Welcome to the show I'm your host Nadia Atwal. Robotics is a hot topic, but most people don't really understand the details. Today I have a CEO who will really take us on a journey, so at the end of this interview hopefully we'll all be more of an expert. Welcome to the show, heat and sunpile. Thank you for having me. You chose this industry for yourself, you're the new CEO of Ryzen Robotics, and I want to know at what point did you decide this is the industry I want to dive into, this I want to be part of that. And how did your development then happen, how did you get where you are right now? Yeah, so I was in first grade and I was growing up in India and occasionally what would happen is that the single Indian TV channel would syndicate shows from all over the world. And one of the shows that they syndicated for kids was this Japanese show that had been dubbed into English and it was called Johnny Soko and his flying robot. And we didn't have a TV at the time and so I would be playing with kids in our backs the alley behind our house. And at some point one of the kids said, hey, it's time to go watch Johnny Soko. And I didn't know what that was, but they were all running and they were like, you're 10, why don't you come with us? And so I followed them and I got into their house and where all of us cramming around this small, it must have been like 13 inches black and white TV set to watch the show called Johnny Soko and his flying robot. And you know, since then I've gone back and watched it again and it was a very silly show, but it was a fun show for kids. And it was kind of like the tele-navela's art today where they would take the same sequence and play it multiple times. For example, the robot could shoot missiles out of their finger. So they would take a good 30 seconds to show a missile coming out of each finger, right? Because they needed the footage to make the show work. Stretching it. They were stretching it out and making the most use of screen time that they could. But I saw that show and I was kind of inspired. And a few weeks later I mentioned to one of my best friends, I said, I have a secret. I don't either tell anyone, you know, again, first grade. And he's like, what is your secret? And I said, when I grow up I'm going to build a flying robot. And he was like, oh, that's great. I'm not going to tell anyone I promised. And that was kind of the, that started the dream of, hey, I want to get into robotics. I want to do something cool. Haven't yet built flying robots, but been doing robots my entire career. Interesting. Including choosing that in university. What did you study? I studied computer engineering. And my senior project was a chess playing robot. A chess playing robot. You know, that's my claim to fame actually that I had a draw against a computer in chess. Oh, wow. One time in my life. But also I have not tried it recently. I was breaking about it for weeks and weeks. So it's a huge industry. A massive industry. Very competitive. You are now the new CEO of Rise Robotics. How are you making your mark? What are you guys doing differently from the competitors? Yeah. So I joined Rise Robotics because they have a technology that is nothing like I've seen before. So there isn't that much competition. The founding team at Rise Robotics, three of whom went to MIT, invented this new technology called Beltrolix. And Beltrolix is three times as fast as hydraulics. It's three times as efficient. It's three times as durable. It basically takes the fluid out of hydraulic system, then replaces it with pulleys and belts. It's also 80% of the weight. It helps electrify and automate heavy machines. And when I liked about the opportunity was I'd never seen anything like it. In fact, I had a friend who was working at Rise Robotics and I called him to just check up on how he was doing. And he mentioned he was working for this company and I said, what are they doing? And he said, well, they've invented something that replaces hydraulics. And I said, oh, I know what that looks like. It's like a screw tight actuator. And he said, no, no, we're doing it with belts. And my initial reaction was that's not possible. I don't think you can do that. And his response was, it didn't even check out the patents. And so I went and checked out the patents. And sure enough, there was something there. And I was like, you know, they might be onto something. So then I asked him if I could come visit the facility and see. And so he invited me over. And if you come to our headquarters at some point, which I hope you're able to make it to Boston, you'll see that we spent $0 on creature comforts. So when I showed up there, they're for just equipment. The chairs were stained, old chairs that they had purchased from somewhere. You know, there was everything looked like it was purchased used. And that was a great feeling for me because I don't, you know, when I look at a company or a startup that I want to join, I want to make sure, especially as a startup, that they're putting all of their money into research involved. Exactly. Instead of a fancy office. Or other things that just for the perceived reality, but they're not really bringing much to the table in terms of elevating the company. That's right. So the money is going where it should be going and developing the product. That's right. And that's what you saw. That's what I saw. So you didn't perceive it as like, oh, this looks a little outdated. Here I'm in a futuristic company. And it looks like that. You actually thought this actually shows me that they are really serious about building the company, not enriching themselves, but everything goes where it should go. That's right. I was in college during the .com boom. And I would read stories about a few years later about companies going out of business and sort of like these post-mortem of those companies. And in many of them, it was that the founders just spent way too much money. You'd hear about these $800 shares and this, you know, very luxury wooden tables and all of that stuff. That has stuck in my mind as something to watch out for when I see a startup. And anyway, so these guys definitely passed the test in terms of where the money was being put. And then I saw systems that were working. And then I realized that, okay, the technology risk has been basically addressed. And now the company is at a point where I can certainly help them scale. So that was kind of the impetus for me to join the company. So the drawlicks is something that most people don't know much about. It's not really on everybody's mind, but you think actually this is something people should think about. Yes, absolutely. Pretty much every heavy machine is powered by hydraulic systems. Anytime you