Energytech Startups

Burning rich field gas in compressor engines wastes valuable NGLs, and Dr. Mathias Schlecht, President and CEO of ColdStream Energy, has a better idea. Jason and Nada dig into how ColdStream’s adsorption system cleans up fuel gas, why midstream contracts split who pays from who profits, and what 22 years at Baker Hughes taught him about should cost, ROI goal posts and building products. Plus a rough first commercial install, microgrids, and how operators are spending capital right now.

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00:00 Intro
01:16 What ColdStream Energy does
05:21 Flaring rules and a pivot
08:10 The ROI for operators
10:46 Size, cost and how it works
13:30 Convincing a conservative industry
18:05 Partners and the first pilot
20:11 Scaling pains and transparency
23:33 From Baker Hughes to ColdStream
30:15 Balance of plant and should cost
36:57 Setting ROI goal posts
41:53 Building a product mindset team
45:50 Smaller systems and a lease business
47:50 Gas demand and microgrids
51:31 How operators are spending capital
55:29 Advice for new founders

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Waste heat is the most boring thing on an industrial site until someone turns it into clean baseload power and hands you the savings. Janice Tran, co-founder of Kanin Energy, joins Jason to break down how her team builds and finances waste heat to power projects, why their biggest competitor is a customer doing it themselves, the fresh $100 million raise, project finance capital stacks, and why heavy industrials with spare land are suddenly prime real estate for data centers.

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00:00 Intro
01:20 Meet Kanin Energy
02:27 Baseload power and project size
04:07 Why waste heat projects are hard
07:25 The real competition
09:06 Phillips 66 and Tallgrass projects
11:16 The $100M raise
14:34 Project finance and capital stacks
19:57 Infrastructure vs venture returns
25:23 Learning project finance
28:05 The founding story
31:02 Building for climate impact
34:03 Data centers on industrial sites
38:52 Wrap up

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One drop of PFAS can contaminate an Olympic sized swimming pool, and 90 percent of us are carrying it in our blood. Dana Vazquez, cofounder and Chief Commercial Officer at Coflux Purification, explains why the current industrial fix is basically a giant Brita filter headed for a landfill, and how her team built a material that captures forever chemicals and destroys them in one step. Plus the liability bill coming for companies that wait, and what it takes to get a first skid into the field.

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00:00 Intro
01:14 Meet Dana Vazquez
02:04 What PFAS is and why it never leaves
06:23 From consulting to co-founding
09:12 How the technology works
13:44 Scaling up and staying modular
16:47 The regulation picture
18:40 Liability is the real driver
23:30 Home filters and what actually works
26:45 Funding the build
30:46 Why this one is personal
32:25 The first field deployment
37:03 Scientists and business people
42:43 What the fall looks like
45:36 The trouble with testing
47:15 Where to find Coflux

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Two engineers who spent years driving innovation inside a major oil company get honest about why the offshore world will land a robot at 20,000 psi but won't swap the pen and paper. Jacob Vizinat of Iron Stag Advisory and Jason Harry of Pontem Analytics unpack the corporate immune system, why the real value lives in the rock, the black magic of flow assurance, and how the right advisor can turn a single pilot into a real shot for energy tech founders.

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00:00 Intro
00:46 Meet Jacob and Jason
02:34 Life as a petroleum engineer
05:55 Driving innovation inside a major operator
08:26 Trading pen and paper for iPads
11:35 The corporate immune system
16:20 Why the value lives in the rock
26:32 Flow assurance and black magic
32:46 How short-term thinking kills innovation
36:00 Building advisory firms after the merger
38:35 Drones, robots, and the rare orchestrators
46:31 What it takes to go offshore
48:00 Reading the 2025 market
53:25 Why founders avoid the gold mine
56:02 Advice for early stage founders
1:01:12 Where to find them

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Flat load growth is dead, and AI just flipped the whole power sector on its head. Gabe Cuadra of Powerhouse Ventures gets into what that means for founders chasing capital in climate and energy, why algorithms alone never make a real moat, and how to actually pitch an early stage VC without wasting the room. Plus the messy truth about selling into utilities, spotting founder market fit, and why Houston is quietly turning into a place worth building.

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00:00  Intro
00:45  What keeps a climate investor up at night
01:55  How Powerhouse Ventures invests
05:20  AI, load growth, and a changing grid
08:30  What traction looks like at early stage
10:25  Finding founder market fit
12:00  Houston vs the coasts
18:13  How to pitch early stage VCs
19:18  Why algorithms are never the moat
25:04  The reality of selling into utilities
28:17  Gabe's winding road into energy VC
34:40  Inside the investment process
37:02  Founder red flags
42:21  Standing out when you pitch
43:30  What has him excited next
46:27  The case for Houston
48:50  How to reach out

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Most climate money chases decarbonization while a bigger problem piles up: two thirds of the losses from extreme weather and disasters go completely uninsured. Arindam Bhattacharya spent 30 years at SLB before launching Tailwind Futures to back startups hardening infrastructure, supply chains, and workforce against a changing climate. He argues resilience is a growth story, not just damage control, and walks through a portfolio from corrosion-proof rebar to a material that could replace copper.

