From C-Suites to C-Rates
Observing the currents of leadership change sweeping battery industry
Written by Intercalation’s Andrew Wang.
South 8, Lilac, AMB, Cuberg, Frey, Our Next Energy, Quantumscape, Solid Power, Sila Nano, GM, Powin, AIonics. Transitions in the C-suite have occurred recently at these companies, let’s plug in and get the positives and negatives on these moves.
NPR’s Marketplace recently reported on the record number of CEO exits: 200 in January 2024, and 1,900 for the whole year of 2023.
It appears the battery industry has not been an exception.
C-suite turnover means either:
(A) Companies are growing well and boards are setting up a transition for further scaling.
(B) Lackluster performance and competition leading to pressure for change.
While some cases are clearly (A) or (B), some may signify a bit of both. See what you think.
South8, Lilac, AMB, & Cuberg: The 2015-2016 start-up vintage
The 2015-2016 vintage of founder-led battery startups with new CEOs include South8 (12/23), Lilac Solutions (2/24), AM Batteries (10/23), and Cuberg (2/24).
South8’s founder and previous CEO Cyrus Rustomji took up the role of Chief Scientist, with Tom Stepien joining from semiconductors to lead the liquified-gas electrolyte extreme temperature battery company.
Lithium extraction company Lilac Solutions has just closed a $124M series C, with former CEO and founder David Snydacker transitioning to the CTO role, bringing in June 2023 COO hire Raef Sully, with a background in agricultural chemicals, in as the CEO.
Dry-electrode company AM Batteries recently closed a $30M Series B, bringing in Celgard battery separator vet Lie Shi as CEO, in place of academic founding CEO Yan Wang.
Lithium-metal battery company Cuberg’s founder and outgoing CEO Richard Wang has also been replaced by automotive vet Shauna McIntyre. Levine reported that the CEO, COO, and CSO of Cuberg were fired, a significant shakeup since the sale of the company to Northvolt in 2021.
Freyr & Our Next Energy: The gigafactories
More traditional Li-ion gigafactories founded in 2018-2020 have also switched CEO’s as pressure to execute on manufacturing mounts.
Freyr (8/23) brought in Birger Steen, software and semiconductor vet, in place of founder and CEO Tom Jenson.
Our Next Energy’s (12/23) founding C-suite was also shaken up, with CEO Mujeeb Ijaz and CTO Steven Kaye leaving their roles. Mujeeb remains with ONE as CTO, and new CEO Paul Humphries brings his background in electronics manufacturing. The change came after a failed Series C fundraise. Both Freyr and ONE have had recent rounds of layoffs too.
Quantumscape & Solid Power: The solid statists
CEO changes also occurred with publically traded solid-state battery companies founded in 2010 and 2011: Quantumscape (2/24) and Solid Power (12/22).
Solid Power’s founding CEO Doug Campbell was early in the transition, making way for John Von Scoter with renewables acumen.
More recently, Quantumscape’s founding CEO Jagdeep Singh took place as chairman of the board, with Siva Sivaram taking the helm as CEO. Siva is a chip industry vet and was originally hired in July 2023 as chairman. The company press release states the leadership transition is a marker to bring their solid-state technology to mass production.
Sila Nano & GM: The executive connection
Sila Nano has a new CFO (12/23) with experience from Intel and GE: Abbey Omokhodion. In the same time frame, Sila announced a large partnership with Panasonic to integrate their silicon anode technology. Sila’s VP of Battery Commercialization & former Tesla exec Kurt Kelty, however, left Sila to join GM (2/24). He is likely to work out kinks with the GM Ultium battery platform.
Honorable mention also goes to GM’s CTO switch out, with Gil Golan subbing out after one month on the job (10/23).
Powin & AIonics: the others
Without any connection to other collections, we also cover the CEO change at grid storage system developer Powin (8/23). Powin brings in solar vet Jeff Waters, succeeding Geoff Brown as the company grows to deliver on over 1.2 TWh of grid storage under construction.
AIonics CTO Lenson Pellouchoud has also recently announced they are stepping down from their role at the AI material battery development & discovery startup. AIonics was founded in 2018, with Lenson citing AIonics growth and role evolution being the primary factors.
What’s next? Or should we say, who’s next?
Whatever happens, we’ll continue to cover these pivotal moments as the battery sector evolves and matures.
🌞 Thanks for reading!
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