have to push, pull, lift or lower a large amount of weight or apply a large amount of force in those directions, linearly you end up using a hydraulic system. These systems are the heavy machines actually are the backbone of our economy. The power sectors like transportation, logistics, maritime, forestry, mining, even defense. And so they make a huge impact on our daily lives. We just don't see them. And then they actually have a huge negative environmental impact because hydraulics is so inefficient. These heavy machines end up emitting half a million tons of carbon dioxide a year. But worse than that, they end up leaking 100 million gallons of hydraulic oil into the ground. And that hydraulic oil is hazardous. So the environment has to be cleaned up. It certainly costs companies money, but it also creates externalities for taxpayers. Interesting. So your company is doing something with a patent and product involved in it. So basically buy-by-competition on that front because you're very unique. So you are part of a 600 billion dollar market. How are you taking a big bite out of that industry? Yes, you're absolutely correct that hydraulics is a huge industry. It's a 600 billion dollar space. And then there are many beachhead markets that we could enter that end up being smaller and easier to break into. So the first thing that I did when I joined RISE Robotics is to review the strategy of the business. And by strategy, you know, people have these sort of ephemeral ideas of what strategy should be. But for me, it's really about resource allocation. And so what I wanted to do was because we were at startup and there were so many opportunities in the hydraulic space that we could disrupt, I decided to focus on things that were that we could get into market in six months to two years. McKinsey has this model. It's a little outdated, but it works for us. I call it the three horizons model, which is where companies need to focus their resources. And McKinsey, when they put the model together, they recommended that most companies put 60 to 70% of their resources into things that could be horizon one. So out in market in six months to two years, another 30% in horizon two. So those things that would be in market from two years to five years. And then five to 10% in horizon three things that were out going to be out in market five years plus. And they usually use this model for established companies that have a tendency to be myopic and quarter to quarter focused. So they're trying to get companies to push some of the R&D investment out. And what I wanted to do at Rise Robotics is to actually do the opposite. We did have projects that were going to be five years out. And I worked with the team to put them on hold. And I reallocated all the resources to things that we could get into market quickly. And there I looked at everything that we had on the shelf that we could convert to market. And I didn't look at new things that we wanted to invent. But I looked at things that were confident that there was customer demand in and that we had a low risk high conference path to getting to market. And I focused all the resources on those things. Okay. So what is your projection for the next year, the next few years, what do you see the company going and growing? I'm very excited about the company. We have three different areas of business. And I'll speak to them briefly. So the first area of business is our contracts with the Pentagon. What we've been doing for the Pentagon is building a new generation of munitions handling units. Making planes get loaded with munitions using these things that are called jammers. That's the colloquial term. And these jammers have been made out of hydraulic systems for the last 50 years. They leak. They image smoke. They're not quiet. So you have to wear ear protection and you're yelling. So they reduce the efficacy of the team. And when they leak, if you're trying to run around, it's a hazard. As I mentioned, they run on diesel because hydraulic systems are so inefficient. And even if you're doing a drill or an exercise, whether it's on the tarmac or inside a hanger, you end up inhaling diesel smoke. And so it's really not great for the quality of life for those folks that they've had our country. And the Department of Defense decided that they actually want to upgrade these systems. And they funded us to the tune of $3 million so far to build a replacement. And we built them a prototype, which actually got into the Guinness book as the world's strongest robotic arm. And we did that because we wanted to show the world that hydraulics, that our hydraulics replacement technology, Beltrolix is strong as hydraulics, which was a fun project to get that into the Guinness book. But now they've extended that contract with another $3 million and they want us to take this arm and convert it to a full system for evaluation. So that business is going well. In the end, I'm expecting the Pentagon to replace 1,500 of these systems at roughly $200,000 a piece. So it's a $300 million opportunity just on these systems. Plus there's support and logistics. So that part of the business is very, very exciting. And that's going to happen over the next five to 10 years. The second year off our business is our cylinders business. So when I joined Rise Robotics, if we wanted to build any kind of joint development, we would ask those companies to fly their engineers to our facilities to look at our tech. We didn't actually have something we could send them. And so I asked the team to run a quick project to build a sample unit that we could sell to anyone that wanted to evaluate our technology, making it easier for them to get our tech as opposed to sending their teams locally. And we started this project in Q4 of last year. Our target was April to finish it and to launch it at Bauma. Bauma is the world's largest construction show. It happens in Germany once every three years. So we launched the product in April. We ended up with 200 leads. We filtered them down and we found a new market for our cylinders, which is in the oil and gas space. So the oil and gas sector is an $11 billion time for our product. And we started a pilot two months ago, our first commercial pilot, which is very exciting. And we're working with the customer to upgrade the systems and really iterating quickly with them on product market fit so we can capture that space. And then our third business, which is a business that's going to get us to be a unicorn, is our liftgate business. So we have a partnership with Anthony Liff Gates. We build a full product, not just the cylinders. It's called a liftgate. And I don't know if you're familiar with lift gates, but they go on the backs of trucks. Anytime