Ready to build your own Founder-Led Growth engine? Book a Strategy Call
Frontlines.io | Where B2B Founders Talk GTM.
Strategic Communications Advisory For Visionary Founders
Actionable
Takeaways
Choose markets ripe for revolution:
Blue Frontier targeted air conditioning because it uses 150-year-old technology and is controlled by a small group of large players. Betts explained, "The market is ripe for disruption, but it also means that disruption will be very difficult... you have to have technology that is way better than the existing technology."
Create unfair advantages through multi-dimensional value:
Blue Frontier's technology delivers 3x efficiency gains while enabling grid flexibility and superior comfort. This combination of benefits creates value streams that incumbent technologies cannot match. B2B founders should look for opportunities where their innovation can unlock multiple, complementary value propositions.
Target strategic entry points:
Rather than trying to serve all market segments immediately, Blue Frontier focused on commercial building ventilation systems where their technology could deliver the highest impact. Betts shared their criteria: "Choose a market that will give you enough replicable product that you get to learn and have generational improvements that occur fast... but that is on the premium side of things and it's not a market that is so large that it overwhelms the company."
Leverage institutional partnerships:
Blue Frontier's breakthrough came through licensing technology from the National Renewable Energy Labs. For deep tech founders, national labs and research institutions can provide foundational IP and validation. However, commercial success requires translating that technology into products that solve real market needs.
Balance user experience with system-level benefits:
While Blue Frontier's grid benefits are compelling, Betts emphasized the importance of user experience: "You must provide technology that is for the user much better... once you're inside this air conditioned space that I am creating, you cannot go back to the old way of doing things." B2B founders should ensure their innovation delivers clear improvements to end-user experience, even when selling to businesses.
Conversation
Highlights
When Air Conditioning Becomes the Problem You Can’t Ignore
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 in funding, shared how an annoying problem became a world-changing opportunity.
Daniel didn’t set out to revolutionize air conditioning. With a PhD in mechanical engineering focused on thermal sciences, he spent his early career working on hydrogen fuel cells, lithium-ion batteries, and electric vehicles. But every project had the same frustrating bottleneck. “Air conditioning was always the thing that would turn on at the wrong time when it was hottest,” Daniel explains. “So you get this air conditioning at the hottest period. That’s when everything else is running at lowest efficiency.”
The problem went deeper. “Air conditioning sizes, everything. So the entire grid, the entire power generation system is all sized to give you the power necessary for your air conditioners,” Daniel notes. “Your average power is much smaller, much lower, but your peak power is much higher. So that means that you’re overpaying for your infrastructure in order for us to have air conditioning.”
After years of complaining to peers in the advanced energy space, Daniel stumbled upon solutions from the National Renewable Energy Labs that could change everything.
From Phone Call to Global Exclusive License
The turning point came through a conversation with friends at the National Renewable Energy Labs about what would make their technology commercially successful. Months later, they called: “Sign an NDA and come over to Colorado and we want to talk.” When Daniel arrived, they had technical solutions for almost everything he’d mentioned.
They offered him a global exclusive license. “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?”
Building the Right Team in a Thai Restaurant
Daniel assembled a founding team that could execute. He called Matt Graham, the best mechanical engineer he knew. Then Dr. Matt Tillman, a thermal analysis expert. And Greg Tropsa, who had founded Ice Energy. They met at a Thai restaurant, shook hands, and Blue Frontier was born in December 2017.
“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. They secured grants from NYSERDA, Southern California Gas, and Oak Ridge National Labs—”just enough money for us not to pay ourselves, but to reinvest into the company.”
The Strategic Wait for Venture Capital
Blue Frontier didn’t rush to raise venture capital. For nearly two years, they advanced the technology using grant funding. “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 breakthrough came in 2019 when they joined Rocky Mountain Institute’s third derivative inaugural cohort. This validation led to a $1.25 million convertible note, followed by a $20 million Series A.
