Speaker 1: Welcome to Made by Women, a new podcast by the
Speaker 1: Seneca Women Podcast Network and I Heart Radio. At a
Speaker 1: moment when businesses face some of the biggest challenges in
Speaker 1: recent history, we bring you inspiring stories, practical insights, and
Speaker 1: shared learnings to help you successfully navigate in today's environment.
Speaker 1: Every Thursday, Made by Women will showcase the experiences of
Speaker 1: legendary women, entrepreneurs, fierce up and comers, and everyday women
Speaker 1: who found success their own way. Consider this your real world.
Speaker 1: N b A designed for the new Now. I'm Kim
Speaker 1: Azzarelli and thanks so much for joining us today. Uncharted
Speaker 1: Powers founder and CEO Jessica O Matthews is on a
Speaker 1: mission to bring smarter, sustainable, and reliable energy to the world.
Speaker 1: As a teen, she started thinking about energy infrastructure problems
Speaker 1: after she experienced the frequent power outages that her Nigeria
Speaker 1: based family lived through. She saw firsthand how they adapted
Speaker 1: to unhealthy solutions, like using diesel generators to literally keep
Speaker 1: the lights on. She continued on her mission to harness
Speaker 1: energy and invented the Socket during her undergrad years at Harvard.
Speaker 1: The socket is an energy generating soccer ball that brought
Speaker 1: her media accolades and even the attention of President Barack Obama.
Speaker 1: But as inspirational and cool as the socket was, she
Speaker 1: was forced to think bigger on her mission to solve
Speaker 1: the problem of reliable energy. Now, at age thirty two,
Speaker 1: Jessica has built an unbelievable organization and a resume that's
Speaker 1: beyond impressive. She has two degrees from Harvard, was named
Speaker 1: a Harvard Foundation Scientists of the Year, holds at least
Speaker 1: ten patents, and has been on the cover of Forbes
Speaker 1: magazine not once, but twice. And she's developing a revolution
Speaker 1: stionary concept to build and replace the current power grid
Speaker 1: with the sustainable and scalable energy solution. Enjoy my conversation
Speaker 1: with the amazing Jessica O Matthews of Uncharted Power. Jessica,
Speaker 1: welcome to Made by Women, and thanks so much for
Speaker 1: joining us. Thank you for having me. So. You run
Speaker 1: an unbelievable organization called Unchartered Power, which I know started
Speaker 1: at least the beginnings of it back when you were
Speaker 1: at Harvard. Could you tell us a little bit about
Speaker 1: what Uncharted Power is and really why you've done everything
Speaker 1: that you've done. I've been in this now for more
Speaker 1: than a third of my life right. Uh. The first
Speaker 1: kind of inklings and ideas around this company started when
Speaker 1: I was nineteen and I'm thirty two now, and so
Speaker 1: to a certain extent, just being a millennial that's stuck
Speaker 1: with the same thing for this long, I think feels
Speaker 1: a little bit like a like a superpower. Um So
Speaker 1: for me, you know, in the company, which was at
Speaker 1: one time called Uncharted Playing now called an Charted Power,
Speaker 1: for the last almost three almost four years now, the
Speaker 1: mission has always been the same. The goal really has
Speaker 1: been to bring sustainable power grid infrastructure to under resource communities.
Speaker 1: As a dual citizen of Nigeria the United States, I
Speaker 1: had this very interesting duality of experience as well. Um
Speaker 1: I was born in Upstate, New York, but my father
Speaker 1: lives in Nigeria. Most of my family lives in Nigeria,
Speaker 1: and I would then, of course be traveling to Nigeria
Speaker 1: annually to spend time with family. And in doing this,
Speaker 1: I saw firsthand the very dire situation related to access
Speaker 1: to power, access just to reliable power, let alone renewable
Speaker 1: or sustainable power. And it was something that was you know,
Speaker 1: very I think bothers some primarily because it wasn't like
Speaker 1: it was just a socio economic issue. If anything, it
Speaker 1: was truly an infrastructural issue masquerading as a socio economic
Speaker 1: issue because people are paying more pro killa one hour
Speaker 1: in places like Nigeria than they are in the United States. UM. However,
Speaker 1: they just don't have a system to pay into. So
Speaker 1: they're paying for diesel generators, they're paying for kerosene lamps, etcetera. UM.
