa, the U.K. peer-to-peer lending company that wants to become a bank, which today is announcing that it has closed £60 million in further funding. Only £16 million is actually new new money, having already disclosed £44 million in August, so this is effectively an extension of that earlier fund-raise.

The purpose remains the same, however: Zopa says it will use the latest round of investment toward the capital needs for its yet-to-launch “next generation bank.” The company began applying for a bank license with the U.K. regulators in 2016. The new funding also comes off the back of what the fintech claims is its sustainable and profitable peer-to-peer business, having achieved full-year profitability in 2017 for the first time since 2012.

An early mover in the space — launching all the way back in 2005 — Zopa says it has served nearly half a million customers, either through loans or investing in peer-to-peer loans. It has lent more than £3.7 billion in unsecured personal loans to customers in the U.K.

The next phase of Zopa is all about becoming a new digital bank, alongside its peer-to-peer business, in order to be able to offer “a unique and broader set of products to customers.”

“Our bank will allow us to give more people a better experience with their finances by introducing more simple, fair products — like savings accounts and credit cards,” a company spokesperson tells me.

At launch this will include offering FSCS-protected savings accounts, and P2P investments (including IFISAs for investors), and personal loans, car finance and credit cards for people looking to borrow.

“Our money management app will offer our customers a more personalised approach to managing their money,” adds the spokesperson.

Cue Jaidev Janardana, Zopa CEO (pictured above): “This new funding takes us a step closer to realising our vision of being the best place for money in the U.K. Having served half a million customers to date, Zopa is set to redefine the finance industry once again through our next generation bank to meet a broader set of U.K. customers’ financial needs.”

Netflix’s hackathon produces a way to navigate its iOS app with ARKit and Face ID

Published November 7, 2018

Netflix’s internal hackathons have consistently produced fun and often silly hacks, from that “Netflixtendo” hack a few years ago that let you run Netflix on the original NES to the more recent “audiobook mode” that turned Netflix series into old-school radio shows by way of Audio Descriptions. This year’s hackathon doesn’t disappoint either, with new hacks that are both as goofy and interesting as in years past, including an AR and Face ID-powered hack that lets you navigate Netflix with just your eyes, another designed for “Sharknado” fans and more.

“Jump to Shark” lets viewers skip right to the good parts of the so-bad-it’s-good “Sharknado,” so they can watch the bloody action sequences with sharks, instead of having to sit through the movie’s actual plot. It’s pretty great, as the video shows.

The AR hack, Eye Nav, is fairly impressive, too.

The hack uses Apple’s ARKit and the technology that enables Face ID for tracking eye position and facial expressions. It tracks your eye position to move a pointer around the screen, then measures the time spent on the same area to trigger a “tap.”

If you want to dismiss a screen, you can just stick your tongue out.

While the resulting hack is definitely fun, there are also implications for accessibility use cases in the future.

The hack was produced in 24 hours, so it may not be stable enough for real-world use, but it’s definitely an interesting idea.

A third hack doesn’t involve Netflix, but rather the productivity software Slack, used by Netflix employees.

“LunchBot” connects co-workers who are too busy to go to lunch, by inviting them to eat lunch together — virtually, while in a Slack chat. The app also checks everyone’s calendars to make sure they’re free.

Other hacks this year included those for product improvements, enhancements to its internal tools and some that were just for fun. A few of these were showcased in its Hackday 2018 video, such as a map for locating studio production resources, an “easy login” system and a version of Animoji using Netflix characters.

But the larger goal of Netflix’s hackathon, as you can probably tell, isn’t necessarily about creating features that will later be productized (although, c’mon…Jump to Shark!), but they sometimes serve as inspiration for features further down the road, the company says.

CircleCI launches Orbs, a package manager for software delivery automation

Published November 7, 2018

DevOps platform CircleCI today announced a new partner program that will open up its platform and allow third-party tools to integrate with it. In addition, the company is launching Orbs, which it describes as “the world’s first package manager designed specifically for configuration of software delivery automation.”

Fresh off its $31 million funding round earlier this year, CircleCI is clearly on a mission to firmly plant its stake in the increasingly competitive continuous integration and delivery space. Its launch partners today include the likes of Cypress, JFrog, Pulumi, Sauce Labs, Sonatype and WhiteSource.

