This Stove Company Wants to Change How the World Uses Energy

Summary

Odd Lots Podcast Summary
Episode Title: This Stove Company Wants to Change How the World Uses Energy
Release Date: December 16, 2024
Hosts: Joe Weisenthal and Tracy Alloway
Guest: Sam D'Amico, CEO of Impulse Labs

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Introduction

In this episode of Bloomberg's Odd Lots, hosts Joe Weisenthal and Tracy Alloway engage in an in-depth conversation with Sam D'Amico, the CEO of Impulse Labs, a pioneering company based in San Francisco aiming to revolutionize household energy usage through innovative stove technology. The episode delves into the intersection of consumer appliances, energy storage, manufacturing, and policy, presenting a multifaceted view of how a seemingly simple household device can have profound implications for the broader energy landscape.

---

The Genesis of Impulse Labs and the Revolutionary Stove

[00:34 - 03:37]

Sam D'Amico begins by sharing his journey from working in consumer hardware, particularly in AR and VR technologies with notable projects like Google Glass and Oculus, to founding Impulse Labs. His passion for cooking and the desire to create a superior pizza oven led him to conceptualize a tabletop pizza oven capable of producing a perfect pizza in under 45 seconds. However, he encountered a significant challenge: the immense power requirement of over 10,000 watts, far exceeding standard kitchen outlets.

Notable Quote:

"I realized that if you put a battery in a device like that, you could actually get that high power for a very short period of time."
— Sam D'Amico [05:32]

This epiphany led to the integration of battery storage into household appliances, allowing for high-intensity performance without being tethered to wall power. This innovation not only enhances appliance functionality but also envisions a decentralized, resilient energy grid.

---

Innovative Technology: High-Power Induction Stoves

[05:51 - 18:49]

D'Amico elucidates the technical aspects of Impulse Labs' stove, highlighting its ability to deliver 10,000 watts of power through an integrated 3-kilowatt-hour lithium iron phosphate (LiFePO₄) battery. This allows the stove to achieve feats such as boiling a liter of water in under 40 seconds, vastly outperforming conventional induction and gas stoves.

Notable Quotes:

"We've been able to put 10,000 watts versus like 3,000 watts into an induction burner."
— Sam D'Amico [10:18]

"It's like under 40 to get a liter boil. Yeah, so like a cup is under 10 seconds."
— Sam D'Amico [10:04]

The stove's performance is complemented by advanced temperature sensing technology inspired by LiDAR, enabling precise control and consistency in cooking. This technology ensures that the stove can dynamically adjust power output based on real-time cooking conditions, resulting in perfectly cooked meals with minimal intervention.

---

Energy Vision and Grid Decentralization

[14:02 - 17:39]

A significant portion of the discussion centers on the broader energy implications of integrated battery storage in household appliances. D'Amico envisions a future where appliances like stoves not only perform their primary functions but also act as distributed energy storage units, contributing to a decentralized energy grid. This approach can alleviate the need for extensive transmission infrastructure upgrades by locally managing energy demand and supply.

Notable Quote:

"If you can put battery storage to charge up kind of over time using whatever capacity of the wires is available, then the battery can be available to provide that peak demand when it's needed right at the point of demand."
— Sam D'Amico [15:02]

This decentralized model leverages the ubiquitous presence of household appliances to create a resilient energy network, reducing the strain on the traditional grid and facilitating the integration of renewable energy sources.

---

Manufacturing Challenges and Supply Chain Management

[17:39 - 21:55]

D'Amico discusses the complexities of manufacturing such an advanced appliance, emphasizing the need for vertical integration and collaboration with consumer electronics manufacturers. Unlike traditional appliance manufacturers that often rely on generic parts, Impulse Labs develops custom components, including power electronics and temperature sensors, to meet their specific requirements.

Notable Quote:

"We actually vertically integrate a lot more of the technology stack from everything from the power electronics to the sensors, to be able to custom design a battery designed for our application."
— Sam D'Amico [18:03]

The company navigates a challenging supply chain landscape by partnering with industry-leading manufacturers and leveraging experiences from the consumer electronics sector. This strategic approach ensures the seamless integration of high-performance batteries and sophisticated control systems within the stove.

---

Policy Implications and Regulatory Landscape

[24:15 - 29:00]

The conversation shifts to the policy environment surrounding battery manufacturing and energy storage. D'Amico highlights the current focus on automotive battery production in the U.S., noting a gap in batteries available for consumer appliances.

Notable Quotes:

"There's an interesting gap of batteries for everyone else and for, you know, people doing weird things like us."
— Sam D'Amico [25:30]

He advocates for streamlined regulations and standardized rules to facilitate the rapid deployment of distributed energy technologies. Drawing parallels with Europe, where energy markets are more deregulated and standardized, D'Amico suggests that the U.S. could benefit from similar approaches to accelerate the adoption of distributed energy solutions.

Notable Quote:

"In Europe, it's like you get this one certification and you're able to just plug in. Whereas in the US it's not just you have to navigate a very small window of what's possible."
— Sam D'Amico [29:00]

D'Amico also addresses potential impacts of tariffs and trade policies on manufacturing costs, emphasizing the importance of selecting manufacturers with diversified locations to mitigate risks associated with geopolitical tensions.

---

Safety Considerations with Integrated Batteries

[43:20 - 46:26]

Addressing safety concerns, D'Amico explains that the stove utilizes lithium iron phosphate batteries, known for their thermal stability and reduced fire risk compared to traditional lithium-ion batteries. The integrated system is rigorously tested to comply with industry safety standards, ensuring that the appliance operates safely under various conditions.

Notable Quote:

"We're using lithium iron phosphate, not lithium ion. And what that means is it actually does not supply enough of its own oxygen to like sustain a fire by itself."
— Sam D'Amico [43:20]

D'Amico contrasts their safe battery design with the problematic batteries used in electric scooters, highlighting the advantages of their integrated and co-designed charger-battery systems.

---

Commercial Applications and Future Prospects

[37:52 - 42:51]

Impulse Labs' stove technology holds significant promise beyond residential use. D'Amico envisions applications in the commercial sector, such as in restaurants, where consistency and efficiency in cooking are paramount. Collaborations with professional chefs and partnerships with establishments like Mr. Ju's in San Francisco demonstrate the stove's potential to enhance culinary processes.

Notable Quote:

"It's like, we actually have to prove that electric is better. You can't just guilt trip people into saying electric is better."
— Sam D'Amico [10:18]

Additionally, the stove's ability to maintain precise temperatures can revolutionize cooking techniques, enabling methods like conductive sous vide cooking directly on the stovetop without the need for separate water baths.

---

Financing and Growth Strategy

[33:41 - 36:20]

Financing hardware startups poses unique challenges, particularly regarding working capital and supply chain financing. D'Amico discusses the reliance on venture debt and pre-orders as key strategies to bridge the financing gap between product development and market launch.

Notable Quote:

"There's a missing gap in that space that's like mostly addressed by venture debt."
— Sam D'Amico [33:41]

Impulse Labs aligns with venture capital firms like Lux Capital, which offer multi-stage support and strategic patience essential for developing complex hardware products. This partnership ensures sustained growth and the ability to navigate the intricacies of manufacturing and market adoption.

---

Conclusion and Final Thoughts

[51:23 - End]

The episode concludes with reflections on the transformative potential of Impulse Labs' stove technology. While acknowledging initial skepticism, the hosts and D'Amico express optimism about the future of smart appliances in shaping energy usage and enhancing everyday life.

