Powering the Future: How Energous is Pioneering Wireless Energy for IoT

Transcript

• Steve Statler 0:00

  Welcome to the Mr. Beacon podcast. We've got a great guest this week, Gianpaolo Marino, who is SVP for business development and strategy at Energous. Really important company, interesting company in the ambient Internet of Things.

  A lot of people counted them out. They were one of the first companies to get into this wireless power and they they're public, and they spend a lot of time and money on figuring out where the gold is buried, what use cases were going to scale. And think there was a lot of focus in the early days on enabling chips that enabled power in the home for devices that wouldn't be plugged in. And all of that's evolved in some of the use cases that they aimed at, but a lot of them in other areas. But I came across them fairly early in willyotz history, and got introduced to them by one of the founders as an interesting technology company. This was round about the time that we were figuring out how to launch a kit, a starter kit for willyot That was a personal project of mine, I guess. I mean, there were a lot of people involved, but it's something that I really something that I really believed in. And energist created a product for that kit, and we sold hundreds of them to many different companies that wanted to get their hands onto ambient IoT. And so that initial energist one watt device at the time, was state of the art, and it allowed people to play with those tags in their homes, in their businesses, and get to know the technology for all sorts of reasons, which we won't go into. Now, those kits ended up not really scaling in the way that I wanted to and will you ended up moving on to a different strategy, kind of a rifle shot strategy of focusing on the very biggest companies and going after them. But energists cut its teeth on that, and they've now emerged as being this amazing supplier of the most serious infrastructure for ambient IoT deployments, and they made a product that was code named Condor, which is basically the most powerful bridge that you can buy to energize tags. So I'm going to talk to Jim Paulo about that. It has been a very interesting week. It's my last week. Was my first week outside of willyot. As you can tell, the podcasts continuing, and for now, at least willio sponsoring it, which I'm grateful for. So we continue, and I've been focusing on setting up the new company, doing the paperwork to incorporate, finding the right lawyer to work with as the company proceeds who will file the paperwork and collaborating and recruiting the founders. We've got an amazing founding team who I can't name and talk about, but really makes me very happy to get to work with people that are just people that I admire and respect and are really, really good. And we've been talking to the early investors, and good conversations, conversations about the strategy, what we're trying to do with ambi.ai, a MB, ambient, and then ai.ai is really ambitious, and it's the downstream work that that will yacht really can't focus on, because they have these huge projects upstream in the in the DCS, the back of the store. And what I really wanted to do was start working on the downstream, work in the home, in stores, in restaurants, and find a way of bringing people, places and things together using this next generation browser for the physical world. You know, what does a browser for the physical world look like? Well, it has AI bolted into it so that you can literally talk to products and have a conversation with an assistant that knows you, not just from what you've said, but what you have done, where you've been, where you've spent your time, the products that you've used, and that's a really privileged position, and it's going to take a lot to get it right. It's going to require pragmatic privacy, privacy control and access control. There's going to be a lot of data. And so inevitably, this story gets. Kind of big and complicated, and the opportunity is massive. It's huge. What can you do in a world where everything around you has a voice and is a sensor and is connected, and what's the network that connects that, and what's the app that use the network uses the network? And so the new company is focused on building this service that will link things with their digital identity and places with all of the digital services that that place offers. And we'll have an app that uses that network. It'll be open to others, and that app will hopefully be delightful and have be the best Somalia tour guide, personal assistant you've ever had, helps you find the car keys, the power tool that you lost, and tells you the story behind the products that you're thinking of of consuming, whether it's a bottle of wine in a restaurant or just the secret to jumping the line and getting your order in if you're stuck in a cafe or waiting for service in a food truck. So that's the idea. And then to cap all of that off, the ambient IoT Alliance announced. So this is something that's been worked on for many months by a lot of people at Intel and Qualcomm and wiliot at Mossack Views group, Infineon and PepsiCo. And we managed to get all of the legal teams, all of the stakeholders to agree on a message on a website. And I got the privilege of being the spokesperson, even though I don't work at Willy art anymore or any of the other companies, then I'm volunteering my time, and it's a privilege to get to speak to some amazing journalists. So we got a got coverage in Wired Magazine, which was awesome, and I think it speaks to the significance of this ambient work that that group is doing around harmonizing the standards, sharing best practice, providing cues and clues based on all of their experience about the use cases that will be the ones that have them have the most impact and scale. So check out the coverage for the Ambia IoT Alliance. There's a really nice article in RFID journal live. There's that Wired article and IoT inside many other publications. So that's it from me over to my conversation with Gianpaolo. As always, don't forget the bit at the end, we talk a bit about his Italian heritage and his music choices and and the latest of what's happening with energies. So enjoy it. The Mr. Beacon ambient IoT podcast is sponsored by williot, bringing intelligence to every single thing. Gianpaolo, welcome to the Mr. Beacon podcast. It's wonderful to have you on the show.