That partner program, though, mostly sets the stage for Orbs. The idea behind Orbs is to give the company’s users the ability to share their preferred CI/CD configuration across teams and projects by allowing them to package their commands, executors and jobs into a few lines of code. It’s basically a way to allow teams to automate more of their build/test/deploy workflow and share their best practices for configuring their software pipelines. For new users, these Orbs will also make it easier to get started without having to write a lot of boilerplate code.

CircleCI will offer its own set of certified Orbs, as well as those written by its partners. Currently, there are Orbs for working with Heroku and Amazon’s S3 and CodeDeploy, for example, as well as the obligatory Slack notification Orb. In total, CircleCI is launching 25 packages today.

“CircleCI Orbs are the most exciting thing in the CI world since Docker containers,” said Gleb Bahmutov, VP of Engineering at Cypress and an early-access orbs customer and contributor. “From a developer’s standpoint, orbs are a much-needed improvement from the regular ‘read the docs, copy/paste example, tweak for 30 minutes until CI passes’ — an outdated workflow. It’s an absolutely incredible experience.”

Tinder doubles down on its casual nature, as Match invests in relationship-focused Hinge

Published November 7, 2018

Tinder has never really shaken its reputation among consumers as a “hook up” app, instead of one designed for more serious dating. Now, it seems Tinder is planning to embrace its status as the default app for younger users who aren’t ready to settle down. According to Match Group CEO Mandy Ginsberg, speaking to investors on its Q3 earnings call this morning, Tinder is preparing to launch its first-ever brand marketing campaign that will promote the “single lifestyle” with billboard campaigns and other digital initiatives.

The move is something of an admission that Tinder isn’t working for helping people find long-term relationships.

“Tinder was such a phenomenon when it launched and spread so quickly that the market defined the brand, versus the business defining the brand,” said Ginsberg, referring to its “hook up app” reputation.

“Tinder’s brand particularly resonated with 18 to 25 year-olds because it provides a fun and easy way to meet people. Tinder sometimes gets a bad rap for being casual,” she then admitted. “But keep in mind that people in the late teens and early 20s are not looking to settle down. It is a time to explore and discover yourself, meeting lots of people and being social.”

Tinder’s new marketing campaign will focus on the “single journey,” the exec said.

The dating app maker has already started publishing content that’s relevant to this “single lifestyle” on its Swipe Life website with stories relating to dating styles, travel, food, and more. For example, some of its recent articles have included things like: “7 Exit Strategies for Terrible Dates,” “Tinder Diaries: Which of these 5 Guys Will Get the Date?,” and “Study Abroad Hookup Confessions.”

Definitely not material for the relationship-minded.

Now, the company will promote Tinder’s “single lifestyle” even further with billboards across major cities throughout the U.S., as well as on digital channels.

The campaign’s goal, explained Ginsberg, is about “further reinforcing how Tinder can enable users to make the most of this fun and adventurous time in their life.”

It’s not difficult to read between the lines here: Tinder’s business model succeeds among people who want to stay single. It succeeds when they’re retained in the app, continually swiping on to the next person they want to meet.

To be fair, Tinder has never really invested in many features that push people to go on dates or exit its app. Instead, it has added addictive features like an in-app news feed – like a social network would have – and tools that enhance in-app chats, like sharing GIFs.

If Tinder was Match’s only dating app, this narrow definition of an app for those embracing their “single lifestyle” would be a problem.

But Match’s strategy has been to diversify its lineup of dating apps. Now it’s a majority owner of dating app Hinge, whose focus has been on helping people get into relationships. In other words, when people are fed up with the ephemeral nature of Tinder, they can just switch apps – while remaining a Match customer, of course!

The company also says it will invest more in Hinge going forward – a move that’s not unrelated to the decisions Match is making around Tinder.

In fact, in another admission that Tinder wasn’t serving those in search of relationships, Ginsberg said Hinge will help the company to address the “previously underserved” audience of 20-somethings looking for a serious relationship.

She speaks of how Hinge’s user interface is clean and simple, and encourages people to be more thoughtful in their initial conversations. It’s a stark contrast to Tinder, which certainly does not.

Hinge downloads have increased five times since Match invested, the company also noted. It’s gaining traction in major cities throughout the U.S, including New York, as well as in international markets, like London.

The plan is to make Hinge the anti-Tinder, then pull in users as they exit Tinder in search of something real. The company said it’s going to increase the marketing spend on Hinge to drive awareness of the app across the U.S.