Notable Quote:

"This is something that's much more of a. Like we are fundamentally changing how every device connects to the grid by putting battery storage integrated into it."
— Sam D'Amico [32:13]

The stove serves as a "Trojan horse" for broader discussions on energy decentralization, manufacturing innovation, and the evolving regulatory landscape, making it a focal point for multiple themes explored in the Odd Lots podcast.

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Key Takeaways

1. Innovative Integration: Impulse Labs' stove integrates high-capacity batteries with induction cooking technology, enabling unprecedented performance and energy flexibility.

2. Energy Decentralization: By embedding energy storage in appliances, the company envisions a decentralized grid that reduces reliance on traditional power infrastructure and enhances grid resilience.

3. Manufacturing Excellence: Vertical integration and partnerships with consumer electronics manufacturers are pivotal in overcoming manufacturing challenges and ensuring product reliability.

4. Policy Advocacy: Streamlined regulations and standardized certifications are essential for the rapid adoption of distributed energy technologies in the U.S., taking cues from more deregulated markets like Europe.

5. Safety First: Using lithium iron phosphate batteries and co-designed charging systems ensures the safety and reliability of the integrated stove, addressing common concerns associated with battery storage.

6. Commercial Potential: Beyond residential use, the technology holds significant promise for commercial applications, offering consistency and efficiency in professional cooking environments.

7. Financing Strategy: Leveraging venture debt and strategic partnerships with experienced venture capital firms is critical for hardware startups to bridge the financing gap and achieve sustainable growth.

---

Notable Quotes with Timestamps

• Sam D'Amico [05:32]: "I realized that if you put a battery in a device like that, you could actually get that high power for a very short period of time."
• Sam D'Amico [10:04]: "It's like under 40 to get a liter boil. Yeah, so like a cup is under 10 seconds."
• Sam D'Amico [15:02]: "If you can put battery storage to charge up kind of over time using whatever capacity of the wires is available, then the battery can be available to provide that peak demand when it's needed right at the point of demand."
• Sam D'Amico [29:00]: "In Europe, it's like you get this one certification and you're able to just plug in. Whereas in the US it's not just you have to navigate a very small window of what's possible."
• Sam D'Amico [43:20]: "We're using lithium iron phosphate, not lithium ion. And what that means is it actually does not supply enough of its own oxygen to like sustain a fire by itself."
• Sam D'Amico [32:13]: "This is something that's much more of a. Like we are fundamentally changing how every device connects to the grid by putting battery storage integrated into it."

---

Conclusion

This episode of Odd Lots provides a comprehensive exploration of how a modern stove can be at the forefront of energy innovation. By integrating high-capacity batteries, precision temperature control, and smart energy management, Impulse Labs is not only enhancing household cooking experiences but also contributing to a transformative vision of a decentralized and resilient energy grid. The discussion underscores the importance of technological innovation, strategic manufacturing, supportive policy frameworks, and robust financing strategies in driving forward such pioneering ventures.

Transcript

[Wells Fargo Representative]

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[Jill Wiesenthal]

Meta's open source A models are available.

[Sam D'Amico]

To all, not just the few.

[Jill Wiesenthal]

Because they're open source, small businesses, students.

[Sam D'Amico]

And more can download and build with.

[Tracy Alloway]

Them at no cost.

[Jill Wiesenthal]

Learn more about the [e-mail] Open.

[Tracy Alloway]

Bloomberg Audio Studios Podcasts Radio News.

[Jill Wiesenthal]

Hello and welcome to another episode of the OddLawds podcast. I'm Jill Wiesenthal.

[Tracy Alloway]

And I'm Tracy Alloway.

[Jill Wiesenthal]

Tracy, we just had like one of the most amazing steaks of our life.

[Tracy Alloway]

It was really good. I just ate the cap and it was delicious.

[Jill Wiesenthal]

It was so good. And you and I are both into steak. We're both steak.

[Tracy Alloway]

I like steak.

[Jill Wiesenthal]

And you're like, also have particularly exacting standards for steak.

[Tracy Alloway]

I don't think it's exacting. I just like my steak cooked a particular way. I like it black and blue. Which is weirdly controversial at some steak restaurants, I think, because they have like health and safety rul about serving raw meat. Raw and burnt meat. Yeah, but that's the way I like it.

[Jill Wiesenthal]

I like it. I'm more, I'm more of a medium rare guy, but I do mid, very mid Joe. Very mid, very mid take. Yeah. But yes, we just had an amazing steak. And, you know, listeners might be wondering why.

[Tracy Alloway]

Why we're eating steak.

[Jill Wiesenthal]

Well, why we're talking about steak and why we would be introducing an episode based on the fact that we just had steak.

[Tracy Alloway]

So, full disclosure, Joe came to me before we started this episode and said, I really want to interview the STO company out in San Francisco. And I was kind of like a stove company. Like, are we doing consumer goods reviews now? But after seeing the stove and hearing more of the overall pitch, I kind of get it. Like, I hadn't realized the scale of ambition here, but it is really interesting. It's not just a stove.

[Jill Wiesenthal]

So on Twitter, I would say over the last six to nine months, every once in a while I'll see a video of someone who made a pilgrimage to San Francisco and they're like, oh my God, I just had this crazy steak. And so in my mind When I knew that we were coming out here, I was like, we should learn about this crazy steak. But actually it's not the steak though, that was good. It's the stove that made the steak. And if a bunch of people feel the need to tweet about a particular stove that they saw when they came here, it's like we should also make that same.

[Sam D'Amico]

Yeah.

[Tracy Alloway]

And as we just learned, it's not just the stove either. There's also a battery component which gets into some really interesting energy ideas.

[Jill Wiesenthal]

There's a whole energy vision.

[Tracy Alloway]

Yeah.

[Jill Wiesenthal]

So why don't we just kick it off. We are going to be talking about steak. We're going to be talking about stoves, eggs again. We're going to be talking about electrification. We are going to be talking. Yeah.

[Tracy Alloway]

About American culture wars over gas versus electric stoves.

[Jill Wiesenthal]

We're going to be talking about manufacturing. There is a lot of meat here, so to speak, for Odlad's.

[Tracy Alloway]

You've been waiting to unveil that one.

[Jill Wiesenthal]

So we have, yeah. The perfect guest. We are going to be speaking with Sam D'Amico. He is the CEO of Impulse Labs, the maker of the legendary stove. We can confirm they were really good.

[Tracy Alloway]

And the whole point was it, yeah.

[Jill Wiesenthal]

It was perfect steak.

[Tracy Alloway]

It was so nice.

[Jill Wiesenthal]

They said they are legendary. Sam, thank you so much for coming on ODLAT and cooking us a steak.

[Sam D'Amico]

Thanks for coming to the office so I didn't have to go anywhere.

[Jill Wiesenthal]

Yeah, I'm trying to think where to begin, actually. Obvious question which is, you know, there are a lot of software companies around here, there are a lot of AI companies. What moved you to launch a stove company?

[Sam D'Amico]

That's a fun one. So it's, it's actually funny is I. I've been in consumer hardware basically for the past 10 plus years working on a number of different AR VR headset programs. So, you know, infamous ones like Google Glass or famous ones, depending on your interpretation of that was at Oculus, kind of as they got acquired, joined the, joined the team, got to kind of shepherd the first true consumer product of theirs to market by basically being one of the people at the factory, like helping bring the factory up from the ground up. Also worked on a couple other programs including like headsets, VR controllers, stuff like that. So I've been in kind of hardware, but not culinary. I've been into cooking for a long time. Personally it was this sort of like some family background, but also I like to cook the food from the places I visit. So I got really into cooking like Chinese food got like a. Got like one of those outdoor skewer grills. And then at one point I kind of got fixated on pizza. And I was like, I want to cook a pizza really fast.

