From National Labs to $47.8M: Blue Frontier’s Playbook for Licensing Breakthrough Technology

From National Labs to $47.8M: Blue Frontier’s Playbook for Licensing Breakthrough Technology

In a recent episode of Category Visionaries, Daniel Betts, CEO and Co-Founder of Blue Frontier, an air conditioning company that’s raised $47.8 million, revealed how he secured a global exclusive license from the National Renewable Energy Labs. This wasn’t luck—it was a sequence of strategic moves.

The Myth of the Lab Partnership

Most founders approach national labs with proposals. They pitch their company, their ability to commercialize, and ask what’s available for licensing.

Daniel did the opposite. He started by complaining.

For years, Daniel worked in power generation. And in every project, the same problem kept breaking his work. “Air conditioning was always the thing that would turn on at the wrong time when it was hottest,” Daniel recalls. The grid would strain. Efficiency would plummet.

Most people would have worked around it. Daniel couldn’t let it go.

Step One: Position Yourself as the Person with the Problem

Daniel wasn’t selling. He was suffering.

“I started complaining about it in my peer groups of the advanced energy space and stumbled on solutions,” Daniel explains. He was discussing the problem with friends who happened to work at the National Renewable Energy Labs.

This positioning matters. National labs aren’t looking for entrepreneurs to pitch them. They’re looking for real-world problems their technology can solve. Daniel became the embodiment of that problem—someone deep in the trenches, able to articulate exactly why air conditioning was fundamentally broken.

The conversations weren’t transactional. They were collaborative. What would it take to actually fix this? Daniel was giving them the problem. They were excited to solve it.

Step Two: Let Them Come to You

After months of conversations, Daniel got a call. “Sign an NDA and come over to Colorado and we want to talk,” they told him.

This sequence is critical. The National Renewable Energy Labs initiated. They invited him.

“Right before starting the company, so I was talking to my friends at National Renewable Energy Labs, like maybe nine months before I started the company,” Daniel remembers. “And the conversation was around what would be the things that would be amazing for them to do with their technology in order for it to be a super commercial success.”

He wasn’t asking what they had available. He was helping them think through commercialization. He was the market validation they needed.

When Daniel arrived, the lab had done the work. “Within a very short period of time, my friends and the folks at the National Labs, and the National Renewable Energy Labs in particular, had found the solutions.”

Step Three: Understand What National Labs Actually Want

National labs don’t optimize for licensing revenue. They optimize for impact.

“If you ever work with the National Labs, that’s very typical,” Daniel notes. “Like, they hire some of the smartest people in the entire planet, and if you give them a challenge, they’ll come up with amazing solutions for them.”

The labs had brilliant solutions. What they needed was someone who could bring those solutions to market at scale. “The National Renewable Energy Labs was open to the idea of me taking a license, a global exclusive license around the technology for us to become a commercialization partner for them around this technology,” Daniel explains.

Notice the language: “commercialization partner.” Not customer. Not licensee. Partner.

Step Four: Demonstrate Commitment Immediately

Daniel didn’t ask for time to think. He committed on the spot.

“National Renewable Energy Labs basically pushed me into saying, like, hey, become an entrepreneur,” Daniel recalls. On his way to the airport, he called his wife: “I think I’m going to become an entrepreneur and I’m going to start this company. And that means I’m bringing no money home for a while. What do you think?”

By the time he landed, he was calling engineers to form a founding team. Within weeks, Blue Frontier existed. The lab saw someone who would bet their career on it.

This commitment matters for exclusive licenses. Labs need confidence you’ll actually commercialize, not shelf the technology.

Step Five: Use the Lab as Your First Investor

Blue Frontier didn’t have money. But they had access to National Renewable Energy Labs facilities.

“We were working from our homes and were also using the National Renewable Energy Labs as a little place where we could do some experiments,” Daniel remembers. The lab became their R&D facility, their testing ground, their validation partner.

National labs have equipment worth millions and deep expertise. For Blue Frontier, this meant advancing technology for nearly two years before needing serious venture capital. “We didn’t feel ready right at the beginning to raise venture with any sort of strength to negotiate a good equity deal,” Daniel explains. The lab partnership gave them runway to de-risk the technology.

What Makes Labs Choose You

National labs have hundreds of potential licensees. Why did they choose Daniel for a global exclusive?

He was credible—PhD in thermal sciences, deep experience in power generation. He articulated a real problem they could solve, not generic market opportunity. He helped them think through commercialization before asking for anything. He demonstrated immediate commitment. And he positioned as a partner, not a customer.

The Playbook for Other Founders

If you’re eyeing national lab technology:

Build relationships before you need them. Daniel spent nine months in conversations before the formal opportunity emerged. Show up with problems worth solving, not license requests.

Position as the market validator. Labs need proof their technology matters commercially. Articulate real-world pain in vivid detail.

Help them think through commercialization. Collaborate on what would make their technology commercially successful. Give strategic value.

Move fast when opportunity appears. When labs are ready, they need to see urgency. Daniel committed within days.

Use the partnership as de-risking capital. Lab facilities and expertise are worth millions. Leverage this before raising institutional capital.

Understand their incentive structure. Labs optimize for impact, not revenue. Frame yourself as the vehicle for maximum impact.

Daniel turned complaints into a global exclusive license, then turned that license into $47.8 million in funding. The sequence matters: problem first, relationship second, commercialization thinking third, commitment fourth.

Most founders do this backward. They start with execution plans and end with relationships. Daniel started with the problem and let everything else follow.

The labs don’t need entrepreneurs with pitch decks. They need entrepreneurs who embody the problem their technology solves.