“We see a real opportunity to invest meaningful dollars in both products and marketing at Hinge to drive long-term growth,” said Ginsberg.

“We think it addresses a great gap in the market,” she continued. “If you think about when Tinder came into the market six years ago, it brought a whole new audience of young users, particularly college-age users. As they start to age…having a product that’s oriented to serious [dating] – but sort of mid-to-late 20s – is really compelling for us,” she added.

Tinder has evolved over the years from casual dating to include those who are more serious. But with Match’s decision to focus on those not looking for lasting relationships, it risks losing some users going forward. The challenge for the company is to pick them up in another dating app it owns, and not lose them to Bumble…or to an exit from dating apps altogether.

Guardian Circle upgrades with a decentralized alert network

Published November 7, 2018

Chris Hays and Mark Jeffrey wanted to create a way for everyone to be able to tell their loved ones if they were in trouble. Their first product, Guardian Circle, did just that, netting a mention a few years ago. Now the same team is truly decentralizing alerts with a new token called, obviously, Guardium.

The plan is to create an ad hoc network of helpers and first responders. “Guardium and Guardian Circle together open the emergency response grid to vetted citizens, private response and compatible devices for the very first time,” write the founders. “Providing an economic framework on our global distributed emergency response network; Guardium brings first responders to the 4 billion people on the planet without government-sponsored emergency response.”

Because the product already works, the team is taking on the token sale as a new challenge.

“We’re serial entrepreneurs — both of us have been venture-backed in the past by names like SoftBank and Intel, and we’ve been senior execs in companies backed by Sequoia and Elon Musk. Transitioning to the token sale-backed universe has been an interesting study in contrasts,” said Hays. “There are a number of ‘panic button apps’ — but without exception, all of them have forgotten ‘the second half of the problem’ — organizing the response. Getting people who do not know one another into instant communication and location sharing during an emergency — the importance of that cannot be overstated.”

The founders found that their idea wasn’t fundable in the valley. After all, what VC wants to help people when they can invest in Snapchat? Instead, Hays and Jeffrey are aiming bigger.

“We’re rebooting the world’s safety grid,” said Hays. “We’re creating a new global public utility. And we want it to service everyone, everywhere on earth. Although it is a very big vision, and it is a capitalist, multibillion dollar ecosystem that we’re chasing — it’s still a very different vision, and not the one venture capitalists are looking for.”

The token works to create a flash mob of help. Guard tokens pay first responders and dispatchers and “cities, campuses, and resorts stake $GUARD to access Alerts created within their geofenced borders,” allowing local folks to help immediately. They’ve sold half of their hard cap of $10 million thus far.

While tokens are always an iffy investment, this team has produced product and, more important, it’s clear they’ll never raise venture. A token, no matter how it’s used in the future, seems like a solid solution.

Spotify Connect speakers will soon work with its free tier

Published November 7, 2018

Spotify’s ad-supported tier has long been one of the service’s differentiators. Naturally, the model’s not nearly as feature-rich as its paid counterpart, though the company’s removing one of those key distinctions as of this morning.

In a press release, the company notes that free users will soon be able to stream music through Spotify Connect-sporting speakers. The newfound integration will work with hardware companies that switch to the new SDK.

Here’s your standard game-changer quote, this time from Senior Product Director Michael Ericsson: “The release of our new eSDK will change the game for Spotify’s Free users who want to enjoy music on their connected speakers. We look forward to supporting our partners over the coming months as they update existing speakers and bring new products to market.”

Most (around 104 million) of Spotify’s 191 million subscribers are free users. The tier has been a tremendous part of the service’s global growth, and it continues to be a difference as Apple Music gains a foothold, particularly here in the U.S.

Earlier this year, Spotify fleshed out its free offering, but Premium continues to offer some marked advantages. Along with getting rid of ads, it includes higher-quality streams and the ability to download offline tracks.

The disappearing Form D

Published November 7, 2018

We are experimenting with new content forms at TechCrunch. This is a rough draft of something new — provide your feedback directly to the authors: Danny at danny@techcrunch.com or Arman at Arman.Tabatabai@techcrunch.com if you like or hate something here.

Ignoring the midterm hysteria, we continue our obsession with SoftBank today by looking at the group’s IPO of its telecom unit. But first, some thoughts about Form Ds.