[Tracy Alloway]

It is surprisingly difficult to build a proper pizza oven. And I have looked into this and I am very intimidated.

[Sam D'Amico]

So I think this was 2019 timeframe. I got fixated on the pizza problem and I. And I was like, it would be amazing if you could make a tabletop pizza oven that was as good as these like fancy brick ovens that could get a pizza out in like 45 seconds or something like that. And I was like, what is the actual power requirement to do this? And I realized that I was like in the 10,000 plus watts zone. So for reference, that's like six times more than the plug in your kitchen. And I was like, okay, but how often am I actually putting a pizza into the oven and blasting it with heat? And I'm like, probably not most of the time. Probably like a small fraction of the time. And that's when I realized that if you put a battery in a device like that, you could actually get that high power for a very short period of time. And then without having to, you know, basically like dedicated watt, the restraint is.

[Jill Wiesenthal]

No longer the wall plug, the constraint.

[Sam D'Amico]

Is no longer the wall plug, because you can then cram a lot of energy into a short period of time versus spreading it out over a long period of time. And that was the first sort of light bulb. Like, okay, you could now make appliances that didn't previously exist. And there was a lot of talk about smart appliances, you know, Juicero being a great example, stuff like this where there was like a subscription model or there was like a smart aspect to this. And I was like, but there wasn't a way to actually increase performance. And this was the first thing I could think of that would actually let you do that. And this is the reason why this whole industry is stagnated. It's kind of like cars, where until EV showed up, there was not really competitive pressure to really innovate on a number of different things in vehicles. Like, every vehicle has the same vendor for infotainment system, for instance, and things like that. So I was like, this is a big deal. Now. The second part was, what if you did this in an installed appliance and how big would the battery be? And I realized that once you put it in like a stove oven, hot water heater, laundry machine, that battery is like a third of a powerwall or a quarter of a powerwall, so equivalent of like a full size home battery system. And so now you could actually change the grid at a fundamental level. You could basically deploy enough batteries through this trojan horse of the appliances to actually reshape the grid in a resilient, distributed way, with essentially the idea of a power plant pushed all the way into people's homes, Basically.

[Tracy Alloway]

I want to get more into the sort of mini energy distribution system that you're envisioning. But before we do, can I ask the basic question, which is why do so many people in America seem to dislike electric stoves?

[Sam D'Amico]

Because electric stoves are terrible and have, in some sense, defamed themselves through bad technology. And I have to be clarifying. The electric stove that has defamed itself through bad technology is the electric stove that most people have, which is either of two types. The ones with the coils that are elevated above the surface and give inconsistent heating to the pan and also take a very long time to heat up and all this other stuff. Or those radiant electric cooktops where it's basically like an infrared light bulb below the counter that also, because it's very high temperature, if anything spills, it scorches it completely, and it's really hard to deal with. Induction has actually been a lot better, but then there's a lot of fear, uncertainty, and doubt where people are like, are my pans compatible? All these other things. And many people have not had an induction stove experience in the United States. So their probable experience they've had with an electric stove is a terrible one. And that means that when you compare that with gas, you're like, okay with gas. I adjust the knob. It directly controls the flame to the pan. I get that direct feedback. I can actually feel like I'm in control. You don't get that necessarily with electric in the same way.

[Jill Wiesenthal]

Okay, so induction stoves already exist. There is a market for them. You have innovated on them by including a battery so that they can get to high intensity for a short period of time, or you can get high intensity without the constraint of the plug in your house or apartment. Is there anything on it? We just got this extremely impressive demo.

[Sam D'Amico]

That's 10 kilowatts of power going into this burner.

[Tracy Alloway]

Oh, yeah, you can see the bubbles. Yeah, it's already simmering. We never thought this would be so exciting, but you have four people staring at a pot of boiling water.

[Jill Wiesenthal]

This is the first time where if you watch the pot boil, if you watch the water boil, it actually does boil.

[Sam D'Amico]

We're debunking that.

[Jill Wiesenthal]

Yeah, that's insane.

[Sam D'Amico]

And then it'll boil much more angrily when you've seen it.

[Jill Wiesenthal]

So what was that, like 30 seconds from when you poured the water?

[Sam D'Amico]

It's like under 40 to get a liter boil. Yeah, so like a cup is under 10 seconds.

[Jill Wiesenthal]

So you boil water in, you know, 40 seconds. Steak came out perfectly. What else, tech wise, had to happen for you to make this really good stuff?

[Sam D'Amico]

The story was basically kind of resuming from, hey, what installed appliances we want to do. The stove culture war kind of came to mind first because we're like, we actually have to prove that electric is better. You can't just guilt trip people into saying electric is better. To electrify homes, we basically need to have better products, period. And so the goal here was to target the one that was the spiciest, because that's the one where we could probably show off the best and have like the most buzz around it, which was the stove. The first thing we were doing was like, okay, once you integrate a battery into the product. And so for reference, this is a medium sized battery, it's 3 kilowatt hours, which is roughly 30 times as big as your laptop's battery, for reference on that. And about one twentieth the size of a Tesla Model 3 battery, to give you kind of an intermediate scale of what that is. So we put the battery in there. That gives us an extra 15,000 watts on top of the maybe 1500 watts that like a normal plug would get you. So you get a ton of power available in the device. So we were like, let's just make that available in the burner. And so we developed a technology to put 10,000 watts versus like 3,000 watts into an induction burner, meaning that a liter of cold water boils in under 40 seconds versus two and a half to three minutes like a normal induction stove, or seven minutes for a typical gas stove. So we've been able to do these side by side comparisons where literally the watch pot is boiling in our video and you cut off before there's even bubbles in the gas stove video.

[Jill Wiesenthal]

Oh, that's cool.

[Tracy Alloway]

So with the battery, if I have, for instance, solar panels at my house, and now I have this appliance that comes with a battery, I can collect some of the energy that the panels are generating during the day, store it for cooking at night.

[Sam D'Amico]

Yes. And so the product basically is we're able to run off of whatever energy your home is producing. So if you've got solar panels in your house, they can preferentially Charge the battery at those times. We've actually, like, ensured this whole thing is software defined, so we're able to accommodate kind of what people would want to do in these sort of situations, basically. But you could imagine that the system works identically to a existing home battery system. It just happens to be, like installed inside a stove, basically.

[Tracy Alloway]

So does that mean you're not just competing with GE or some maker of household appliances, you're also competing with battery companies, like maybe a Tesla?

[Sam D'Amico]

Yeah, I don't want to say I'm a competitor. I don't think you want to bet against Elon, you know, in some cases, especially given the events the last two weeks. But my sense is, yeah, like this is. There's actually a really compelling story, which is appliances are installed every day in the United States in every neighborhood. Home battery systems are a lot more invasive to install. So installing a home battery is. You basically can get a microscope to your electrical panel, figure out, hey, what are the important loads to prioritize size the system. There's basically a, like, individualized arts and crafts and electrician project required to get a home battery in your house. And Tesla's done a very awesome job at mostly making that painless, but it's still very high lift. It's like 6,000 bucks to do the install. Not just the cost of the batteries, but then appliances are installed every day in the United States. So the story is like a best Buy truck pulls up and unloads a dishwasher and it gets put into someone's place, and that's like marginal cost of $50 or whatever. And if you can piggyback on that installation and then you also get a battery on the grid, you're now the cheapest energy storage by far in the United States.