a store or a CVS needs something delivered, they usually have a distribution center. The distribution center has a dock and the truck loads the goods from the dock, but has to deliver them at ground level. And so the trucks need some way to bring these goods down. And what they use is typically call a liftgate. And these lift gates have all kinds of problems. They're not durable. They break down. They kill the battery because they take so much power. Sometimes trucks get stuck and someone has to come and restart the truck. Especially now cities have no idling laws. So you can't keep running the trucks and emitting diesel pollution. So that's really impacted the folks that are using these lift gates. So we build a system that is not only quiet and efficient, but it's also twice as fast. And so our customers can deliver an additional delivery every day on every route, which generates between $300 to $1200 more revenue for them. And that product and that market is actually recurring revenue business. Every one we talk to replaces 15% of their lift gates every year. So I can build it up like a SaaS business. And so once I get a customer, then I can use the same sales team to keep growing the business without actually growing the sales team, which is really exciting. And most SaaS businesses, once you hit $1 million in revenue, you can get them to be a billion dollar business in five years. So we're expecting to get to three million in revenues next year with our liftgate business. And in another four years, we can get to $100 million. We can get to $1 million in revenues and be worth a billion dollars. So I'm very excited about that business. Well, you also have a very good PR narrative going because on one hand, you have the innovation. And that makes you very unique. But then also you can double into the narrative of, well, look, we are the ones who are caring about the environment. We are caring about people that are working with these products because as you said, there is a health hazard involved on many fronts with the business as usual. But with your technology, you actually provide something that helps the environment, helps people in their life quality. Then you say it's also faster, more effective. I think this is a wonderful thing for investors. Yes, absolutely. And to your point, we don't approach our customers and we say, hey, buy this because it's environmentally better. We say buy this because it's three times faster. So you'll make at least three times more money. Buy this because it's three times as durable. So you'll have to replace the systems less frequently. Buy it because it's three times more efficient. So your operating expenses go down. And guess what? Your employees are going to love it too, right? Yeah. Well, in the end, whenever a saving cost is involved, anyone is happy. So I think your customer is always happy already because they get something that works but takes less time. So win-win situation. Absolutely. And since hydraulics is such a core part of the heavy industries that power our economy, anything rise robotics does to reduce the cost of those industries ultimately ends up reducing the cost of goods for the average person. So one of the things that gets me excited about the rise mission, certainly we're cleaning the environment. We're also going to improve the standard of living for everybody. So your company is making waves because it is unique, has very specific technologies. I could imagine that you don't have to go out and ask for investors. I can very much imagine that people are coming to you and say, hey, how can I get in? You're so spot on. So when I joined the company, Aaron Acosta, the previous CEO, I'm one of the co-founders who brought me on board, mentioned to me that people will get so excited about rise that even folks that would come and deliver parts to us would ask us what we're doing. We're in this large garage with a lot of heavy equipment, large cylinders and things like that. So people would be very, very curious. And once we explained to them what we were doing, usually the next question was, how can we get in on this just like you phrased it? And so we would ask them, we tell them, hey, or Aaron would tell them, hey, follow us on LinkedIn. And at the time I joined, we already had 1500 followers on LinkedIn. So when we were thinking about how we were going to raise the current round, we decided to open it up to retail investors. And there's this regulation that was passed during the Obama administration called REG CF. And so what that allows companies to do is to raise up to $5 million from retail investors who are not accredited. The only requirement is that they have to do it through a third party platform. And the platform does the vetting on both sides. They make sure that the company is legit and they make sure that the investors understand the risks. So we picked, there are many platforms out there. We picked this platform called WeFunder. And we launched our campaign in January. And we've raised, the campaign has been very successful. The most we can raise is $5 million. And we raised well over 80% of that. We have only 15% remaining in our round. The campaign closes November 20th. And so if people are interested, they can check us out on wefunder.com slash rise robotics. But what's interesting about our campaign, and this totally surprised us, we've ended up being the number one REG CF fundraiser in the Seattle Massachusetts. And you can imagine there are lots of robotics companies in that area. And we are in the top 80 of all time. And one of the reasons why our campaign has been so successful is that the terms that we offer retail investors are very similar to the terms that we offered our institutional investors in the previous round. So they know that they're getting a good deal because someone else is better at the terms for them. So that's been very, very exciting. And then after this round is closed, we'll have basically accomplished all of our goals, which is we wanted to go from a company that didn't have commercial products to a company that had pilots in the field. And then our next step, of course, is to take those pilots and turn them into scalable revenue. So next year, we're targeting $3.2 million in commercial revenues plus another 5 million in government contracts. So we're very excited about where we expect to be at the end of next year. Well, Hiten was such an amazing interview. I learned so much in a short time. And I understand the excitement for your company due to the various reasons that make you stand out. And I hope you will join us again in the not-to-distant future. Keep us posted on all your success. Thank you, Nadiya. Looking forward to it. Join us again next time.