Speaker 1: And so that's what, you know, initially really got me
Speaker 1: into it. Seeing that my own family, my my my
Speaker 1: cousins who are engineers, you know, that they're best kind
Speaker 1: of situation of thinking about how to address a broken
Speaker 1: power system that not only was horrible for the environment
Speaker 1: but put their own health at risk, that they could
Speaker 1: not even fathom a better solution, that there could be
Speaker 1: a better way to fix this. And then I think
Speaker 1: what ended up happening though over time, is that I
Speaker 1: realized that America wasn't necessarily built on the strongest foundation
Speaker 1: for power infrastructure either. But you know, ultimately, while every
Speaker 1: community is very different around the world, if you're an
Speaker 1: under resource community in the United States or in Sub
Speaker 1: Saharan Africa, UM, and specifically in Nigeria, you're facing a
Speaker 1: lot of the same issues when it comes to reliable
Speaker 1: grid infrastructure. The funny thing I think was that I
Speaker 1: always knew my why, but really figuring out the problem
Speaker 1: right to address and like the very like specific point
Speaker 1: that needed to be shifted, that's what really evolved over time.
Speaker 1: So first and foremost I thought it was an issue
Speaker 1: of inspiration. So I assumed that there were smarter, better
Speaker 1: people who could create the infrastructure solutions that were supposed
Speaker 1: to be created. I've been thought up in my own
Speaker 1: cousins who you know again, our our engineers, and thinking
Speaker 1: why do they not believe in their own ability to
Speaker 1: create a better solution. I'm going to take you back
Speaker 1: to your college here. So you're nineteen. You start to
Speaker 1: recognize that there's some um inequity going on here and
Speaker 1: there's some challenge, some systemic issues happening that you're wondering
Speaker 1: why people aren't addressing them. So you're at Harvard. How
Speaker 1: do you get the idea and where do you get started?
Speaker 1: At the age of seventeen, before actually I went to Harvard,
Speaker 1: there were two things that happened. One, I was in
Speaker 1: Nigeria for my aunt's wedding and we lost power that
Speaker 1: was expected. We brought in the diesel generator. It was horrible.
Speaker 1: The fumes were horrible. I started to complain, and that's
Speaker 1: when I actually heard my cousins say, don't worry, You'll
Speaker 1: get used to it. And it became very clear that
Speaker 1: we had two issues. One was, yes, this infrastructural issue,
Speaker 1: but probably what hurt me more was the reality that
Speaker 1: there was also a psychological issue. That people felt like
Speaker 1: the status quo was always going to be the status
Speaker 1: quo and that this system could not change UM and
Speaker 1: that just didn't feel right for me. Now, I didn't
Speaker 1: do anything in the moment. I went back to the
Speaker 1: US after you know, that trip, and over the course
Speaker 1: of a year, I lost three members of my family.
Speaker 1: My aunt who's would have been younger than I am now,
Speaker 1: my uncle, and my grandfather, all from things that UM
Speaker 1: either could have been delayed, if not totally avoided, if
Speaker 1: people actually had reliable infrastructure, you know, because people don't
Speaker 1: think about what happens if you go to the hospital
Speaker 1: and you lose power, you know. And so now that's
Speaker 1: what pushed me at least to start with something, because
Speaker 1: seeing the kind of sadness that my family was facing.
Speaker 1: I felt immediately like, well, okay, I don't think I
Speaker 1: can cure death. That doesn't seem to be the thing.