[Jill Wiesenthal]

People talk about electrification. What does it mean to have a battery in our home? Obviously, the battery helps you in the situation of high performance cooking. But big picture, what is good about having a battery in your home?

[Sam D'Amico]

So this is actually the reason why not everyone has a battery in their home yet.

[Jill Wiesenthal]

Okay.

[Sam D'Amico]

And so the story is the current reason to have a battery in your house is for backup. It's for, hey, if the power goes out like it did in Seattle yesterday or something like that, your house still works. And you can, like, you know, your stuff in your fridge doesn't go bad. Like, you end up being able to continue to live your life in a modern, connected way, despite the fact that the grid's down. That is the feature that sells battery storage to people today. It's kind of a marginal thing I would describe it as. It's a prepper pitch versus a.

[Tracy Alloway]

Versus it's by that instead of a generator.

[Sam D'Amico]

It's by that instead of a generator. Exactly. Exactly.

[Jill Wiesenthal]

And so, but mostly on a day to day basis, that doesn't make my life any better.

[Sam D'Amico]

And then on a day to day basis, that is invisible. Unless you've gotten like, maybe you live in Texas and you got just totally shellacked by storms over a previous year. Now you're like, I'm totally buying a battery for next storm season. The problem with that is that's not enough to get batteries in every home in the United States.

[Jill Wiesenthal]

Yeah.

[Sam D'Amico]

And so what we realized was if you could make better user experiences for the devices and those were enabled by the batteries, then suddenly the batteries are installed in their house. And then the actual benefit for having the batteries in people's houses beyond that, beyond the user experience is, well, this is also part of a new decentralized grid that is getting kind of built in real time today. Yeah. And if you can push battery storage all the way into homes or like as close as, like the street and basically the street and into people's houses, you actually cut down on the transmission upgrades required to the rest of the grid. So a big problem is, as everyone is electrifying because electric vehicles are better than gas cars, for instance, as electric dryers are better. For instance, like the heat pump dryers are better, as induction stoves are better, people's energy consumption, especially the peak energy consumption of their house, is going to go up. And what that means is your utility is going to have to upgrade all the wires up and down from the power plants all the way into people's neighborhoods. The transformers have to get upgraded because, like, if everyone on the street starts charging their vehicle, that's a problem. We're going to have to make all these sort of massive upgrades. But then we're kind of obeying this previous reality, which was we were planning for peak, like everything being on at once, like every light switch being turned on at the same time, versus the real reality, which is everything is intermittent. And if you can put battery storage to charge up kind of over time using whatever capacity of the wires is available, then the battery can be available to provide that peak demand when it's needed right at the point of demand, which saves you from essentially having to upgrade much of the grid. So to summarize, because that was kind of a long point, batteries are actually a key part of the future of wires, in a sense like, because it's kind of like I have a skinny pipe because the app, I just don't want to take a shower. I have a skinny pipe. I have a reservoir upstate. I have a skinny pipe to my house. And then I've got a water tank. I can go shower off the local water tank, even though that pipe is only giving me a trickle of water over the whole day, because I'm not showering more than twice a day or something like that in my building. So that's a way to potentially think about it. But instead of upgrading the pipe, you can essentially upgrade the storage. And you can do that without having to modify the built world, which is, you know, if you go. Which is very difficult, which, as we know, is illegal.

[Tracy Alloway]

Well, okay, speaking of the real world, I mean, the idea is very clear and very cool, but talk to us about the actual manufacturing process of doing this, because you're trying to do like a bunch of different things at the same time. So incorporate that battery storage, make sure that you can turn up the power very quickly. Also manage the actual heat on the appliance itself with sensors. It seems complicated.

[Sam D'Amico]

Yeah. And so I'm not sure if I've walked through the whole architecture of the system just to kind of describe it for the listener. Basically, this is a induction cooktop. Standard size induction cooktop can fit in your counter. So if you're remodeling your kitchen, feel free to buy one. We're selling them right now. Just a shill. But inside the normal form factor of the device, there is a battery that's basically the size of, I don't know, it's like two shoeboxes or something like that. It's kind of a way to think about it. So the battery kind of inserts in a slot in the device, but otherwise it's not any bigger than a normal stove, effectively. We then also had to develop, to leverage that high power of the battery, we had to develop a new type of temperature sensor technology, which also resulted in the perfect steak that you all had earlier. Had earlier.

[Jill Wiesenthal]

This is a perfect egg, by the way.

[Tracy Alloway]

Yeah.

[Sam D'Amico]

And this actively will sense the temperature and catch up to like by implying more power basically dynamically.

[Tracy Alloway]

So if you put something cold in, it automatically adjusts.

[Sam D'Amico]

It throws more power in such a situation. So what I can do is actually cook this egg perfectly, steaming it in its own water, basically. And then you'll notice the temperature starting to catch back up on the ui.

[Jill Wiesenthal]

Sorry, how does it know, like, what is the mechanism via which it knows the temperature? Of the egg or that it knows something cool has been dropped in there.

[Sam D'Amico]

So this sensor, this is an active temperature sensor that we designed. It uses technology that has not previously been deployed in the culinary space at all. It's actually inspired by some technology from LiDAR, which our CTO used to work on. The approach basically is this can actually sense inside the pan what the pan's temperature is through the metal because it works through heat flow, not through temperature.

[Jill Wiesenthal]

Tracey, review.

[Tracy Alloway]

It's really nice. There's a good egg.

[Sam D'Amico]

All of this stuff had to basically be built custom from the ground up. A big problem in the appliance space is a lot of the major appliance manufacturers essentially just build boxes that they put other people's parts into. And it's very similar to how the automotive industry pre Tesla worked where they're sourcing stuff from. In the automotive case, it's like Bosch and Continental and all the other folks. They're sourcing essentially like a kit of parts and then they integrate it into a vehicle. That's how the appliance industry has developed over the past 20 or so years. Because there's been kind of a variety of like combo of regulatory plus innovation gap sort of things that have kind of frozen the industry a bit. We actually had to operate at a lower abstraction layer. We had to basically go and say, hey, we're building this like a consumer electronics device more generally than as a stove. And by interfacing with consumer electronics manufacturers, folks that build things like TVs and headphones and products like that, we're able to actually vertically integrate a lot more of the technology stack from everything from the power electronics to the sensors, to be able to custom design a battery designed for our application and tie that battery to all of the other pieces of the system we're developing. And so we ended up booting up a very complicated supply chain through some industry leading partners we've been working with to be able to make this happen. And like my background in consumer electronics, I've had to work with a number of big contract manufacturers and joint development manufacturers in Asia. That's been invaluable experience that we've kind of taken over from. Weirdly enough, it's like, how do you jump from VR headsets to stoves? It's like in some sense we kind of reran the playbook.

[Wells Fargo Representative]

Wells Fargo seeks broad impact in their communities. They're focused on building a sustainable, inclusive future for all by supporting housing, affordability, small business growth, financial health and other community needs. That's why They've donated nearly $2 billion to strengthen local communities over the last five years. Wells Fargo the Bank of Doing see [e-mail] Saydo Wells Fargo's philanthropic support includes contributions from Wells Fargo and Company, Wells Fargo Bank N.A. and the Wells Fargo Foundation.