  Giampaolo Marino 8:06

  Thank you so much, Steve, thank you for inviting me My pleasure.

  Steve Statler 8:09

  So in the podcast, we cover a really broad range of subjects, but ambient IoT is the focus, and energis is a fascinating company, and I'd love to hear the latest from you. I you know, in the relatively early days of Willie art, we had this idea of putting a starter kit together, which is one of those. It's a more controversial part of our company's history, but I was a big fan of it, but I think it was maybe a little early, but it was very popular. And I remember that one of our co founders, you're on, introduced me to Caesar, who was the CEO at the time. And you guys basically built a device for Will ya and for that kit. And in fact, I've got one here. I do have some 3d printed versions of this. But I thought it was, yes, it was a beautiful device, and it was kind of really the first one of its kind, because it was like a sub gigahertz and a 2.4 gigahertz device. So it had all the power of the sub gigahertz and the and so forth. So, you know, my relationship with your company was forged then, I think that was before your time. You joined after that, and now you're basically running strategy, sales, marketing and so forth. So A lot's happened. Do you want to I've kind of rambled around an explanation of what part of what your company does, if you're in a meeting and you're having to explain to people from scratch what energist does. What do you typically say? How do you introduce the company? Interesting?

  Giampaolo Marino 9:49

  Well, it's a great question, and I always try to simplify the concept of our technology so it's easier for everyone to understand. So the analogy that I always. Like to use is, well, you know, think of when we had cable internet, right? You know, we had, you know, our cable internet plugged into our computer, and so that gave us access to the internet. And then from cable internet, we went to Wi Fi, where now we have, you know, Wi Fi everywhere. You know, internet everywhere. And we can pick that, you know, that Wi Fi signal and do our browsing. In essence, at energies, we are doing the same thing with power. We're really transforming cable power to basically power everywhere. And think as you're basically running into entering into a room where your sensors, where your IoT nodes, and all sorts of IoT devices now are getting powered by this technology, without the need of a battery, and also without the need of any source of human intervention. Because, again, if you don't have batteries, now, you don't need any one to maintain those batteries. So in essence, this is what we do at energies. It's really how do we push power at a distance, and how we get to energize large distances, you know, large areas, and power obviously, and connect technology like in the likes of Willi, it for instance.

  Steve Statler 11:12

  And you work with Will you, but you also work with other companies as well, right?

  Giampaolo Marino 11:16

  Yes. So we absolutely work with Williard. But for us, you know, when you look at Willi, it is the perfect we call it the perfect receiver, because the sensitivity of will you, it's, it's so high, you know, the power is so low, that we're able to really get fantastic ranges of coverage, you know, with the Willi technology, right? So we basically propagate power over 900 megahertz. Will you harvest over 900 megahertz, and then, you know, we communicate over, you know, 2.4 gigahertz Bluetooth channel, right? But will you is on is not only the only technology that we're focusing we're also focusing on, you know, this new category of IoT node and sensors that today are being powered or are communicating off of Bluetooth, and the goal for energies is, well, how do I get to reduce or eliminate, you know, the batteries out of these sensors so that I can give customers an opportunity to reduce cost, perhaps to reduce the area of these sensors, the surface areas of the sensors, because now you're eliminating the battery further, also reducing or eliminating cost or maintaining, you know, those sensors, because now there's no more batteries. And so that is really an area that energies has been focusing on, and it's an area that we're very, very excited about it. Because also, when you think about, you know, sensors, you know whether those are temperature sensors or humidity sensor, for instance, light spectrum sensors for vertical farming, right CO two sensor, for instance, you know, for smart building. You know, it's an area that I think, you know, it's going to go through tremendous opportunity and tremendous growth, and we are there to eliminate all sorts of frictions, you know, out of these areas, so that we can really propel the growth further. You know, very rapidly,