Speaker 1: But what saddened me the most was this idea that
Speaker 1: members of my family had died with this concept that
Speaker 1: they had no agency, that systems cannot change, that the
Speaker 1: default will always be the status quo. Uh And I
Speaker 1: wanted to invent something that would inspire people, show people
Speaker 1: that there could be another way that would bring people
Speaker 1: from a place that they're comfortable to a place where
Speaker 1: they would be needed. Uh And and and that's that's what
Speaker 1: got me first into this space. And I think the
Speaker 1: irony of it perhaps was that the socket ended up
Speaker 1: being most impactful um and most kind of inspirational, I
Speaker 1: think to me because I never thought that I could
Speaker 1: make any real difference in the in this world or
Speaker 1: in this space right of infrastructure. And so by starting
Speaker 1: with the play product, it felt like an easier, more tangible,
Speaker 1: accessible thing for me to to do, and it launched
Speaker 1: my career to get me to the point now where
Speaker 1: we're building really exciting power grid infrastructure. Essentially, it's where
Speaker 1: what we've built is UM an organization that's putting out
Speaker 1: technology like where the Google for power infrastructure, and so
Speaker 1: it's I think that the thing people have to realize
Speaker 1: sometimes is not everything I think about life and about
Speaker 1: doing anything that's particularly hard. It's about understanding the exact
Speaker 1: thing to do in that moment. I think the big
Speaker 1: win was that I was willing to try something. I
Speaker 1: think the big win with that I was willing to
Speaker 1: look and I started with the thing that was most
Speaker 1: you know, very apparently in front of me. Okay, my
Speaker 1: own family and people who I think are able to
Speaker 1: do something don't believe that anything can change. So how
Speaker 1: do you start to spark that? How do you create
Speaker 1: a psychological innovation? And it ended up working on me
Speaker 1: as well, Right, I started to drink my own kool aid.
Speaker 1: And as you start to move forward and you're like, okay, oh,
Speaker 1: you know, I made it, And as you're generating soccer
Speaker 1: ball wonderful. Let's talk about the socket because a lot
Speaker 1: of people know about the socket. But I just want
Speaker 1: to make sure everybody listening understands what a revolutionary concept
Speaker 1: that was. You know what it is? Though it's funny, Kim,
Speaker 1: I actually don't think it was a revolutionary problemt um.
Speaker 1: I think it was the start. I think what I'm
Speaker 1: building now as a revolutionary you know, because when you
Speaker 1: think about it, right, it was a magical product, right,
Speaker 1: it had a beautiful story, But one million soccer balls
Speaker 1: will not solve any problem, and it will not give
Speaker 1: my family a Nigeria the power that they need. It
Speaker 1: was simply a first step to explore the concept of
Speaker 1: energy being delivered in a different way. Okay, fine, great,
Speaker 1: there's an energy generating soccer ball. And then made an
Speaker 1: energy generating jump rope. That's that's great again. Trust me.
Speaker 1: I know people are just like, oh my gosh, this
Speaker 1: is so exciting. But the funny thing is we started
Speaker 1: to get that out there, we started to do more work.
Speaker 1: But the most important thing is that I had the
Speaker 1: self awareness to say, well, but this is not solving
Speaker 1: the problem. And so then we shifted as a company
Speaker 1: has said well, maybe we need to do more than
Speaker 1: just play. If my goal is to inspire the world
Speaker 1: to build a better system so my family can survive,
Speaker 1: maybe it's about now saying look, it's not just in
Speaker 1: play products. It's a less sexy story to talk about infrastructure,
Speaker 1: but if that's what's needed, and if no one else
Speaker 1: is going to do it, let's shift. And so I
Speaker 1: started then to work as a black girl in Harlem
Speaker 1: to build a team of world renowned scientists and technologists
Speaker 1: to start to translate our i P to infrastructure. And
Speaker 1: we actually built a really awesome energy generating speed bump,
Speaker 1: which was the first step to energy generating roads um.
Speaker 1: And we're getting ready to bring that to steps here
Speaker 1: in Africa and actually deploy that in Nigeria and Rwanda. UM.
Speaker 1: And it was actually at that moment in seventeen that
Speaker 1: brought us to where we are now. That really excites
Speaker 1: me because it was at that moment when literally we
Speaker 1: created something that when you drive over it, you'd have
Speaker 1: a kill a lot of power. Right. So again, same concept, UM,
Speaker 1: it's the concept of hey, generating energy from motion, generating
Speaker 1: energy from things that we already do, whether it's playing
Speaker 1: a soccer, playing with soccer ball, or jumping rope or driving.