[Ron Kraszewski]

Hi, I'm Ron Kraszewski, Chairman and CEO of Stifel Financial Advisors. If you're not growing your practice, you're losing market share. Stifel is a growing entrepreneurial advisor centric firm built for successful advisors like you. Imagine having the resources of the largest wire houses and the support of the boutique shops, but none of the bureaucracy to get in the way of you serving your clients. At Stifel, it's your business, your book, your clients. I always tell the advisors we're recruiting, I want you to come to Stifel and double or triple your business. Most of them laugh and shake their heads, but I'm serious. Don't take it from me. Take it from Stifel's number one finish in J.D. power's 2023 U.S. financial Advisor Satisfaction Study. So there's a reason why 148 financial advisors joined Stifel last year. Come join us and find out why Stifel is the firmware Success meets success. Visit www.choosestif.com Stifel Nicholas & Co.

[Jill Wiesenthal]

Incorporated member SIPC and NYSE and then just crack it.

[Sam D'Amico]

Yeah. Amazing. And then you put the lid on to see.

[Jill Wiesenthal]

My kids would be blown away having seen my eggs that I could do this. Amazing. I just have a quick random question. I want to get into some policy questions because electrification a lot of ambiguity. Just a real quick question on the battery component itself. One of the pushes under the most recent administration has been boosting domestic battery manufacturing primarily for EVs in your either currently or when you look a few years down the line like do you see us sourced batteries being important or useful or part of it at this point?

[Sam D'Amico]

Yeah. So I think there's actually a number of things that are very interesting going on here that you have to kind of poke through to read. So like an example is Tesla. After the IRA passed, Tesla essentially bought the tooling from one of their battery manufacturers and moved it to California. And essentially the battery cells that go into I think Tesla Megapack and maybe Powerwall are made in Lathrop, California at a big factory at their like mega quote unquote mega factory. So a number of big shifts have happened. I would say honestly, like I was looking at this, I think Tesla is like probably one of the biggest players right now just in terms of total volume. But LG Goshen, a number of big folks have committed to large factories in the U.S. a lot of this is targeting automotive specifically like GM or Rivian.

[Jill Wiesenthal]

Sure.

[Sam D'Amico]

Or things like that. There's kind of this like interesting gap of batteries for everyone else and for, you know, people doing weird things like us. I have not seen the motion there yet because I think there needs to be slack capacity in the automotive space. But we've also been tracking what does onshoring look like? What does all this other stuff look like. There's a pretty clear step by step process that we think is going to exist and it's likely going to involve even the existing players that folks are already sourcing batteries from overseas.

[Tracy Alloway]

Speaking of policy away from energy, do you have a spreadsheet somewhere that's like the cost of manufacturing this item currently versus the cost of manufacturing this item with 20% tariffs on imports from China?

[Sam D'Amico]

Yeah. So that's fun. 1. I think there's a very funny situation from the first Trump administration which was oddly enough, every Apple product had an exemption.

[Tracy Alloway]

Yeah, I remember that.

[Sam D'Amico]

Like very oddly enough, every Apple product had an exemption and that was locked in, you know, and so maybe there's an exemption for stoves in the future. I'm joking. I don't think I matter that much. But the point though is they did not exempt appliances in the beginning for reference. So my understanding is a more broad China tariff is something that we could potentially expect. Our playbook is we pick manufacturers that have multiple bases of operations and also are amenable to US onshoring where relevant. Or Mexico onshore. We're relevant. So we've been from day zero very cognizant of this. I mean another example of this is like when the company started, you could not go to China very easily unless you did. Oh yeah, unless you, unless you did a two week plus quarantine and all this other stuff. So we've been very aware of like trade barriers and potential risks while also trying to make sure that we work with the best people in the business.

[Jill Wiesenthal]

I have two more policy questions. One is just really straightforward. You currently, if you buy the stove you can get a tax credit, right?

[Sam D'Amico]

Yes.

[Jill Wiesenthal]

And we don't know what the future of the IRA is, but at least under current law you get what's the price?

[Sam D'Amico]

Just so, so the product is 6,000 bucks MSRP, which is normal for a high end induction cooktop by itself. So like if you go buy one from one of the Fancy European brands, even ones that you can buy and say best buy or things like that, there are stuff at that price range. But then you additionally get this 30% tax credit because it is a home battery system and it is a full home battery system, it's got an inverter, it's able to actually do all the things that a powerwall can do from a grid interactivity perspective. So you get that 30% tax credit or you can, you can you self submit for the 30% tax credit. And then on top of that there's income based IRA rebates that kick in. So like there's an $841, if you're switching from a gas stove to an induction stove, you can get that, it has an income limit. And then a lot of local utilities plus like various local jurisdictions have like a gas to electric incentive program. And those kind of vary by state and region.

[Jill Wiesenthal]

All right, the second one, and this is like probably one of the most complicated, it's also kind of policy related, but it's also one of the most difficult things for me to wrap my head around. Despite having read many ChatGPT outputs and talked to various guests. Something you hear from anyone who's involved in distributed energy or renewable energy in particular, is that the rules of power markets, legacy rules of the grid that govern the grid, et cetera, are not ideal for a rapid rollout of some of these technologies, whether it's on, whether it's distributed batteries or whatever else. And so I'm curious from your perspective and I know it's different in every state and whatever, but when you look at the rules that sort of govern how power markets work, what is either worked for you or ideally should change to sort of accelerate this process.

[Sam D'Amico]

Yeah, so people were very critical of the Texas energy markets for being kind of like a libertarian wild west and then.

[Jill Wiesenthal]

But they roll it out fast and.

[Sam D'Amico]

They roll it fast and they're installing more solar and storage than California is now. And so in some sense I think this, this mirrors the yimbyism movement in some sense where effectively there's going to be strategic deregulation because clean tech is going to win because it's cheaper now. And we need to realize that it's not going to be, hey, we're going to accidentally turn your river purple if we loosen restrictions on interconnection or whatever. It's like, no, like you'll actually decrease emissions massively. So I think that there's that mindset does need to change because essentially building now is good for the environment versus in the 70s, that was not clearly the case. And I also would say that we should look at Europe as a model, which is hilarious to say as a tech guy based in San Francisco. And when I say that is so Europe has deregulated their energy markets closer to kind of what Texas is like.

[Tracy Alloway]

In response to Ukraine.

[Sam D'Amico]

In response to Ukraine. And then additionally they have been much more lenient on distributed energy interconnection, like at the small house scale. So there's this movement started in Germany for balcony solar power. So essentially, if you have a south facing window in Germany, it's relatively northern latitude. You just hang a solar panel facing south on your railing and you plug it into a normal outlet. And that solar panel essentially reduces your home's electricity demand and helps the grid. And they made some very simple rules that a ton of manufacturers now follow. And this is basically just something you can buy and it pays for itself pretty quickly. And it's super easy. We need solutions like that in the United States. And that sort of stuff is very, very difficult to kind of work through. I would almost call it like a thunderdome of like regulatory and compliance details. Because the enforcement regime in the US there's no single jurisdiction. This is actually one of the bigger problems is there's no single jurisdiction here. Basically, individual building codes in individual cities have specific rules on what you can and can't do with electrical stuff. And they do cite national codes like the National Electric Code. But these things are a patchwork of regulations and a patchwork of enforcement across the country versus one clean set of roles all the way across. In Europe, it's like you get this one certification and you're able to just plug in. Whereas in the US it's not just you have to navigate a very small window of what's possible and then make sure you check all the boxes, which we're very confident we've done so and we view that as one of the really awesome things we've achieved as a team. But additionally then playing ball with every utility which has a different set of APIs, there's no, hey, I have a battery. Just go to this one website and it tells you when to charge and discharge and you get paid for it. That doesn't exist yet. And I think that's something where, if I was advocating for federal action, it's like stuff of that nature where it's making it just much easier to control stuff from a standards perspective is going to be a big deal.

