00:00Let's get technical here because for the layperson, Bluetooth, it's a very cheap sensor that's
00:05embedded in a lot of different devices out there. I thought it only had a range, even Bluetooth low
00:10energy of like 30 feet or something like that, maybe a little bit more. How do you enable this
00:15technology to connect to satellites? Absolutely. And as you might imagine, the first reaction I
00:21ever get is, what the heck, my headphones barely work when I leave the room. And the reason everyone
00:27thinks of Bluetooth as such short range communication is the use case that it was built
00:31for, which was streaming music from your computer to your headphones. And so it's trying to transmit
00:35a lot of information at once. And that actually massively reduces the range that you can get
00:42out of Bluetooth. And instead, what we're focused on is much smaller amounts of data, but very
00:46important data. Where are my things? How are they doing? And is everything okay? And so by focusing
00:51on this different use case and then changing the characteristics of the RF signal, you can actually
00:56get it to go all the way to a satellite and reach it from outer space. But the true IP
01:01and the true
01:01core technology is a new antenna array that we've built in space that has thousands of antennas on
01:06it that are doing advanced digital beamforming to make it all happen. How do you get those to space?
01:10We launched them with SpaceX and a few other rocket launchers. And much like everyone else in the
01:15space economy, the Falcon 9 is getting us up to space. How's the consistency of it?
01:20Of the Falcon 9?
01:22No, no, no.
01:24Pretty consistent.
01:25But in terms of having, you know, is it durable? Do you have problems with it?
01:30Yeah. The great thing is we've been able to solve a lot of the reliability problems that
01:33people think of Bluetooth. And the way that we've done that is, again, focused on our use
01:38case and then really specialized the antennas that are super sensitive, specifically in our 2.4
01:43gigahertz band. And then what we also do is we have a network of terrestrial gateways as well
01:48that are able to receive the signal. So we have over 100 million different gateways. These are
01:53things like smartphone apps that are listening for the Bluetooth signal as well. And through this
01:57combination of a terrestrial network and then the direct-to-satellite connection, you can solve
02:01the problem anywhere in the world.
02:02If you don't have that network of phones and apps that are connected and serving as gateways,
02:08on its own, can the satellite signal get through buildings?
02:12Yeah, it actually can. So the intuition I can give you is we're as sensitive as the GPS signal is.
02:18So if you imagine your device could get a GPS lock, it can send a Hubble signal.
02:22I mean, look, if I'm using my Garmin cycling computer, I have to go outside to get a GPS for
02:26that.
02:26Yeah. So again, it depends on the building and there's no like one size fits all, but like say
02:32your viewership can't see this, but a normal single family home with like wood would be fine.
02:37A steel building and concrete, would it?
02:39I just want to clarify, we're not in a normal single family home right now.
02:42This is a single family home that's featured in the show Billions as Mr. Axelrod's Hamptons
02:50purchase. So not a normal single family home.
02:53Who are your customers?
02:55Yeah. So a lot of our customers and a little bit about myself, I co-founded a company called Life360.
03:00Right.
03:01And this whole idea came from trying to build hardware devices for families. So think about
03:04like smart collars for pets, GPS watches for kids, fall detectors for elderly parents, a better
03:10version of the AirTag tile like product. That's where the idea for Hubble first came from. So
03:15we've got all these consumer use cases for Hubble, but the real business value is in the enterprise
03:20and industrial like IoT kind of use cases. So lots of use cases across construction, oil and gas,
03:26agriculture, mining, defense, places where, you know, you're deploying assets in mass out in rural
03:32areas and you just want to know where they are and what's going on with them.
03:34Are you working with the government?
03:35Uh, we do have a contract now with the government. Uh, we've mostly have been a commercial business,
03:40but ultimately we view ourselves as a dual use company.
03:44I'm wondering about the gateways and the smartphone apps that serve as gateways. What does that network
03:49look like? And I mean, are these just Life360 customers? How does that work?