Speaker 1: But then what's the issue, right, So we're creating infrastructural
Speaker 1: level solution and I've already gone farther in this than
Speaker 1: I ever thought I ever would. And we find out
Speaker 1: that the problem is actually not on the generation side,
Speaker 1: whether it's kinetic energy, which is where I started. Whether
Speaker 1: it's solar, whether it's biofuels, anything like that. There's a
Speaker 1: lot of cool things when that are people are doing
Speaker 1: for generation that's renewable, more sustainable, smaller, more distributed and
Speaker 1: spread out. The problem is that it's all feeding into
Speaker 1: the same archaic system, and that's the power grid. The
Speaker 1: way we have our power cables above head, and the
Speaker 1: way we think about building these power networks has not
Speaker 1: been updated in the last one hundred years. So I
Speaker 1: realized after at that time seven years right of like
Speaker 1: I'm just pushing this forward just for in the company, um,
Speaker 1: you know, for that no matter how cool of a car,
Speaker 1: let's say, no matter how sustainable of a car I created,
Speaker 1: if the road it was supposed to drive on, either
Speaker 1: did not exist like in Sub Saharan Africa in any
Speaker 1: real way, or had not been updated in the last
Speaker 1: one hundred fifty years like in the United States, how
Speaker 1: far do I possibly really think this car could go?
Speaker 1: And that aha moment was the it wasn't expected, it
Speaker 1: wasn't planned, But because I always had my true north
Speaker 1: of the mission, which was to solve this problem right
Speaker 1: and kept them getting closer and closer and closer. That's
Speaker 1: when we realized that the issue actually wasn't generation. The
Speaker 1: issue was something that very few people understand, very few
Speaker 1: people think about, but it's critical to actually building sustainable
Speaker 1: power infrastructure, and that's the way that we transmit and
Speaker 1: distribute this energy from different places. And so we ended
Speaker 1: up in focusing specifically on power grid infrastructure and how
Speaker 1: to rebuild the power grid in a way that would
Speaker 1: actually be sustainable and that would actually be scalable, so
Speaker 1: I could go back to my my family and Nigeria
Speaker 1: and say, here's the infrastructure that's going to give you
Speaker 1: what you need. The most exciting thing about the socket
Speaker 1: is that it is a very effective inspirational tool, um.
Speaker 1: And so, and sometimes we need to create things that
Speaker 1: at pull from these exciting worlds and frame them in
Speaker 1: a way that people can really adopt them, right and
Speaker 1: and explore with them. UM. But you know where we
Speaker 1: are now with the uncharted system that we've made, UM.
Speaker 1: You know, it's it's literally just like a paper solution
Speaker 1: that you put in the ground. But with this paper solution,
Speaker 1: you're able to make it easier for under resource communities
Speaker 1: to build power grid infrastructure, to manage power grid infrastructure,
Speaker 1: and to finance it so that I'm not going to
Speaker 1: a poor community, you know anywhere. Honestly, in the COVID world,
Speaker 1: a lot of communities do not have any money um
Speaker 1: or a community you know in Sub Saharan Africa who
Speaker 1: doesn't want to take on more debt, you know from
Speaker 1: the you know, the World Bank. I'm able to go
Speaker 1: to them and say, let us build a renewable micro
Speaker 1: grid for you, a full power grid solution for you,
Speaker 1: and we're not actually going to ask you for any money.
Speaker 1: We're going to actually help you sustain this. You know,
Speaker 1: you had mentioned that that first product, which you know
Speaker 1: you was, like you said, an inspirational product. It was
Speaker 1: important at the time because it opened your eyes and
Speaker 1: frank through the world's eyes to what is possible. And
Speaker 1: I think that question of possibility. But then, but then
Speaker 1: you were saying that, you know, sometimes you know you're
Speaker 1: going down a path and you kind of have to
Speaker 1: pivot right or you see that there's a better solution.