[Tracy Alloway]

What's the big risk factor? When I read Your inevitable IPO perspectives or I don't know, whatever document you produce to be acquired by some massive company. What are going to be the risk factors that you list? Are they on the regulatory side, on the manufacturing side?

[Sam D'Amico]

That's an interesting question because I think we've actually addressed the ambiguity on the regulatory and install side. I would argue that a big part of this is the appliance industry, is this old and stayed industry. One of the big challenges is I actually see it as we're doing something a lot bigger than hey, we're making an oven or a stove or anything like that. This is something that's much more of a. Like we are fundamentally changing how every device connects to the grid by putting battery storage integrated into it. So I would argue the risks are going to be around supply chain for batteries, the fact that we've not onshored LFP production in an appreciable way with some specific brand specific exceptions like Tesla. And then I would also argue you need a lot of SKUs. People have different preferences and needs and stuff like that.

[Jill Wiesenthal]

I want to ask a question about financing. So you've raised VC money, but because you're a company that builds physical things, I assume you need a lot of working capital to place orders and that this ties up a lot of cash, et cetera. And I don't think a lot of VCs love to invest in that sort of pure working capital. Are there different financing streams that you need? So there's like the growth over time of Impulse Labs. Do you have other financing streams for the actual like placing the orders of the various parts and pieces?

[Sam D'Amico]

Yeah. So I mean I actually think that there's a missing gap in that space that's like mostly addressed by venture debt. That's the sort of canonical solution to this problem. But basically the issue is you can't finance orders for a product that doesn't. Hasn't sold yet. Right. Like you know, you can see this product and be like this is really awesome and like this is going to totally sell. But like you actually have to kick off that process. And that Cold Start is actually.

[Jill Wiesenthal]

Yeah. And I've heard this in a lot of things related to energy specific it's come up.

[Sam D'Amico]

Well, there's that there's like a missing middle. Commercialization, finance.

[Tracy Alloway]

Well, this is also what Kickstarter was trying to do.

[Jill Wiesenthal]

Right.

[Sam D'Amico]

And Kickstarter. And Kickstarter sort of addresses some of this as well. The other way you address this in hardware is you take orders ahead of time. Oh yeah, okay, right. And so Tesla did that. Yeah, yeah, yeah, that's. I mean this is exactly what, this is exactly why Tesla had some of these strategies. It's like they, they address these issues by virtue of essentially having a really compelling mission driven pitch and being like, you want to be on the team, by the way, you're basically giving us a free loan. And I think it worked really well. But I don't think there's a standardized solution here beyond raise some venture debt off the tailwinds of your most recent fundraise or something like that.

[Tracy Alloway]

So we're obviously for zero for the.

[Sam D'Amico]

Zero to one side of it.

[Jill Wiesenthal]

Yeah.

[Tracy Alloway]

So we're obviously in San Francisco and Joe and I have been talking to a lot of venture capitalists and talking to them about what it is that they offer founders and what their specific pitch is. So I'm very curious, when it comes to your investors, why did you just. I think it's. Lux Capital is the biggest one.

[Jill Wiesenthal]

We've interviewed Josh a couple times.

[Tracy Alloway]

Yeah, that's right. Why, why did you decide to go with them versus I, I assume you were courted by a bunch of others.

[Sam D'Amico]

Yeah, so I mean one, one big deal here is this space. I basically would say that VC for hardware is a knife fight. There was basically a very brief window, I would call it like the 2020-2022 window, where a ton of people raise a ton of money for a lot of different stuff. But basically I wanted to make sure that this was not. We worked with someone who's multistage and also has dealt with like things of this nature where this is not going to be a single interaction where then we're successful immediately. We're building a very complicated platform that happens to be delivered through a stove as the first product. And that's going to require, I would argue, a combination of strategic patience, but also depth of experience from prior hardware bets that had similar processes. Basically that was a big factor in making sure that we work with multistage folks that knew the game versus there were a ton of new funds spun up in 2021 era. Making sure that this wasn't. The meme of the week was hardware. Now I guess the meme of the week is hardware again, which is great, but making sure that we've got folks that are mission aligned through a longer process because this is not going to be a two year long company that gets acquired.

[Tracy Alloway]

Are you going to incorporate some AI just so you can put out the press release for your next fundraising round?

[Sam D'Amico]

I mean, okay, so this is an Open invitation. If you park a humanoid robot at our office, you can, you can do the same stake demo and we'll just film it. So any humanoid robot companies want to do a little tie in for PR purposes, just pull up with your humanoid robot. That's my one joke. But actually it's very interesting is we realized that actually the key product feature for the thing was the temperature sensing. And it turns out that. It turns out that like a stove that can hold temperature accurately is just not something that exists. Like, which is kind of a weird thing to think about where you're like, okay, I put the pan on the stove and I set it to medium. What does medium mean? Or like you're using one of these touchscreen cooktops and you press the number eight, you're like, again, what the hell does that mean? And so, so that's the sort of situation where we were like, okay, we actually should do the smart thing and make it so you can say 350 degrees, just like your oven can. And that was an entire can of worms of both custom sensor design and manufacturing, like down into like custom ceramic parts. We had to do some crazy magnetic engineering to make everything work too. From that all the way to algorithms that approach, but maybe aren't exactly machine learning, if that makes any sense. I keep threatening to say we can put a transformer on this and make it better, but we're not going to have to do that. But we realized that there was actually some key automations that didn't exist. And it's not a robot autonomously cooking your food. It's the stove holds temperature and then suddenly your cooking workload goes down by an order of magnitude.

[Jill Wiesenthal]

Do you see a commercial, Obviously residential, but like, you know, I imagine a big pain point for a lot of restaurants is that consistency. Right. Every dish has to be identical over and over and over and over again. And that requires a lot of patience and stuff. Is that good? Do you anticipate that? And requires training and training and someone watching it. So labor costs, et cetera. Is that something you're envisioning as part of.

[Sam D'Amico]

We've gotten a lot of excitement from professional chefs. We're in touch with a couple. We actually have a partnership with Brandon Ju from Mr. Ju's in San Francisco, which we're super excited about. But basically we're engaging professional. We're engaging professional chefs on, across the board on this. The obviously the first use case is like, get this into people's home kitchens.

[Jill Wiesenthal]

Yeah.

[Sam D'Amico]

Because a lot of these folks also do content at home, but the restaurant side obviously very interested. I would say the closest analog is like turbochef where like Starbucks essentially buys tons of these machines and there are the ovens behind the counter where they put in your like quasi pre made sandwich or whatever and they, and they hit the red button or the green button or blue button, what sandwich it is and then it comes out perfect because it's programmable. Starbucks can control that from corporate and that can be going while the barista is making your coffee, for instance. And so I can see a direct application of some of this temperature sensing technology into the stove version of some experiences like that for commercial.

[Wells Fargo Representative]

Wells Fargo seeks broad impact in their communities. They're focused on building a sustainable, inclusive future for all by supporting housing, affordability, small business growth, financial health and other community needs. That's why they've donated nearly $2 billion to strengthen local communities over the last five years. Wells Fargo, the Bank of doing see [e-mail] Saydo Wells Fargo's philanthropic support includes contributions from Wells Fargo and Company, Wells Fargo Bankna and the Wells Fargo Foundation.