Recently, I was looking up the investment history of Patreon (Note: I was an investor in the company through my previous venture firm CRV). I did what I normally do: I went straight to the SEC’s EDGAR system and started searching for the company and its filings. And came up with nothing. Full-text search, office address searches and founder name searches — nothing was returned.

And yet, the company has publicly raised more than $100 million in venture capital according to Crunchbase, and to my knowledge, is not incorporated outside of the United States.

There should be a whole spate of filings, and yet none exist. What’s up with that?

After some investigation, my working hypothesis is that startups are (increasingly?) not filing disclosures with the SEC as a specific strategy to avoid scrutiny.

To take a step back, when companies take money from investors, they sell those investors securities. Under American laws, all securities need to be registered with the Securities and Exchange Commission using pre-defined templates (such as an S-1 registration form) to ensure that all investors know exactly what they are buying.

However, registration is expensive and time-consuming, and so U.S. law also provides a set of exemptions from registration for companies where that process is impractical. Startups take advantage of these exemptions and stay private, until they eventually want to become public through a registration with the SEC.

One mandated component of taking advantage of these registration exemptions is that the startup needs to file a Form D with the SEC. The Form D is free to file and relatively simple, requiring basic information such as the amount of capital fundraised and who the investors were in the round. It’s required to be filed 15 days after the first sale of securities, and, conveniently, the form preempts most state securities laws so that startups don’t have to file in state jurisdictions.

There are theoretically large penalties for failing to file — a company could open itself to investor lawsuits, and there are various financial felonies available that could be applied, as well.

But that’s legal theory, and the practicalities are that almost nothing bad happens to startups that fail to file a Form D. American courts, along with the SEC, have upheld that a startup does not lose its covered security exemption by failing to file the form. The only additional requirement is generally to file state security forms in lieu of the federal form.

A bigger question is why go through this when filing is easy and free? The obvious answer is that startups don’t want to put their round’s information out in the public eye where the good people at TechCrunch will see it and report on it. Of course, the whole point of Form D disclosure is to provide the public a modicum of information about what is happening in the economy.

But actually, the motivations go far beyond that. One reader, Paul David Shrader, saw our note yesterday that we were investigating Form Ds and offered this list of reasons on why companies in general (and to be clear, not specific to any company he has advised) choose to forgo filing:

As for the “why,” there are a few reasons why management, the board of directors, or even investors may be sensitive to fundraising disclosures:

1. The company doesn’t want the increased scrutiny internally that comes along with a new funding round. This can come from employees demanding different levels of compensation.

2. The company doesn’t want increased regulatory scrutiny. Many startups operate in regulatory gray areas, and increased attention from regulators before they are ready can be a Bad Thing.

3. The company has security concerns. For startups that operate in certain environments internationally, raising a monster round can place a target on the backs of its employees. This has been an issue in Latin America from time to time.

4. The company has competitive concerns. Raising a big round may attract new entrants to the market or heighten attention from existing competitors before a startup has solidified its position in the market.

5. Investors don’t want disclosure. Some investors want to disclose new investments on their own timeframe, and they make this a condition of their investment. Publicly-traded investors or sovereign wealth funds may only want to disclose at the time of their quarterly reports.

6. Flat rounds or down rounds can suck away any positive momentum. When founders are trying to convince customers and employees to join the rocket ship that is their company, a flatlining fundraise can look like… well, a flatlining company.

7. The round may not be closed yet. Companies sometimes have optimistic goals about the size of a round (“We’re raising $4 million!”), but only have a smaller amount committed at the outset of the round. Sometimes a single round can take 18+ months to close, even though a sizable (or not so sizable) percentage closed at the outset.

Some of these are obvious, but others, such as internal compensation concerns or international security concerns, were more surprising to me. Thanks Paul David for the thoughts.

Now, I said at the outset that my hypothesis is that startups are increasingly foregoing Form D disclosure. Arman and I are still doing work on this (the SEC has some data sets), but to be frank, it is very hard to operationalize and prove. Form D filings are up or steady, which makes sense given that the number of startups in areas like San Francisco have skyrocketed over the past decade. We are trying to prove something that doesn’t exist, and Karl Popper has helpfully explained that that is impossible.

Nonetheless, we are still interested in whether the legal norms have shifted here, and will hopefully report back on this again. If you are a startup attorney with an opinion here, please email Danny@techcrunch.com or Arman.tabatabai@techcrunch.com with your thoughts.