  Steve Statler 13:03

  very good. I in a little bit, I want to talk about some of the the way the product range has evolved, and your what we call Condor product. I don't know whether we're allowed to call it, but basically it's kind of the big, the big guy in the the lineup, which we're seeing really do very well. But before we get to there, let's just spend a bit more time on the bigger picture and these different devices that you work with. Can you, you know, what if you were to give an analysis of this IoT business, you know, where would you say it is? If you're like having a board meeting, and you're, you're like describing the pros and cons of the different segments within IoT, because you have one device, but it's used by these different kinds of devices. I'm really intrigued by that vertical farming light sensor thing that you that you described, but what, what are the kind of if you were to break up the market and look at, well, this is the size and this is the growth, and there's here's the value, what are the pros and cons of the different segments? And, you know, obviously Willi arts, ambient, IoT tags is one of those. I'm kind of interested in how you look at these from the outside?

  Giampaolo Marino 14:22

  Yeah, that's a great question. Steve, So, typically today, as energies, we like to break the market into three specific focus segments, right? The first one is retail IoT. And within retail IoT, obviously you had, you know, supply chain, you had cold chain, you know, you have a track and trace. I mean, there's obviously be an application that are driving in retail, IoT. Then the second segment is TNL, transportation and logistics, which is another segment that we're focusing on today as energies. And then the third set segment is manufacturing. Because manufacturing there is, you know, it's, there is a side of manufacturing that it's, it's really growing and is in need. Need of a lot more sensors, you know, to really provide, you know, better efficiencies in the process, and also to make, you know, the right decision in terms of, hey, you know, if I have a cloud and I have a bunch of sensors, you know, how can I basically make the right decision in terms of, for instance, you know, preventance and maintenance. So those are the three segments that we are really focusing today. And so when I look at the segment where we are, you know, when I look at the adoption curve, right? I mean, because, again, ambientality, you know, will your technology, battery life, sensors, it's the element that we're trying to introduce in every single market. And so when I look at those market and when I look at the adoption curve, I think we are right there, Crossing the Chasm, right? We are basically getting into the innovation phase, where now we are seeing a bunch of very innovative customers, large customers, that are basically adopting the technology and are developing use cases around the technology that is going to benefit their operation. And so today we are seeing that. And so as we cross the chasm, I believe that the rate of adoption of these use cases and you know, the amount of customers that are going to be jumping in is going to grow exponentially. And so we're very excited about that. And when I look at the market again, I always like to mention ambient IoT. The growth of ambient IoT is tremendous. I mean, we are seeing basically the market going from hundreds of millions into the trillions, and that growth is going to be over the next three to five years. And so, you know, we want to be part of that. You know, we are positioning ourself energy, positioning yourself as the network of choice within that infrastructure, within the ambitie infrastructure that can provide, you know, seamless data communication, you know, from Wilier to from battery less sensors all the way to the cloud, and enable customers in the cloud to do the right level of computation, to receive the level elaborate information that will make their processes better and more efficient.

  Steve Statler 16:57

  Very good. And what are the biggest problems that you see being driving adoption, fastest, where, where? That's always kind of the it's the need that will drive the investment. And what are you hearing?