Choosing Hardware When Software Dominated
Daniel saw hardware differently than most investors. “Hard tech gives you that mode of technology that is very difficult for someone to come in and just copy and just implement around you,” he notes. “You can create new services and growth spurts that you couldn’t follow with that conventional technology.”
But he’s clear about challenges. “You’re bound by the laws of physics. In the world of physical things, only if the physics enables it will it do what you want it to do.”
The key was creating unfair advantage. Blue Frontier’s technology delivers three times the efficiency of conventional air conditioning while embedding energy storage. “We’re three times the efficiency,” Daniel states. “So now you’re in a very different world.”
The Market Entry Strategy
Picking the right initial market proved critical. They needed replicable products, economies of scale, premium pricing, and manageable market size. “All these things are competing with each other in terms of picking,” Daniel acknowledges.
They chose commercial building air conditioning, specifically dedicated outdoor air systems—units providing ventilation air. Every commercial building owner has multiple buildings with substantial air conditioning needs, creating high customer lifetime value.
Dedicated outdoor air systems offered the biggest impact. These units bring humid outside air into buildings constantly. “That humid air basically is a river of water into the space, and you need to get rid of that water,” Daniel explains. Conventional systems over-cool to remove humidity, then reheat—incredibly energy-intensive.
Blue Frontier’s liquid desiccant technology removes humidity without over-cooling, delivering 50 to 90% energy reductions. “You’re gaining like 30% reductions in energy consumption, plus the fact that our unit is more efficient from a fundamental standpoint,” Daniel notes.
Creating the Revolution
The advantage goes beyond efficiency. Blue Frontier controls humidity and temperature independently while providing outdoor air ventilation. “It just so happens that humidity control is more important to your comfort than temperature control,” Daniel reveals. “But temperature control is what the conventional air conditioner doesn’t do very well with. Humidity.”
This creates an impossible experience with conventional technology. “No longer you have to wear a sweater when you walk into your office in the summer. No longer are you cold and sweaty at the same time,” Daniel promises.
The Utility Partnership Vision
Looking ahead, Daniel sees air conditioning fundamentally changing utility operations. “Because air conditioning is the thing that sizes the entire infrastructure of the utility, it is very convenient for a utility to become involved in the provision of advanced energy, storing air conditioning into the market,” he explains.
Utilities can deploy energy storage through advanced air conditioning faster and cheaper than traditional batteries. “It will better for utility to become a hero of their community by providing people with the capacity to escape increasing temperatures with advanced air conditioning while at the same time making money off of it,” Daniel predicts.
Blue Frontier’s journey demonstrates a crucial lesson: the most annoying problems often hide the biggest opportunities. By waiting for the right moment to raise capital, building unfair advantage, and choosing entry points where competitors can’t follow, they’re reimagining how we cool buildings and power cities.
Recommended Founder
Interviews
Curtis VanWalleghem
Co-Founder & CEO, Board Member of Hydrostor
Curtis VanWalleghem, CEO of Hydrostor: $322 Million Raised to Build the Future of Energy Storage
Michael Witte
CEO & Co-founder of Workrise
Michael Witte, CEO & Co-founder of Workrise: $750 Million Raised to Power the Future of the Energy Industry
Joshua Riedy
CEO and Founder of Thread
Joshua Riedy, CEO and Founder of Thread: $20 Million Raised to Power the Future of Energy Grid Maintenance
Michael Witte
CEO & Co-founder of Workrise
Michael Witte: Workrise: the GTM Story of Workrise ($3 Billion Valuation)
Allison Wolff
CEO of Vibrant Planet
Allison Wolff, CEO at Vibrant Planet: $34 Million Raised to Build the Future of Land Management Restoration
Iain Cooper
CEO of SeekOps Inc.