SoftBank’s telecom IPO weirdness

Photo by Alessandro Di Ciommo/NurPhoto via Getty Images

Talking about filings, one of the most complicated filings in the world is underway. While we were digging into SoftBank’s financing strategies yesterday, all the activity around the looming IPO of its telco business caught our attention.

As we analyzed yesterday, though SoftBank’s debt balance continues to balloon, the company’s balance sheet has rarely prevented it from pursuing investments in the past.

SoftBank continues to dole out multi-billion-dollar checks with stunning regularity, having invested around one-third of its $90+ billion Vision Fund. And we know SoftBank has no intention of slowing its torrid pace, with chairman and CEO Masayoshi Son previously stating he plans to raise $100 billion funds that would spend around $50 billion annually, every two or three years.

One way SoftBank is looking to access additional funding to pour into the next batch of unicorns is by taking a portion of its Japanese mobile business public. For some context, SoftBank is generally considered to be the third largest telco in Japan behind NTT DoCoMo and KDDI.

Even though initial estimates expect SoftBank to only sell around 30-40 percent of the company’s shares, the offering is widely expected to be one of the largest listings ever at potentially more than $25 billion, which would value the overall business at $90 billion on the high end. Reuters recently reported via a Japanese news service that the Tokyo Stock Exchange is expected to give SoftBank approval to list shares next Monday, with a likely listing date of December 19th.

But the progression of the IPO has been oddly complex and unique from the beginning.

First, there was an issue with a set of bonds SoftBank had issued in 2013, which were guaranteed by the telecom business and had covenants requiring that the company hold investment-grade credit ratings before pursuing a sale of any sort. However, SoftBank’s bonds hold junk status from major credit ratings agencies. To fix that roadblock, SoftBank issued a new set of bonds with better terms to buy back the bonds with the prohibitive covenants, undercutting and aggravating some investors of the initial bonds.

Then, it was reported that while lining up the underwriting banks for the IPO, SoftBank reportedly asked banks to commit to loans to the Vision Fund that total around $9 billion, a claim SoftBank has not commented on. As reported by Bloomberg:

The IPO’s top underwriters, which include Nomura Holdings Inc. and Goldman Sachs Group Inc., have given non-binding assurances while they finalize terms of the loan to the Vision Fund, the people said. Stakes in around five of the investment fund’s holdings will be used as collateral, according to the people, who asked not to be identified because the information is private.

Deutsche Bank AG, Mizuho Financial Group Inc. and Sumitomo Mitsui Financial Group Inc. were also among banks chosen to lead SoftBank’s wireless unit IPO, Bloomberg News reported last week. Details of the loan are still being worked out, and terms could change, the people said. Meanwhile, Deutsche Bank and Goldman Sachs committed about $1 billion each, they said.

While the fund’s holdings (perhaps Uber or WeWork or others) would be set as collateral, Bloomberg also reported in the same article that the loans were non-recourse, meaning that if for some reason SoftBank were unable to repay the loan, the lenders would have no claim to any assets outside of the company stakes set as collateral. The loan terms become more concerning with the Vision Fund since it invests in many unlisted and, in many cases, unprofitable companies. As we noted yesterday, at least one potential lender, Bank of America, decided not to participate due to concerns that the terms were too risky.

Such sausage-making isn’t usually visible to the public, which would seem to indicate that at least some of the banks are grousing to reporters about terms they find egregious. As always, feel free to grouse to us as well.

What’s next

Definitely drop us a line if you have thoughts about Form Ds or SoftBank — we are continuing to investigate

Reading docket

What we are reading (or at least, trying to read)

Politico EU’s What the US midterms mean for the world
The Atlantic’s The Bus Is the Best Public Transit for Cities
Daniel J Hopkins’ The Increasingly United States (about how U.S. elections are more national and less local than ever before)
Bloomberg’s piece called “The $6 Trillion Barrier Holding Electric Cars Back ”
The New Yorker piece called “Why Doctors Hate Their Computers”
Eliot Peper’s new science fiction novel Borderless
A new report about China’s military and its deep connections into American academic research
“LA Is Trying to Fix its Prostitution Problem by Banning Right Turns at Night—and it Might be Working” — intriguing headline, let’s see if it follows through
The Information’s deep dive into white-collar crime and lack of prosecution thereof in Silicon Valley

The cost of energy storage has stalled adoption of renewable power. Energy Vault has a solution.