  Giampaolo Marino 17:12

  What I have experienced, Steve is, as you look at a specific solution, and I call an end to end solution, right? You know, from, let's say from from William pixel tag, or from a sensor all the way to the cloud. I think the biggest challenge is to reduce the number of players, you know, into that solution, so that now you have a very well controlled, you know, end to end solution. You have the well, very well controlled distribution of power data into the cloud. And so reduction of players, I think, also brings more confidence, you know, to the end customers that, you know, this is a solution that is robust, is very well defined, you know, doesn't have five or six different players into the equation. And so they feel comfortable adopting it, because the value is tangible. I mean, you know, you have been in the same position as I had. The value of the technology. It's very tangible. The I would say that the worry is into the implementation of the technology into an existing infrastructure, right? It is already there. And so the worry is like, well, I don't want to disrupt what I had, right? I want to make sure that you know, this technology, this infrastructure, can be seamless into these overall infrastructure that I had created and can provide, obviously, additional use cases. So I think we together, we will yet and energies, we have been demonstrating that we are working very well together. I think as you, as you have seen at the progress of our products into the market, and also what we are going to be offering moving forward, has an aim to reduce the number of components. It has an aim to reduce the number of players, and also has a very much focus to reduce the cost of ownership of the infrastructure for customers so it's easy for them to deploy, and puts them in a better position of confidence to go and use a technology that today might be a new technology. Do you

  Steve Statler 19:00

  have something specific in mind in terms of that consolidation of functionality so that you can simplify things? You

  Giampaolo Marino 19:08

  know, when I look at how our network topology looks like, you know, from, from, I'll give you an example. I always, I always like to use will yet, because it's a player, is a customer, is a partner that we work with very closely. Well, you know you have the really pixel tag. And then you know you have the energies, power bridge network topology. Then you have gateways. And then you you have ways, you know, to send data into the cloud, whether that is energies cloud, well, whether that is, will it cloud, or whether that is, you know, the customer cloud, right? So, so, okay, fine pixel, which is there because it's a digital trigger that you cannot get rid of. But then, you know, you have gateways and you have power bridges, or, you know, energy transmitters. Well, can I combine now gateways and bridges together so that now I provide a little bit of a seamless and cost effective, you know, network infrastructure, you know, for my customers, where they don't have to worry about, okay, dedicated gateway, or dedicated. Power bridge that might be from two different sources, and hopefully that gives you an idea of to where we

  Steve Statler 20:04

  go. Okay, yeah, that's a good hint. And just for people that aren't in the know on what the difference is between the gateways and the bridges, the bridge is kind of the first stepping stone. The signal comes from the tag. The bridge energizes the tag, it reads the tag, and then it relays a stronger Bluetooth kind of aggregate of packets up to the Gateway, which goes from Bluetooth to internet protocol. So the basically goes over the internet. And you're looking at ways of simplifying that. Well, let's look at the products range as it stands. So I waved that small device, the small, round device that we included in the starter kits way back when, when those were a thing, they aren't a thing anymore, that people have to do kind of a pilot, and it's much more of a high touch process for us, at least when, when will it goes to market. I think you got, you guys have other approaches, but tell us a bit more about the new products. And what is it, what is it that you've done to really optimize that bridge product, something that can deliver good power and and do a good job of reading the tags,

  Giampaolo Marino 21:14

  certainly. So yes, Steve, you know, we go back to, you know, the round one, what we call it power bridge device, which I think was a great device to introduce the technology, you know, to introduce, you know, to enable customers to test, you know, the technology on a POC level, on a small scales level, but you know that that was basically it. So, you know, as we have progressed with will, you know, to engage with bigger and larger customers, we felt the need to really introduce to the market an enterprise grade product that, you know, will really provide the level of coverage, you know, the power level, you know the data communication infrastructure that was needed at a large scale. And as a matter of fact, we were able to introduce to market a few, few quarters back. We call it the power bridge Pro. Which is, which is this device right here? Okay, you can see it. Okay, so, so, in essence, what this device is, is a two watt conducted a watt EIRP device. So this is the highest power device available in the market right now, and it's capable of delivering eight watt, okay, eight watt RBI, RP power is an enterprise grid product device as an IP 67 rated certification. It could be used for indoor and outdoor use. So

  Steve Statler 22:35

  IP 67 that basically means you can subject it to rain and snow, and it'll be fine. It