Speaker 1: Is it your mission that always keeps you looking for
Speaker 1: new ideas and keeps you open to what's possible. I
Speaker 1: think that it's my personal connection to the results. That
Speaker 1: kept me focused on what would actually be meaningful versus
Speaker 1: something that would be fun. I had quite a few
Speaker 1: offers to just focus on making a million socker balls,
Speaker 1: but that if I know that that's not going to
Speaker 1: solve the problem, what's the point. And I think this
Speaker 1: is where I feel very lucky that I can lean
Speaker 1: into my connection right to these communities. UM Like, even
Speaker 1: right now, a lot of people ask like, how has
Speaker 1: your company not just survived but thrived in this year
Speaker 1: that with all these phases of things that are happening,
Speaker 1: And it's like, well, Okay, I am black and you're
Speaker 1: telling me that this is a disease that affects black
Speaker 1: people and brown people disproportionately. I am a woman, and
Speaker 1: you're telling me that most essential workers are women and
Speaker 1: who are also disapportionately affected by this. UM I live
Speaker 1: in an under resource community in the United States, and
Speaker 1: my family lives in under resource communities in here in Africa,
Speaker 1: where I know now that this power infrastructure issue, which
Speaker 1: has always been important, um it's now becoming important and
Speaker 1: urgent because it's this It's it's the reason why we
Speaker 1: have the digital divide as well. If you do not
Speaker 1: have this reliable power infrastructure, you're not going to have
Speaker 1: the connectivity infrastructure that would need to live on top
Speaker 1: of that. So people can do simple things like go
Speaker 1: to school online. So for me, when that is my
Speaker 1: day to day, no matter what, I cannot forget it.
Speaker 1: I can't imagine a world where it's not It's not
Speaker 1: so much like even just looking for new ideas. It's
Speaker 1: finding the answer because it's a life or death situation
Speaker 1: and it always has been. Right. Um. The biggest issue,
Speaker 1: perhaps if anything, was I did not have the confidence
Speaker 1: in myself to believe that I could solve the big
Speaker 1: problem we're solving now because I saw no one that
Speaker 1: looked like me doing this, and because the world also
Speaker 1: quite frankly, can barely handle can barely handle the truth
Speaker 1: of disruption being necessary, let alone its coming from a
Speaker 1: vessel that looks very much not like the status quo
Speaker 1: CEO from Silver Value, Right. And so you have this
Speaker 1: juxtaposition that people are people are trying to you know,
Speaker 1: it's almost like there is nothing to do a dance
Speaker 1: or have a talk show, but they struggle with, um,
Speaker 1: the energy problem. Yeah, exactly. I think that there were
Speaker 1: a lot of people who were so excited about the
Speaker 1: concept of an invention, but never expected me to stick
Speaker 1: with it and have the confidence to say, oh, yes, no,
Speaker 1: we've built an amazing team of people, we have the
Speaker 1: best technology, we're going to change the game, and yes
Speaker 1: there are a bunch of people who tried before, and
Speaker 1: yes we were better, and yes we did it. It
Speaker 1: took so much time to get to that point, especially
Speaker 1: as a woman, I'm sure you know, as where where
Speaker 1: everything has to be so kind of like precisely designed
Speaker 1: because we'll never overstate, right. I went through so many
Speaker 1: um delayed moments. I think with the team, all of us, like, honestly,
Speaker 1: each time you've had like a breakthrough, we would pause
Speaker 1: and then do like a quick survey of the entire
Speaker 1: world and what people are creating from Singapore to Boston,
Speaker 1: because we were unsure, right like, oh, there's no way
Speaker 1: this could actually be as good as it is. Um
Speaker 1: And I think this year, especially with some of the
Speaker 1: people we've now brought on, who who are very close
Speaker 1: in this space I've been working in the space for
Speaker 1: my lifetime, who are saying, no, this is wow, this
Speaker 1: is it, this makes sense, let's do this. How how
Speaker 1: can I grow with you. I think it's a huge
Speaker 1: validation point. But in terms of a lesson, I think
Speaker 1: that on one hand, there's a competitive advantage to being
Speaker 1: humble because you push yourself to be the to be
Speaker 1: the best, and I think the world gets something that's better.
Speaker 1: On the other hand, it does slow down necessary innovation
Speaker 1: if only one type of person believes that they can
Speaker 1: do anything under the sun, and the rest of us
Speaker 1: are kind of, you know, finding our lane. And I
Speaker 1: think we're seeing that in this world right now, Like
Speaker 1: Silicon Valley has essentially failed us because they were supposed
Speaker 1: to be this innovation platform where any you know, problem
Speaker 1: the world has, something will come out of it. Um.