Published November 7, 2018

Because solar and wind power are now cheaper to produce than energy from fossil fuels, the only obstacle that remains to the mass adoption of renewable power is the amount of money utilities need to spend to store the energy those systems produce.

Right now, storing 100 megawatts of renewable energy (enough to power roughly 600,000 homes) means spending roughly $65.6 million on massive batteries like the kind made by Tesla, or relying on huge pumped hydro-electric storage projects that essentially create man-made dams where the release of water spins turbines to generate energy (those projects are typically far larger than 100 megawatts).

A new company called Energy Vault, launched from Bill Gross’ Idealab incubator in Pasadena, Calif., has developed a technology, based on the principles of pumped hydro storage, that it claims can slash the cost of energy storage to a fraction of the current price and make renewable energy cost-effective all day, every day.

As climate change worries mount, finding a solution that can make renewables even more compelling and cost-effective isn’t just a good business — it’s a global priority.

Energy Vault’s technology consists of a 33-story-high, six-armed crane with booms extending to nearly the length of a football field (about 87 yards). That crane is surrounded by 5,000 huge concrete blocks weighing roughly 35 metric tons altogether (or around 172,000 pounds).

“These would typically be built out near wind farms or solar plants,” said Robert Piconi, the chief executive of Energy Vault. “This is not something that you’d drop in the middle of the city.”

The cranes are controlled by a software system that manages the movement of the cement blocks to either store the energy generated by solar or wind farms, or discharge that energy onto the power grid.

According to Piconi, each of the company’s systems will have 35 megawatt hours of nominal energy capacity and 4 megawatts of peak power capacity. Ramp times occur in as little as a millisecond with 100 percent power achieved in 2.9 seconds.

The systems have roundtrip efficiencies of roughly 90 percent and there’s no energy loss, as the technology relies on mechanical energy from incredibly durable materials that have a roughly 30-year lifetime.

And all of this at a price tag of around $7 million to $8 million per system, according to Piconi. What makes the system even more sustainable, according to Piconi, is the use of recycled concrete that was only going to be landfilled — instead of new cement construction.

Energy Vault has already set up a demonstration system in Biasca, Switzerland, next to the company’s Lugarno headquarters. That demonstration plant likely had a role in the company’s ability to sign up a clutch of initial customers, including The Tata Power Company Limited, India’s largest integrated power company, to deploy an initial 35 MWh Energy Vault system by 2019.

“Innovation in energy storage represents the largest and most near-term opportunity to accelerate renewable deployments and bring us closer to replacing fossil fuels as the primary source to meet the world’s continual growth in energy demand,” said Bill Gross, co-founder, Energy Vault and founder of Idealab. “We’re excited to support Energy Vault in bringing this groundbreaking technology to the market.”

Indeed, over the next two years, Energy Vault expects customers to build between 500 megawatts and one gigawatt of storage capacity using its systems, according to Piconi.

“We have customers on every continent to build these units,” he said.

Piconi, a former Danaher executive, met Gross 12 years ago as the Idealab founder was beginning his push into renewable energy technologies. The two men stayed in touch and began seriously contemplating the creation of Energy Vault after nearly a decade of collaboration and contact.

It was back in 2017 that Piconi, Gross and fellow co-founder and chief technical officer Andrea Pedretti hit upon the idea for Energy Vault’s novel approach to energy storage.

“It became clear to him a few years ago how important storage was going to be,” said Piconi.

The three men started looking at the efficiencies available through pumped hydroelectric storage, and began brainstorming ways to mimic that process using mechanical energy. “We looked at a steel tower first, but that was too expensive. We thought about water in a tower pumped up, but there were efficiency issues there,” Piconi said. “Then we got to the concrete bricks and the crane.”

The concrete was important for the cost of materials, and because of the energy intensity and pollution that’s involved with manufacturing cement, the team decided to use recycled cement to make the blocks that its energy storage system would use.

Enter, Cemex, one of the largest cement manufacturers in the world, which has joined with Energy Vault as a partner.

Energy Vault has already raised capital through several “seed” rounds to develop its technology and get the prototype in Switzerland up and running.

“Energy Vault’s team has developed a disruptive platform, and we are enthusiastic to work with their team to deploy an environmentally efficient and cost-effective energy storage solution that is highly viable,” said Dr. Davide Zampini, head of Cemex Global R&D and IP. “We share a common commitment to enable a future where resources are used responsibly, which is paramount to Cemex’s strategy for sustainable development.”