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0:00   Intro
0:28   Meet Arindam and Tailwind Futures
2:07   30 years at SLB and the jump to venture
4:06   The insurance gap nobody talks about
7:05   Where the capital for resilience isn't going
12:11  Playing offense: resilience as a growth story
15:29  Government pullback and the opening it creates
18:22  The portfolio and how the fund invests
19:02  DexMat and replacing copper
25:20  Allium and solving steel corrosion
29:17  Water, heat, and flooding bets
33:30  Sourcing deals across the US and Europe
35:00  What makes a company worth backing
40:17  Giving founders honest feedback
44:27  How pitching differs around the world
47:36  Finding the best companies theme by theme
50:20  Cooling, wildfire, and parametric insurance
54:11  Pitching Arindam and Houston's role
57:16  Where to find Tailwind Futures

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Writing the check is the easy part. The marriage that comes after is what nobody warns founders about until they are five years deep. Mitra Miller, President and Board Member of the Houston Angel Network, gets into what actually makes a startup investable, why she hunts for red flags fast, and how being a founder herself rewired the way she writes checks. Plus where Texas capital needs to go next, why AI is quietly soaking up all the oxygen, and how 25 years reshaped the Houston ecosystem.

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0:00:00   Intro
0:00:28   Inside the Houston Angel Network at 25
0:02:12   From the dotcom boom to angel investing
0:05:44   Why being a founder makes a better investor
0:09:43   How new angels learn the game
0:13:38   Pitching HARN and what makes a company investable
0:18:18   Why investing is a marriage, not a check
0:27:25   Reading founders and spotting red flags
0:36:48   What has changed in 25 years
0:42:01   When venture money is not the answer
0:46:29   Houston, Texas, and the energy transition
0:51:25   All of the above: data centers, the grid, and fusion
0:58:02   Public vs private capital in Texas
1:02:44   The capital outlook and AI's pull on funding
1:09:16   Secondary markets and finding liquidity

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Cybersecurity is invisible until it isn't, and Gary Martin, CEO and founder of Scan Ninja AI, is on a mission to make continuous vulnerability management affordable for startups and mid-sized companies hackers love to target. Gary walks through SOC 2 readiness without the once-a-year scramble, how AI agents are changing scanning and remediation, why he ditched CapEx pricing to disrupt the market, and the brutal lessons from going all in after two and a half years building on the side.

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00:00 Intro
00:28 Meet Gary Martin and Scan Ninja AI
02:03 Vulnerability scanning and AI-driven remediation
05:16 Third-party risk and what enterprises like ExxonMobil require
05:58 What SOC 2 actually is and the 90-day audit
07:33 Continuous compliance vs the once-a-year scramble
08:47 Vibe coding, npm vulnerabilities, and what slips through
11:46 Why Gary finally went full time
13:20 The reality of hacks on small and mid-sized companies
15:05 Where the Scan Ninja name came from
17:33 Detection, remediation, and built-in project management
21:35 Business model, MSPs, and tokenization
23:52 Who actually needs Scan Ninja
26:09 Sponsor break: Saffron
26:46 Lessons from leaving Exxon and starting up
31:32 The pivot from selling product to selling solution
34:48 Pricing, perception of value, and the no-discount rule
39:08 Building a lean company in the age of AI
41:08 Sales outreach with Apollo and token-based economy
43:30 What he loves most about being a founder
45:15 Advice for anyone thinking about taking the leap
47:03 Five-year vision and the Super Bowl commercial
48:13 How to find Scan Ninja AI

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Pouring billions into AI without first fixing data logistics is exactly why most of those investments stall. Mohammed "Mo" Saadat, CEO of Stratahub, sits down with Jason and Nada to talk about liberating the operational data trapped in legacy historians, PLCs, and acquired-asset patchwork. Mo unpacks two decades of frontline lessons, why digital twins keep falling flat, and his plan to build the industrial data fabric for the entire energy sector.

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00:00 Intro
00:55 Meet Mo and Stratahub
02:57 Two decades growing up in oil and gas
06:10 Why operational data stays trapped
11:14 Selling new tech to a skeptical industry
14:08 The digital twin reality check
19:25 Where OEMs fall short
24:24 Sponsor break
25:30 Stratahub's ideal customers and what's under the hood
32:41 The ESP pilot that changed the approach
38:25 The North Dakota moment that sparked it all
42:39 Trading a corporate seat for the founder grind
45:55 Building the industrial data fabric for energy
47:16 How to reach Mo

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Tennis player turned drill bit disruptor. Vasili Borissov, founder and CEO of Cool Edge Bits, joins Jason and Nada to unpack how his rocket scientist father's hydraulics breakthrough is changing PDC bit cooling, why he walked away from a term sheet that wanted his board, and how 25 years on the tennis court taught him to take 100 nos to land the right yes. Plus the made in the USA story behind every bit.

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00:00 Welcome to the show
00:29 Tennis pro meets rocket scientist dad
04:27 Founding Cool Edge Bits
09:11 Sales as a transfer of emotion
16:16 The first friends and family check
22:32 Volatile markets and geopolitics
27:58 Scaling the financial model
30:31 Walking away from a bad term sheet
36:08 Lessons heading into the seed round
40:18 The hardest part of fundraising
43:53 The elevator pitch with Ron
49:15 Advice for first time fundraisers
50:36 Made in the USA and chasing grants
54:40 Wrap up