Speaker 1: But look here we are right now and what has
Speaker 1: been proposed, And so now what does that mean right
Speaker 1: in terms of how we've been deciding who's a visionary
Speaker 1: and who isn't, who should get funding and shoe shouldn't
Speaker 1: right like and at the end of the day, I
Speaker 1: think it's why the future really should be about focusing
Speaker 1: resources and development and building the confidence of diverse founders,
Speaker 1: not just for diversity's sake, but because these are the
Speaker 1: people who represent the communities who are feeling the pain
Speaker 1: the most. And are most incentivized then to find a
Speaker 1: true sustainable solution no matter what. So much of what
Speaker 1: you said is resonating because we know that you know, men,
Speaker 1: I would say, typically tend to raise their hand pretty
Speaker 1: early with the solution and get rewarded for that. Right,
Speaker 1: if they get rewarded for you know, put me in
Speaker 1: the game. And you know, women want to come with
Speaker 1: like an actual solution often and spend a lot of
Speaker 1: time thinking about what is the solution, and we will
Speaker 1: reward the men for doing that. And then we say, well,
Speaker 1: you know, the women lack confidence. And and actually what
Speaker 1: we were We've been thinking about a lot about the
Speaker 1: myths that are holding women back, and one of those
Speaker 1: myths is that that's the right standard. Right, maybe those
Speaker 1: guys are just reckless, right instead of calling them confident,
Speaker 1: maybe they're just reckless. And actually, what you're doing, Jessica,
Speaker 1: is like you actually have a solution. You know, you've
Speaker 1: worked on it, you've tested it, it works, you know,
Speaker 1: let's face it, I think every female led country in
Speaker 1: the world right now is handling this pandemic much better,
Speaker 1: and no one wants to about it. And it's like, well,
Speaker 1: because we're not like I mean, that's just it's not
Speaker 1: even about forcing gender nor like that's just a fat
Speaker 1: just fat because like when you when you're solving really
Speaker 1: hard problems that affect different people in different ways, there
Speaker 1: the society has bred us in a way, I think,
Speaker 1: to just be better suited, right, Like I love my
Speaker 1: dad as an innovator and and done so many amazing things.
Speaker 1: But when like when we're in a real problem, we're
Speaker 1: not calling my dad, We're calling like you call my mom,
Speaker 1: because like, let's just be honest here, Like, it is
Speaker 1: a dynamic in a way, right that I think serious
Speaker 1: problems I think are are are addressed. And you know,
Speaker 1: for for us, we actually have a very balanced team
Speaker 1: of men, women, um you know, also people who do
Speaker 1: not subscribe to that as well, you know, which I
Speaker 1: think is important when you think about the world that
Speaker 1: we're building. But at the end of the day, the
Speaker 1: reason why we have a diverse team and as a
Speaker 1: team representing all cultures and races and ethnicities and in
Speaker 1: suxual orientations versus just a team of people who even
Speaker 1: just look like me, it's because we're It's like, how
Speaker 1: else do you build an actual global solution? Right? For us,
Speaker 1: the key thing was always recognizing the differences of different
Speaker 1: people in different communities, different cultures, but then trying to
Speaker 1: find that kind of common line that brings us all together,
Speaker 1: and then working on that common problem that needs to
Speaker 1: be addressed to get the biggest bang for it for
Speaker 1: our buck. And so you know, the where the uncharted
Speaker 1: system particularly, it's something that we're really proud of because
Speaker 1: while there's a lot of technology that goes into it,
Speaker 1: there are still some a through line from the socket, right,
Speaker 1: so that the socket was a soccer ball that had
Speaker 1: a mechanism inside of it that when the ball was
Speaker 1: being played with it would generate energy. Now what I'm
Speaker 1: currently talking about does not generate energy. It's energy agnostic.
Speaker 1: You can put solar through it, you can put anything.
Speaker 1: It's all about how you think about the power grid,
Speaker 1: those power cables. But from our experiences and trying to
Speaker 1: create something that had energy technology inside of it, we
Speaker 1: were able to say, okay, how would you sustainably put
Speaker 1: innovative energy technology in the ground. And so we took
Speaker 1: that experience, which is nice so over like the thirteen
Speaker 1: years and said, well, here's how we have this paper
Speaker 1: system you put in the ground that makes it easier
Speaker 1: to build power grids actually in the ground versus just
Speaker 1: having them above head right in affordable way. You have
Speaker 1: a smart way of managing this system so that you
Speaker 1: don't just have people landering around like you know, waiting
Speaker 1: to find out when there's an issue. You have a
Speaker 1: smart system of visualization, UM and accessibility to make it upgradeable.