Iain Cooper, CEO of SeekOps, $23 Million Raised to Build the Future of Emissions Monitoring
Martin Kosak
CMO of Sensoneo
Event Marketing Mastery: Martin Kosak on Sensoneo’s Success at Trade Shows
Doron Myersdorf
CEO & Co-Founder of StoreDot
Doron Myersdorf, CEO & Co-Founder of StoreDot : $200 Million Raised to Power the Future of Electric Vehicles
Kaitlyn Albertoli
CEO and Co-Founder of Buzz Solutions
Kaitlyn Albertoli, CEO and Co-Founder of Buzz Solutions: Nearly $6 Million Raised to Build the Future of Infrastructure Inspection
Troy Helming
Founder & CEO of EarthGrid
Troy Helming, Founder & CEO of EarthGrid: $63 Million Raised to Build Underground Super Grids with Plasma Torch Technology
Preston Bryant
Co-Founder, Executive Chair, & Chief Commercial Officer of Momentum
Preston Bryant, Co-Founder of Momentum: $20 Million Raised to Transform Battery Recycling Through Materials Science Innovation
Thomas Sisto
CEO & Co-Founder of XL Batteries
Thomas Sisto, CEO & Co-Founder of XL Batteries: $20 Million Raised to Transform Grid-Scale Energy Storage
Zak Lefevre
CEO of ChargeLab
Zak Lefevre, CEO of ChargeLab: $20 Million Raised to Build the Operating System for EV Chargers
Ben Christensen
CEO of Cambium Carbon
Ben Christensen, CEO of Cambium Carbon: $5.5 Million Raised to Build a new Category of Sustainable Wood
Dan Forman
CEO and Co-Founder of Copper Labs
Dan Forman, CEO and Co-Founder of Copper Labs: $13 Million Raised to Enable the Data-Driven Utility of the Future
Edward Chiang
Co-Founder and CEO of Moment Energy
How Moment Energy secured Over $30 million in government contracts by proving commercial readiness first | Edward Chiang
Alexis Normand
CEO & Co-founder of Greenly
Alexis Normand, CEO & Co-Founder of Greenly: $78 Million Raised to Build the Future of Carbon Management
Saurabh Kapoor
CEO & Co-Founder of Metafuels
Saurabh Kapoor, CEO & Co-Founder of Metafuels: $22 Million Raised to Pioneer Synthetic Aviation Fuel Technology
Liz Gilligan
CEO & Founder of Material Evolution
Liz Gilligan, CEO & Founder of Material Evolution: $19 Million Raised to Build the Future of Sustainable Cement
Manik Suri
Manik Suri, CEO and Founder of Therma: $30 Million Raised to Build the Cooling Intelligence Category
Rebekah Braswell
CEO of Land Life
How Land Life evolved from selling technology to delivering A-to-Z restoration projects | Rebekah Braswell
Javier Marti
CEO and Founder of Divirod
Javier Marti, CEO & Founder of Divirod: $7.6 Million Raised to Build the Google Maps For Water
Alex Siminoff
Director of Marketing of Parity
Alex Siminoff, Director of Marketing at Parity: Mastering HVAC Optimization with Effective B2B Storytelling
Matthew Besch
VP of Marketing of ACCURE Battery Intelligence
Building a New Category: From Zero to Market Leader in 3 Years
Dr. Kai-Philipp Kairies
CEO and Co-Founder of Accure
Dr. Kai-Philipp Kairies, CEO & Co-Founder of Accure: $18.5 Million Raised to Build the Future of Battery Intelligence
Omar Abou-Sayed
Co-Founder & Executive Chairman of Vaulted Deep
Omar Abou-Sayed, Co-Founder & Executive Chairman of Vaulted Deep: $8 Million Raised to Build the Future of Carbon Removal
Kentaro Kawamori
CEO & Co-Founder of Persefoni
Kentaro Kawamori, CEO & Co-Founder of Persefoni: $114 Million Raised to Build the Climate Disclosure & Carbon Management Category
Francesco Volpe
Founder of Renaissance Fusion