  Giampaolo Marino 22:41

  would be subject to rain and store water. It will be absolutely fine. As a matter of fact, when we qualify this product, we had it under water for about two months, okay, and still perform very well. It's, it's a little bit of a change of game, because, again, eight watt of power compared to the one watt, the original one watt. I mean, you're talking about eight times power really gives, you know, that level of visibility that customers are looking for. And so we are able to energize Willie picks of tags, even the one that are, you know, hidden, maybe, you know, when they are applying, you know, the certain asset we are ready to read those, you know, very quickly. We are able to get a very fast response, right? We always like to say, we turn the light on as soon as you know the to what you know, the power Beach, bro pro goes on. And so you know, this is really a game changer for a lot of our customers, because now you know, they're starting to see level of visibility in the 9798 99% and this is really where we need to be together energies and will, you know, to really win customers, you know, confidence into the technology. But also, you know, win the confident that these technologies is a game changer. Yeah,

  Steve Statler 23:51

  so how do you hack that amount of power in there, legally? I mean, because there are limits to what you're allowed to broadcast, right?

  Giampaolo Marino 23:59

  Yes, no, it's a great question. Steve, I think we have been able to really do these at energies, because we are also a we're not just a system company. We are also a semiconductor company. So we develop our own controllers, we develop our own pas, we develop our own semiconductor components, and that gives us great flexibility to when we go and look for regulatory approval, for instance, in the United States, in Europe and other country where this technology could be applied. So, you know, the energy's Power Pro as full FCC certification in the United States, it's safe to use. And now we're basically going for, you know, certification in other adjacent countries where, you know, we believe there's a lot of opportunities. But going back to your question, I think you know, the fact that we control our semiconductor gives us a lot of flexibility on how to meet sometimes stringent requirements that are coming from, you know, different country regulation when it comes down to safety.

  Steve Statler 24:54

  Yeah, and I don't want to get too much into the weeds, but you talked about the fact that you design your. Power amplifiers and your own chip technology. But I think part of what makes these devices good is the antenna design, right? It's about having an antenna that not isn't just pushing out the power, but it allows you to have flexibility in terms of the tag orientation and so forth. How do you do that? Yeah,

  Giampaolo Marino 25:21

  no, this is a great question. Steve, yes, we also have an antenna team at energis that has been with the company for the last 10 years. So we had really antenna experts in this field of power delivery and power distribution, and so, you know, this device right here has actually has an antenna topology that is very different from the one what Okay, is really what is giving us? You know that the higher level of performance, and again, you know that core competence, you know, comes from our antenna team, come from years of experience that we have in power transfer, distribution of power transfer.

  Steve Statler 25:58

  Okay, very good. Maybe any other updates you want to give on the company? I see that you're offering shares to end users. I didn't quite understand that, so maybe you can kind of explain a little bit about about that on the corporate front.

  Giampaolo Marino 26:14

  Yeah, so we as a company, we're looking at different ways, you know, to raise capital and Emily Bucha CEO, she's, she has a tremendous experience in microcop company in the likes of energies, so we are undertaking a reg a offering right now, which gives, basically, institutional investors an opportunity to really buy shares, you know, for energies and, you know, believing what the company is doing, really believe also in the sustainability aspect of the company, you know, which I think also, along with will, you know, we want to eliminate batteries, because batteries are not only toxic for the environment buyer, batteries are also a limiting factor for IoT to really get into the thrilling subdivisions. So, yeah, we are undertaking this reg offering. Reg, a offering, and we're super excited about it. You know, we're telling our story. Where, you know we're telling institutionally, well, we're telling basically, sort of retail investor, not institutional investors, retail investors, people just like you and I. You know what our story is and what our vision of energies is going to be over the next three to five years.