Speaker 1: But the most exciting feature of what we've built, like
Speaker 1: with this kind of ground solution, is realizing that we
Speaker 1: can use colocation and data to finance it. And so
Speaker 1: when we say that we're like an ethical Google for
Speaker 1: power grid infrastructure. If you think about Google, they've given
Speaker 1: us so much amazing digital infrastructure that has unlocked the
Speaker 1: digital world, from Google Chrome, to Google Search, Gmail, Google Hangouts,
Speaker 1: all of these things were especially leaning into now during
Speaker 1: the pandemic. But you know, how do they pay for
Speaker 1: how do they finance this infrastructure? Essentially they monetize ad
Speaker 1: space on their platform and data. And so what we
Speaker 1: realize it's like, well, why can't we do that for
Speaker 1: power infrastructure. So when we've built this platform in the ground,
Speaker 1: why don't we go ahead and help communities monetize co
Speaker 1: location space. So that's like where the five g antennas
Speaker 1: will go, where all the different things that you know,
Speaker 1: the different telecode companies and IoT companies where they want
Speaker 1: to put them. Will help cities monetize co location space
Speaker 1: on this platform and sell their data to finance. And
Speaker 1: so what we're finding now is that projects that would
Speaker 1: have otherwise been unfinanciable, right, so all communities that just
Speaker 1: would not I've had power, we can deliver payback periods
Speaker 1: of five years and we can finance this. And that's
Speaker 1: the the It's exciting in and of itself, but I
Speaker 1: hope that it is inspirational in that I do not
Speaker 1: have a degree in engineering. I started with an energy
Speaker 1: generating soccer ball when I was nineteen. I'm thirty two
Speaker 1: now and I stuck with it. The next year will
Speaker 1: be huge because we're finally building our our first big
Speaker 1: smart city with this technology. But over the next five years,
Speaker 1: I am really really excited to do what everyone else
Speaker 1: thought was impossible, and to and to do it, and
Speaker 1: to do it being um really honestly unapologetically black female,
Speaker 1: and me throughout all of it. So that's that's what's
Speaker 1: been the honor of this last decade. The name of
Speaker 1: your company. It makes so much sense. I mean, you're
Speaker 1: you're charting new ground in so many different ways, whether
Speaker 1: solving a hundred year old problem of energy systems, whether
Speaker 1: you know, honestly solving the issue of of of being
Speaker 1: a black woman. Uh, you know, succeeding UM after I'm
Speaker 1: sure a huge amount of effort. I mean you also
Speaker 1: raised a series A round, right, I mean that's that's
Speaker 1: a pretty amazing feat. Can you tell us a little
Speaker 1: bit about that, Yeah, I mean, you know, the series
Speaker 1: A was again the same issue of just having to
Speaker 1: do so much more than I think our peers, like
Speaker 1: we we raised at that time in what we believed
Speaker 1: to be the largest series A that a black woman's
Speaker 1: have a raised in history, you know, just based on
Speaker 1: what's been reported. But that that amount was seven million,
Speaker 1: was the average amount raised by anyone UM that year, right,
Speaker 1: And so it becomes funny. It's like, Okay, I had
Speaker 1: to go to Harvard twice beyond the cover of Forbes twice.
Speaker 1: The Harvard scientists of the year before thirty fortune most
Speaker 1: problems in women to raise the average amount of the
Speaker 1: guy who dropped out of community college and had an idea,
Speaker 1: So what did that tell you about the world. And
Speaker 1: again the ideas that die before they're even born because
Speaker 1: they're not coming from the status quo, because I'm not
Speaker 1: coming from what we expect. And and I think again
Speaker 1: that's part of why we really as a society and
Speaker 1: go to decide, we need to reflect on the people
Speaker 1: we've been empowering did not solve the problem when we
Speaker 1: needed them. They gave us the app to help us
Speaker 1: tailor our pants, okay, but when we needed them to
Speaker 1: to live, they did not help us. So moving forward,
Speaker 1: who are we going to cultivate, Who are we going
Speaker 1: to support? Who are we going to develop and build
Speaker 1: so that the next time the world needs solutions there
Speaker 1: are people ready with them who get it and it
Speaker 1: can push in that way. What you're doing and the
Speaker 1: way you're working and the way you're thinking um is
Speaker 1: so transformative and people need to hear what you're saying.