[Ron Kraszewski]

Hi, I'm Ron Krushevsky, Chairman and CEO of Stifel Financial Advisors. If you're not growing your practice, you're losing market share. Stifel is a growing entrepreneurial advisor centric firm built for successful advisors like you. Imagine having the resources of the largest wire houses and the support of the boutique shops, but none of the bureaucracy to get in the way of you serving your clients. At Stifel, it's your business, your book, your clients. I always tell the advisors we're recruiting, I want you to come to Stifel and double or triple your business. Most of them laugh and shake their heads, but I'm serious. Don't take it from me. Take it from Stifel's number one finish in J.D. power's 2023 U.S. financial Advisor Satisfaction Study. So there's a reason why 148 financial advisors joined Stifel last year. Come join us and find out why Stifel is the firmware. Success meets success. Visit www.choosestifel.com Stifel Nicholas & Co.

[Jill Wiesenthal]

Incorporated member SIPC and NYSE. And it won't set off a smoke.

[Sam D'Amico]

Alarm and it won't set up a program. And this was really tricky because this diversion is being very software defined. I got mocked relentlessly online, online for under seared steaks. And then we fixed some of the software and now it works great.

[Jill Wiesenthal]

So this is real technology. This is like real progress.

[Tracy Alloway]

So having Watched the demonstration. Part of me is very excited because this seems like a very cool product. The steak was great, the eggs were great. Part of me is also sad because I think I'm a decent cook and one of my competitive advantages in life is my ability to cook a steak reasonably well. And now I'm kind of. I'm not watching a robot come and take my job, but I'm certainly watching technology. Perfect. That particular human skill. Yeah, well, you're a cook guy. You like making food. Tell me why I shouldn't be slightly sad about this.

[Sam D'Amico]

It's like the joke. I keep seeing these AI references where they're like, be not afraid, you know, like human. But. But the point is. Yeah, no, I mean, I think the point is basically like, do you want for rustic reasons to have an oven that has a low, medium or high setting for baking? And then I think the other point is people who are good bakers are good bakers in a dimension after the temperature control portion of it. And so I think that's the other point that I'm really excited about, which is now suddenly a lot of complicated stuff that was not accessible to you is now going to be so you.

[Tracy Alloway]

Don'T have to worry about the cooking time and monitoring the temperature. Maybe you can spend more time on like, I don't know, the marinade or like pre treating the meat.

[Sam D'Amico]

Pre treating the meat or slow cooking it. And you can. Or an example is like you can free up counter space because you can cook rice on this thing without a rice cooker though, you know, there'll be debates over which profile people select. But the idea is that is a thing that we can do because our product is fundamentally software defined for, you know, for the first time for stoves.

[Jill Wiesenthal]

So I just have one last question. I'm cards on the table having seen it. I'm like, oh, I kind of want to buy one of these. And I don't know, I don't know how soon I'll be in the market for a stuff, but Q1. Okay, but are there any safety issues with having a battery? I mean, I know it's like sometimes the batteries, people are anxious about them. The scooter batteries, of course, which I guess are different, but that's a classic New York issue. Yeah, it's a really big New York issue. Where I live in New York. Talk about designing with safety in mind.

[Sam D'Amico]

Yeah. So I think there's actually a couple things to think about when you think about batteries and battery safety. So as I mentioned earlier, the Battery is a 3 kilowatt hour battery that is roughly 30 times the battery size of a 16 inch MacBook Pro. Okay, but it's a different chemistry. So first we start with a chemistry design for thermal stability and safety. So we're using lithium iron phosphate, not lithium ion. And what that means is it actually does not supply enough of its own oxygen to like sustain a fire by itself. It needs external oxygen to do so, which is the big difference between that and the traditional lithium ion chemistry, which is like you almost can't put out a fire from a, like a phone battery if it, if it goes off. In this case, it's, it's different. Additionally, the lithium iron phosphate technology is actually advanced to such a point because the cells are so, so much safer. They've actually been able to make bigger cells, which is one of the reasons why China has been doing so well with EVs, because they basically said, okay, if a big cell is now safe, we can make a battery pack much more easily. And so they make these car battery packs out of very long cells they call blade batteries that are basically like the width of a table or they're like the width of the vehicle, but like kind of like the profile of a deck of cards just stretched out over the length of a table. And so that's where the technology direction has actually been pushing towards larger, safer battery cells, which we can ride the tailwind of from a safety perspective to start. Additionally, there's a number of relevant industry standards that we're going to be abiding by as part of this. So you have to basically pass essentially a fire test effectively to make sure that this thing is good. And then the last thing, which is actually the reason for the scooter story, is people are getting these scooters and they're riding them like crazy because they're doing tons of delivery jobs. All this other stuff, they're actually cycling these batteries because the batteries are not very big on these scooters. So they're wearing them out, out pretty fast. And they're the traditional lithium ion, not the iron phosphate design. So they're swapping the batteries out on the vehicles. They're also using chargers that are not matched to the battery. And so if you mismatch the charger and the battery and you swap these things out, you've now got a safety problem just by virtue of you're not using the warranty approved equipment to charge the battery. And so that's one of the exacerbating situations with these, specifically these scooter fires. The difference between that and like a stationary storage battery, like, what we've got is our charger and our battery are like, co designed together. And so we do vet the safety of the integrated system versus, oh, suddenly you could be using a cord that maybe isn't even rated for the right current, and the cord catches on fire and then takes the battery out, for instance. So that's kind of the difference between a lot of the reports of what these fires are versus where we're operating in a much safer domain with an integrated system that we've designed for safety with a different chemistry that is also at lower risk of fire. Basically.

[Tracy Alloway]

You mentioned rice earlier, and people obviously have strong opinions about food and how it should be cooked. What's been the most heated controversy that you've had to deal with in designing the stovetop?

[Sam D'Amico]

So there's a bunch of fun stuff. So I'll start with the gas stove culture war. So basically we announced that we were up to some stove stuff in like, November.

[Tracy Alloway]

Some stove stuff.

[Sam D'Amico]

2022, early 2023, there was a. I think it was the CPSC. One of the CPSC members said that they were evaluating banning gas stoves, and this kind of was like a trial balloon sort of thing. I'm not sure if the Biden administration was fully clued in on this, but basically, like, the GOP extended GOP cinematic universe was like, okay, this is gonna be some good shit. Let's. So this happened. I then decide to post an infographic that's like, showing that all the gas stoves are where the liberals live.

[Jill Wiesenthal]

Oh, yeah. Funny thing. So I was in the market about a year ago for a new apartment in the East Village.

[Tracy Alloway]

Oh, you told me this.

[Jill Wiesenthal]

Yeah, in the East Village. Which is. We all know how the East Village votes and who. And we were looking around and our broker was showing us, and she's like, by the way, this is grandfathered so you can keep a gas stove. Like, it was like, you know, because New York has passed the right. But like, all these buyers, like, actually want to make sure that they could keep their gas stoves in them anyway. Keep going.