Francesco Volpe, Founder of Renaissance Fusion: $30M Raised to Build the Future of Nuclear Fusion Technology
Adam Silver
CEO & Co-Founder of Plural Energy
Adam Silver, CEO & Co-Founder of Plural Energy: $2.8 Million Raised to Build the Future of Clean Energy Investing
Troy Carter
CEO and Co-Founder of Earthshot Labs
Troy Carter, CEO and Co-Founder of Earthshot Labs: $11 Million Raised to Power the Future of Ecosystem Conservation and Restoration
Arvin Ganesan
CEO of Fourth Power
Arvin Ganesan, CEO of Fourth Power: $20 Million Raised to Build the Future of Energy Storage
Tim Weiss
CEO and Co-Founder of Optera
Tim Weiss, CEO & Co-Founder of Optera: $17.5 Million Raised to Build the Future of Carbon Management and Accounting
Scott Graybeal
CEO of Caelux
Scott Graybeal, CEO of Caelux: $70 Million Raised to Transform Solar Energy with Perovskite Technology
Antoine Welter
CEO and Co-Founder of Circu Li-ion
Antoine Welter, CEO & Co-Founder of Circu Li-ion: $8.5 Million Raised to Build the Future of Battery Upcycling
Thibault Castagne
CEO and Founder of Vianova
Thibault Castagne, CEO and Founder of Vianova: $8.8 Million Raised to Build the Go-To Operating System for the Mobility World
Michael Belenkie
CEO and President of Entropy
Michael Belenkie, CEO and President of Entropy: $300 Million Raised to Spearhead Efficiency and Innovation in the Carbon Capture Economy
Kenneth Herschel
CEO and Co-Founder of Viggo
Kenneth Herschel, CEO and Co-Founder of Viggo: Nearly $6 Million Raised to Build the Future of EV Charging Infrastructure
Chris Tolles
CEO & Co-Founder of Yard Stick
Chris Tolles, CEO & Co-Founder of Yard Stick: $18 Million Raised to Build the Future of Soil Carbon Management
Tara Bartley
Vice President of Marketing of REsurety
How to Squeeze as Much Value as Possible out of Each Piece of Content
Mukund Karanjikar
CEO of CleanJoule
Mukund Karanjikar, CEO of CleanJoule: $55 Million Raised to Power the Future of Sustainable Aviation Fuel
Rachael O’Brien
Head of Demand and Brand of Opna
The End of Marketing Specialists: Building AI-Native Teams That Scale
Astrid Atkinson
CEO & Co-Founder of Camus Energy
Astrid Atkinson, CEO of Camus Energy: $20 Million Raised to Build the Future of Grid Management
Josh Knauer
Co-Founder of Reseed
Josh Knauer, Co-Founder of Reseed: $5 Million Raised to Build the Future of Carbon Credits for Farmers
Matt Loszak
CEO & Co-Founder of Aalo Atomics
Matt Loszak, CEO & Co-Founder of Aalo Atomics: $33 Million Raised to Build the Future of Nuclear Energy
Joselyn Lai
CEO & Co-Founder of Bedrock Energy
Joselyn Lai, CEO & Co-Founder of Bedrock Energy: $9 Million Raised to Power the Future of Geothermal Energy
Ali Javidan
Co-Founder of Range Energy
Ali Javidan, Co-Founder of Range Energy: $9 Million Raised to Build the Future of Electric Semi-Trucks
Allen Kramer
Co-Founder & COO of Crux
Allen Kramer, Co-Founder and COO of Crux: $27 Million Raised to Power the Future of Sustainable Finance
Gary Lewis
CEO & Co-Founder of Resourcify
Gary Lewis, CEO & Co-Founder of Resourcify: $15 Million Raised to Build the Future of Recycling Management
Stwart Peña Feliz
Co-Founder and CEO of MacroCycle
Stwart Peña Feliz, CEO of MacroCycle: $7.6M Raised to Build the Future of Plastic and Textile Upcycling
Quentin Scrimshire
CEO and Co-Founder of Modo Energy
Quentin Scrimshire, CEO & Co-Founder of Modo Energy: $20 Million Raised to Build the Energy Asset Benchmarking Category