Speaker 1: And I think particularly for I was going to say
Speaker 1: for young women, but I think for all women. Your
Speaker 1: story is something that is I think so freeing because
Speaker 1: you've acknowledged so many things that you faced. I mean
Speaker 1: that that sort of lack of confidence that is endemic
Speaker 1: to the society. What advice could you give? And I'm
Speaker 1: sure lots of people ask you for advice. What advice
Speaker 1: could you give young women coming up who are thinking
Speaker 1: that they have an idea, but they're not so sure
Speaker 1: that their idea is going to work. So one, I
Speaker 1: think it's really important to make sure you're very clear
Speaker 1: on your why versus your what UM, because it's it's
Speaker 1: it's one thing to say, Okay, well this is what
Speaker 1: I think you should I should do. Now there's another
Speaker 1: thing to know why you're doing it. UM. Entrepreneurship has
Speaker 1: a lot of ups and downs, and at the end
Speaker 1: of the day, you can't, you know, be sure of
Speaker 1: your success, but you can do a lot to make
Speaker 1: sure that you know who you are at the end
Speaker 1: of the day and that you like the person that
Speaker 1: you're looking at in the mirror. And so throughout all
Speaker 1: of this I always took the time to make sure
Speaker 1: that I believed in what I was doing, that I
Speaker 1: believed in the way I was doing and who I
Speaker 1: am throughout this process, and then I understood my my
Speaker 1: my main goal. Because there are so many different things
Speaker 1: that can be distracting and exciting UM, and so you
Speaker 1: have to be clear on that why, And it can
Speaker 1: be hard, but you have to be clear. And then
Speaker 1: I think the big idea is also to be open um.
Speaker 1: A lot of times we feel like we can't even
Speaker 1: get started un til we we can't even get started
Speaker 1: until we we know exactly how things are going to end.
Speaker 1: I think that oftentimes we feel like we have to
Speaker 1: know the end of the story before we even start
Speaker 1: the book. And that's just not a very interesting book
Speaker 1: to read, then, is it. And so we need to
Speaker 1: be willing to know our why right, why are we
Speaker 1: even opening up this book? And we need to be
Speaker 1: ready to go on the ride um. And I think
Speaker 1: just having that openness and creating that space for ourselves
Speaker 1: it's critical to get to the solutions that we actually
Speaker 1: need in this world. I love talking to Jessica. Honestly,
Speaker 1: I could talk to you all day. Thanks so much
Speaker 1: for joining us, Jessica. We look forward to watching everything
Speaker 1: you're doing. Thank you, thank you. I want to thank
Speaker 1: Jessica oh Matthews for an inspiring conversation and for sharing
Speaker 1: the passion that keeps her pushing uncharted power to find
Speaker 1: a solution. Here's a few takeaways that I got from
Speaker 1: the conversation. First, It's important to keep your why at
Speaker 1: the center of your business versus just the what. Jessica
Speaker 1: made the tough choice as an entrepreneur to pivot her
Speaker 1: company in order to reach her mission. She could have
Speaker 1: kept creating energy generating play products like the socket soccer ball,
Speaker 1: but she refocused when she realized her why needed a
Speaker 1: different solution. Second, even the most ambitious and accomplished founders
Speaker 1: need to find their confidence and run their company in
Speaker 1: a way that is unapologetically true to themselves. Jessica's talent, drive,
Speaker 1: and diversity have the potential to shift the perception of
Speaker 1: what an energy industry CEO looks like, and that's good
Speaker 1: for everyone. Lastly, think big and keep pushing forward. Jessica
Speaker 1: is on a mission to change the energy grid and
Speaker 1: a system that hasn't been updated for the last hundred
Speaker 1: years now. This is no small feat and she probably
Speaker 1: runs into obstacles every day. But true innovation requires big ideas, risk,
Speaker 1: and sheer perseverance. We at Seneca Women are very excited
Speaker 1: to continue to follow Jessica's work and the incredible solutions
Speaker 1: of Uncharted Power. See you next Week Made by Women
Speaker 1: is brought to you by the Seneca Women Podcast Network
Speaker 1: and I Heart Radio, with support from founding partner p
Speaker 1: and