03:52Yeah, it's not solely the Life360 network, although we do have a partnership with, uh,
03:56my previous company. And, um, it's also there are a lot of people have tried to solve this problem,
04:01uh, and they've created their own small little gateway networks. And so we're essentially
04:06collecting all those networks together to create like a much bigger network. That's kind of a
04:10combined network. Would you consider, um, like Apple's air tag, I think is a consumer application
04:15that a lot of people are familiar with, but there are many limitations. And one of those limitations is
04:19it creates this network that is only through iPhones. Um, and it also is limiting in the distance
04:25that it can be tracked. Uh, do you think that Apple would be interested in this technology?
04:30My dream and hope one day is Apple's one of our big customers. So we'll, we'll see.
04:35So they could maybe beef up the air tag using your technology.
04:38Or buy you?
04:39Well, no, we're not for sale.
04:40Okay.
04:41But everybody's for sale.
04:43We'll see.
04:43It's just the price.
04:44Uh, yeah. Uh, but what I would say is the great thing about the Hubble technology is you don't have
04:49to change your existing devices at all. So the air tag would need zero modifications. It would just be
04:55a software change to the air tag. As an example, we've launched publicly with Sam Sara as a customer.
04:59And so Sam Sara was able to take their existing devices, just add a little bit of software on it.
05:05And now they're connected to our network.
05:06This is an asset tracking, uh, company. They are a publicly held company worth just shy of about
05:11$20 billion based out in Silicon Valley. And they help keep track of fleet. They do fleet management.
05:17Um, they're doing asset tagging for like supply chains and stuff. You help them with all that stuff?
05:22Yeah. And they just recently announced a cool new label that, you know, looks like a shipping label,
05:27super flat. It has a Bluetooth chip and a battery in it. And you can start to think about tracking
05:31every package that gets shipped globally.
05:33How expensive is that though? That label that you're putting on?
05:37Yeah. Now, nowadays, uh, they're being built for a sub dollar. You can start, I mean, I think long
05:42term as this all plays out and the supply chains get better, we'll be talking about 25 cent shipping
05:47labels that are trackable anywhere in the world.
05:49Is it something Amazon's interested in? Uh, Amazon also could be very interested without
05:54breaking any NDAs, but another customer I hope to, uh, work with one day.
05:59You also mentioned you took help. You're a co-founder of Life360. That is now a publicly
06:03held company. It has a market cap right now of about $4 billion. Do you take Hubble public?
06:08Uh, that, that might be the goal. I mean, uh, what I'm going for is not to get bought,
06:13but is to build a very, uh, independent company that does something massive. And I think
06:17has a huge impact in the world and maybe, you know, part of solving the capital structure
06:21is going public one day. I'm still on the board of Life360. And so I appreciate the
06:25struggles of being a public company, but hopefully this is the second one.
06:28Where are you in the entrepreneurial journey for Hubble? Are you raising money right now?
06:32Uh, we're currently in the middle of our next fundraise, uh, up to date. We've raised about
06:36a hundred million dollars total in, uh, venture funding, uh, and looking to, uh, build more
06:41rockets and launch more satellites.
06:43And that's what you're using money for.
06:44Primarily. Yeah.
06:45Yeah. Um, launch more rockets, um, relationship, but it's, it's, you have to rely on, uh, on
06:51SpaceX, right? And Elon.
06:53Let's just say the entire ecosystem is hoping that there is another launch provider and there
06:58are many people trying to do that.
06:59What about Rocket Lab?
07:00Rocket Lab has its neutron coming out and hopefully, hopefully with any,
07:03Have you used Rocket Lab yet?
07:05Not yet. Cause they, they have their electron, which is a very stable platform, but it's significantly
07:09smaller than the Falcon 9 in terms of how much mass you can get up there. So for our use
07:14case, we do need a Falcon 9 like a satellite. And as you correctly pointed out, there's
07:19really only one provider today, but people are trying.
07:22Okay.
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