Virginia Klausmeier
CEO and Founder of Sylvatex
Virginia Klausmeier, CEO and Founder of Sylvatex: More Than $15 Million Raised to Build a Better Class of Sustainable Materials and Drive the Green Revolution
Matei Stratan
CEO of Ogre
Matei Stratan, CEO of Ogre: $2 Million Raised to Build the Future of Energy Management
Khaled Hassounah
CEO & Founder of Ample
Khaled Hassounah, CEO and Founder of Ample: $290M Raised to Build the Future of EV Batteries
Matt LeDucq
CEO and Co-Founder of Forum Mobility
Matt LeDucq, CEO & Co-Founder of Forum Mobility: $423 Million Raised to Power the Future of Zero-Emission Trucking
Marina Azcarate
Head of Marketing of Mitiga Solutions
Marina Azcarate, Head of Marketing at Mitiga Solutions: Driving the Future of Climate Risk with Cutting-Edge Tech
Gary Ong
CEO & Founder of Celadyne
Gary Ong, CEO & Founder of Celadyne: $5 Million Raised to Power the Future of Green Hydrogen Production
Andre Fernandez
CEO & Co-Founder of Invert
Andre Fernandez, CEO of Invert: $26 Million Raised to Build the Future of Nature-Base Carbon Credits
Chris Hare
CEO of PRTI
Chris Hare, CEO of PRTI: Over $25 Million Raised to Transform America’s Billions of Waste Tires into Valuable Commodities
Elizabeth Muller
Co-Founder and Executive Chair of Deep Isolation
Elizabeth Muller, Co-Founder and Executive Chair of the Board of Deep Isolation: Over $22 Million Raised to Build the Future of Nuclear Waste Disposal
Adrienne Pierce
CEO of New Sun Road
Adrienne Pierce, CEO of New Sun Road: $6 Million Raised to Accelerate Renewable Energy Deployment
Ankit Somani
Co-Founder of
How Conifer secured Wall Street Journal and TechCrunch exclusives within weeks of launch | Ankit Somani
Sid Jha
Founder & CEO of Arbol
Sid Jha, Founder & CEO of Arbol: Over $20 Million Raised to Build the Future of Climate Risk Management
Kathy Hannun
Founder & CTO of Dandelion Energy
Kathy Hannun, Founder & CTO of Dandelion Energy: $175 Million Raised to Democratize Geothermal Energy for Home Heating and Cooling
Jan Willem Rombouts
CEO & Founder of Beebop AI
Jan Willem Rombouts, CEO & Founder of Beebop AI: $5.5 Million Raised to Power Grid Orchestration for the Clean Energy Transition
Kameale Terry
Co-Founder and CEO of ChargerHelp!
Kameale Terry, Co-Founder and CEO of ChargerHelp!: Over $20 Million Raised to Build the Future of Electric Vehicle Infrastructure
Alisa Valderrama
Co-founder and CEO of FutureProof Technologies
Alisa Valderrama, Co-Founder and CEO of FutureProof Technologies: $10 Million Raised to Translate Climate and Weather and Financial Risk with Unprecedented Accuracy
Greg Fallon
CEO of Geminus
Greg Fallon, CEO of Geminus: $12 Million Raised to Help the Industrial Sector Prepare for the Energy Transition
Marc Borrett
CEO & Co-Founder of Reactive Technologies
Marc Borrett, CEO & Co-Founder of Reactive Technologies: $80 Million Raised to Build the Future of Grid Measurement
Jaimi Klein
Head of Marketing of STAX Engineering
Seeing is Believing: How STAX Builds Trust
Steff Gerhart
Co-Founder & Co-CEO of ecoLocked
Steff Gerhart, Co-Founder & Co-CEO of ecoLocked: $6 Million Raised to Transform Buildings into Carbon Sinks
Greg Newbloom
CEO and Founder of Membrion
Greg Newbloom, CEO & Founder of Membrion: $23 Million Raised to Build the Future of Industrial Wastewater Treatment Solutions