[Sam D'Amico]

Yeah. So this is correct. Yeah. So the woke mob actually is who has the gas stove. Yeah, yeah, whatever you want to. Whatever. Whatever epithet you want to use here. So essentially I post this infographic. It goes mega viral, like millions of views or something like that. And then it also. People start coming at me being like, with impulse behind the Rocky Mountain Institute study that showed that incidents of asthma are 42% more higher in homes. With gas stoves, I'm like, I had nothing to do with that, man. But it was definitely a, like, fun culture war conversation where I'm like. And then there was people also getting mad, being like, oh, yeah, I'm never switching to electric stove except that one and pointing at us. And so there was kind of that. There was some of that. There was some of that feedback as well. That was the first thing that was like, early 2023. Then we started getting hardware back from our manufacturer. We're like writing, putting the software together, and I'm getting to the point where I'm like, I should try to do this dry sous vide thing. And so I had this crank idea where I'm like, okay, normally with sous vide, you put a steak in a bag, you put the bag in water, and you let water circulate at a set temperature with like a little circulator gadget you put in there. I was like, okay, we develop this new type of stove that can hold specific temperature on the top surface of the pan. Using technology we developed, which is. Was a giant unlock. I'm going to cook a steak with it, and I'm going to do it sous vide style, where I'm going to set it to like 135 degrees or something like that, or 140 degrees and let it conduct through the entire bottom of the pan into the steak. So the whole steak gets cooked like medium rare, and then you go and sear it at the end. So I managed to cook the steak medium rare, just fine, like that conductive sous vide thing that I mentioned, with no water bath, no plastic, no microplastics and other stuff works great. I then go and sear the steak. Basically, this is a very software defined product and we've been trying to make sure that we also don't hit smoke points in the house. So if you set. If you set the stove to 400 degrees, you can actually fry with olive oil on this thing and it won't like, smoke up your kitchen. But there's this very fun, like, fine line between like, not doing that and then also, like under searing or under cooking the food. So I went and posted a demo video of me doing this whole thing end to end, which is on Twitter. Link to it or whatever. And my steak looked pathetically seared. And I just got like, so much, so much.

[Jill Wiesenthal]

There was nothing. The two things that set people off on Twitter are being happy and experiencing joy in life and anything that would invite someone to criticize anything. Opportunity for someone to tell you that you cooked the steak wrong. Those are the two things that are guaranteed to make people angry.

[Sam D'Amico]

And yeah, so I basically just got like, steak Twitter just went, yeah, well. So a bunch of people were like, this is cool. This is cool. As I'll get out. This is awesome. But then another faction of people were just like, dude, what the hell is that? Steak.

[Jill Wiesenthal]

Yeah.

[Sam D'Amico]

And then so. So that then kicked off a period of learning and self discovery where one, we've been entering our software and it's gotten more aggressive at putting the sear on without smoking up the kitchen. So that's been a big improvement and like, very excited to ship that to people very soon. But then the second piece was I went on YouTube and I actually followed Chris Young, who makes the combustion ink thermometer, and he has like this instructions on how to cook a steak perfectly. So I basically just went to steak university, followed his stuff, and then the videos just started. The pictures started just improving time, time and time again.

[Tracy Alloway]

You rehabilitated yourself.

[Sam D'Amico]

I hopefully did. Hopefully did, yeah.

[Jill Wiesenthal]

It's a really good steak. Sam D'Amico, thank you so much. This was so much fun. It really lived up to the hype.

[Sam D'Amico]

Thanks for coming by.

[Jill Wiesenthal]

I do love how this story of the stove touches on so many of our themes.

[Tracy Alloway]

I know, Genuinely, I was skeptical when you were like, let's go interview the stove.

[Jill Wiesenthal]

But like, let's talk about. So there's like power markets. There is international trade.

[Tracy Alloway]

Batteries.

[Jill Wiesenthal]

There's batteries in the attempt by the US manufacturing them. There's a few other ones, plus they're staked. Plus there's steak. There's food. Like it's. Oh, funding, venture funding and working capital. And the missing middle. Hardware versus software, ramping up energy. There is something about this stove that it's like, it's a Trojan horse for talking about topics and by design, it's a Trojan horse for this vision of what a different sort of structure of power markets.

[Tracy Alloway]

It's true. I just realized today's been a big day for me in terms of technological awakenings because to get to the stove company, we took a Waymo and it was the first time I've ever and.

[Jill Wiesenthal]

Yet lived up to the hype. Right.

[Tracy Alloway]

Yeah, it was great. So I'm very into driverless cars right now. I'm very into cool electric stoves with battery storage.

[Jill Wiesenthal]

This is why it's good for us to come out to the West Coast. San Francisco specifically. I like la. I don't leave with a sense of. I've seen the Future the same way. It's very nice and the weather is good. But you do sort of come to San Francisco. We held a live event here, and you meet a lot of interesting people doing really interesting stuff here. It's kind of cool.

[Tracy Alloway]

Yeah. We met a quantum computer guy last time.

[Jill Wiesenthal]

Met a quantum computer guy. We met chips people.

[Tracy Alloway]

I feel a little bit more optimistic about the technologist future, but I guess. Well, we'll see. We'll see how these things turn out.

[Jill Wiesenthal]

Are you actually anxious? Like, I hadn't thought about that element of. Oh, yeah. There are certain skill at pan skills until. Or tilting the pan.

[Tracy Alloway]

The essence of cooking is, like, responding to the process that's happening in front of you. And so it's funny because I know if I was cooking on that stove, my impulse, my instinct would be to, like, move the pan around and, like, flip the steak over more times than it actually needs to be flipped.

[Jill Wiesenthal]

Yeah. So like, when I, you know, I've never, like, cooked a perfect egg in my life, and then I cooked a perfect egg on that stove because there was literally nothing to it and I didn't have to worry about it burning or getting stuck because of how consistent that temperature was.

[Tracy Alloway]

Yeah. Yeah. So we're now. We're now on equal footing, even though I've been working so hard to develop my skillset at cooking on mediocre stovetops. Oh, well, shall we leave it there?

[Jill Wiesenthal]

Let's leave it there.

[Tracy Alloway]

All right. This has been another episode of the Odd Thoughts podcast. I'm Tracy Alloway. You can follow me at tracyallaway.

[Jill Wiesenthal]

And I'm Joe Wiesenthal. You can follow me at the stalwart. Follow Sam D'Amico. He's D'Amico. Follow our producers Carmen Rodriguez at carmenarman, Dashiell Bennett at dashbot, and Kel Brooks at Kellbrooks. Thank you to our producer, Moses Ondam. For more Odd Lots content, go to bloomberg.com oddlots where we have transcripts, a blog, and a newsletter, and you can chat about all of these topics 24. 7 in our Discord. You talk about it in the HGTV channel in the Discord. Right? Discord. GG Odd Lots.

[Tracy Alloway]

And if you enjoy Odd Lots, if you like it when we talk about the latest in consumer appliance technology, then please leave us a positive review on your favorite podcast platform. And remember, if you are a Bloomberg subscriber, you can listen to all of our episodes absolutely ad free. All you need to do is connect your Bloomberg account with Apple podcasts to do that. Just find the Bloomberg Channel on Apple Podcasts and follow the instructions there. Thanks for listening.

[Sam D'Amico]

Are you looking for a new podcast about stuff related to money?

[Tracy Alloway]

Well, today's your lucky day.

[Sam D'Amico]

I'm Matt Levine.

[Tracy Alloway]

And I'm Katie Greifeld.

[Sam D'Amico]

And we are the hosts of Money Stuff the Podcast. Every Friday, we dive into the top stories about Wall street, finance and other stuff.

[Tracy Alloway]

We have fun, we get weird, and.

[Sam D'Amico]

We want you to join us. You can listen to Money Stuff the Podcast on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you get your podcasts.