  Steve Statler 27:13

  Very. Good. All right. Good. Anything else that we should cover, any more news that in the company we've, we've obviously spoken to energies in the past, but I wanted to take this time to give people an update on where you're at. Oh,

  Giampaolo Marino 27:29

  I think the, you know, from a company standpoint, you know, we are looking at different elements of our solution again, you know, we love to work with Willi it. You know, it's been a tremendous journey, but the company is also looking at like, as I mentioned before, maybe, you know, changing the game in sensors, right in back to in Bluetooth enables, you know, sensors. And so, you know, we're looking at a complete end to end, you know, ecosystem solution, where now you have sensors, where you have a cloud that is an energy cloud, where you had a dashboard where, you know, you can provide information, you know, to customers that are relevant, you know, to their operation, and hopefully help them, you know, improve things. Very

  Steve Statler 28:06

  good. One thing that I don't think I've mentioned to you is I'm actually leaving Willy today. This is today's my last day. Wow,

  Giampaolo Marino 28:13

  are you? This is actually an interesting news that is catching me by surprise.

  Steve Statler 28:20

  Yeah, it's I'm leaving to start a company that's going to use the willyop platform and license some of the willyot IP. So it's not like I'm losing faith in this ecosystem that energies and will yacht and many other companies have been developing. It's actually that I see this huge opportunity. And the company's flagship product will be some an app called ambi, as in ambient AI. It'll be an intelligent assistant, and the platform that it uses will be called Living web. And these are things that we've been working on at will, ya and just couldn't focus on, couldn't focus on, because we've got these massive customers that your company's involved in doing work upstream. And so, you know, how do you do this downstream work that's closer to the consumer experience, whilst not taking your eye off the ball upstream. And so this is my last day. So bittersweet. This is my last interview, not my last interview on the Mr. Beacon podcast, but the last interview whilst at Willie. And so it's kind of a significant one for me. Anyway, I just thought I'd let that know, because it might come out in the rest of our discussions, but and we can talk more offline, and we're kind of recording, so you may little bit of time to process it, but let's get let's get back to you. Less about me, more about you. How did you end up working at energies? So it's

  Giampaolo Marino 29:56

  a great question. So prior to energies, I was. Business at a company called Analog Devices, obviously a big semiconductor company, sparing, you know, you're, you know, your ex experience with Qualcomm, and I was driving for Adi system solutions across the entire organization. So focusing on consumer application primarily, but also looking at IoT and really leveraging, you know, some of the best IP Adi had developed across the board to really build solution to go after consumer and IoT application. So I got very familiar with IoT as some of the use cases of IoT. And, you know, my interest actually grew quite a bit as I started to learn about Wilier, for instance, when I was Avi, and I started to learn about ambient IoT, and I started to learn about, you know, some really interesting use cases that were going to form, in my opinion, around IoT, and I believe that they were going to be the drivers of all that. So Andre just contacted me when, when I was still at AI, they asked me whether or not I was interested in joining the organization to continue focus the technology and the product on IoT and help the company pivot from a technology that they had built for the last 10 years into a market that will really create the right product market fit, you know, for the company. And so I felt that having a little bit of knowledge of RF and wireless power, you know, this could be a quite of an interesting play for energies. And I felt there was a good opportunity, you know, to really, you know, take a leap of faith and see, well, you know, what can I do? How can I, you know, help pivot the company? How can I find the right market? Given my experience in IoT, so, yeah, I decided to leave our devices to join energies and take on a big challenge. And a big challenge, I'm sure you know, you you have seen, you know, the milestones and the progression that you know, we've gone through over the last few years, yeah, but it's been an amazing experience so far. Because, you know, thanks to Will you also, and thanks to, thanks to the Wilier technology and the focus of will, you know, we have been able to really carve out for energies what we call the right product market fit, which is ambient. IoT, yeah,

  Steve Statler 32:16

  great to get that background. I want to make sure we continue the podcast tradition and ask you about music as we wrap up the show. And were you able to think of three songs that had meaning for you? Yeah,

  Giampaolo Marino 32:30

  so I, you know, I obviously coming from Italy. For me, Italian music is very important. I love opera, Pavarotti. For me, I grew up with Pavarotti. My dad was, was really, you know, in love with opera music. So I was exposed, you know, since the beginning, you know, to a lot of different Pavarotti songs. And, you know, the Three Tenors, as you as you can imagine Pavarotti, you know, Domingo. So, so for me, you know, I think let's one of, one of the songs that I grew up with from Domenico modernia, which is a little bit different from Pavarotti, I know, but I think volare is such a great song, and he's got such a great meaning, at least for me, that, you know, I'm coming from Italy, that is a song that I love to listen to, and it gives me inspiration, and it gives it brings me back so many good memory of my upgrade upbringing in Italy and my family and my grandparents and my cousins, because we used to sing that often time, you know, during Sundays, family get together,

  Speaker 1 33:31

  yeah. What does it mean by the way we fly is to fly, you

  Giampaolo Marino 33:36

  know? Okay, volatile is like, you know how you can free yourself as a bird and fly high in the sky, you know, without being chained down by, you know, any type of restrictions, right? So you

  Speaker 1 33:47

  know, whereabouts in Italy, did you grow up? So I grew up

  Giampaolo Marino 33:51

  in a city called Salerno, which is in a city of the Amalfi coast on the south part of Italy, southwest side of Italy. Just to give you some reference, Salerno is about a 50 kilometer south from Naples, about 250 kilometers south from from Rome. The city is very well known for the Amalfi Coast. Yes, places like Amalfi, Positano or Sorrento, which, which are, you know, very well known. And, yeah. So I've been fortunate, because growing up as a little kid, I had the amount because right in front of me, and it's always been a great place of vacation and memories, you know, with my family and friends. And do you go back? I go back. My my family still lives in Italy, my mom, my sister, my my extended family, so my wife and I, you know, and our daughter, you know, we try to go back at least once or twice a year, or as much as we can. Awesome,

  Steve Statler 34:48

  yeah, I went on a holiday with my family to Italy. And, you know, you're sometimes in life, you collect these images that memories and. And I traveled with my youngest son, who's like 20 at the time, and we had a nightmare flight in from the US. It was just, we don't have enough time on this podcast to describe all the things that went wrong. But we arrived in Venice, and you know, you get from Venice airport to the Venice city via boat, and so we took this water taxi, and it was the most amazing experience. It was just the most beautiful thing I've ever seen. It was just stunning. And I'm like, I'm in a movie. This is, this is, like, it was an amazing antidote a very challenging journey. And when We made it, we made it down to Rome and did all the touristy things. So I have my LEGO model of the Coliseum, which I can see

  Giampaolo Marino 35:45

  that on the back. Yeah.

  Steve Statler 35:49

  Very good. Well, so what's song number two?

  Giampaolo Marino 35:51

  Song number two is Conte partiro, with you. I will leave. I will go. I will depart from on there, Andrea Bocelli. And you know, this is a song that it's very dear to me, because it brings me memory to when I left Italy for the United States to undertake my, you know, my college journey, my undergrads and graduate studies. So, you know, it was a song that gave me, you know, strength to really face the challenges ahead in a completely new country without my family, but at the same time, also reminded me of where I was coming from, and so Andrea Bocelli. I love him. I mean, he's great boys, and I think he's a testament in a statement of Italian music. So

  Speaker 2 36:35

  amazing. Conte bastiro, all right. And then number three.

  Giampaolo Marino 36:39

  Number three is all of me from Joel legend. It's our wedding song. So, okay, you know, if, if you know, I wouldn't call this out, my wife should have been really mad. But no, this was a song that we played at our wedding. And, you know, it brings back, brings back great memories, you know. And then obviously the bond that there is between me and my wife.

  Steve Statler 37:04

  Fantastic choices. I really enjoyed hearing about it. GM Paulo, thanks so much for joining us on the podcast. It's been great to have you. Thank

  Giampaolo Marino 37:12

  you so much, Steve for having me.

  Steve Statler 37:16

  So that was the conversation with GM Paulo, a great guy, works hard, super smart, super focused. I'm rooting for the people at energies. They've got a great product, and I can see some really good things on the short time horizon for them that will, I think, be very good for their business. Thank you for sticking with this podcast listening to the end, you're an exceptional listener that's bucking the Add trend, or maybe, like my friend Elizabeth, you're just using this podcast as your way of getting to sleep, whatever. It's still streaming hours, and that contributes to the momentum that we have with the podcast, and hopefully we can help help people figure out how to make ambient work for good. So until next time, be safe. Have fun. Enjoy the journey you.