Scaling Hydrogen for Heavy Industry with Hgen

Oct 10, 2024

Molly Yang, CEO and co-founder of Hgen, discusses her journey from Tesla to creating clean hydrogen solutions for heavy industry. She dives into the innovative alkaline electrolyzer technology that promises efficient, low-cost hydrogen production. Molly explores market strategies, the transition from gray to green hydrogen, and real-world applications in sectors like steel manufacturing. She also shares her insights for climate tech entrepreneurs, emphasizing the importance of understanding niche markets for successful startups.

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Intro

00:00 • 2min

Fueling the Future: The LA Hydrogen Revolution

01:30 • 5min

Decarbonization through Hydrogen Innovations

06:11 • 7min

Advancements in Alkaline Electrolyzer Technology for Renewable Integration

12:57 • 3min

Scaling Hydrogen in Heavy Industry

16:12 • 12min

Hydrogen: Investment Perspectives and Challenges

28:11 • 5min

Building a Sustainable Startup: Finding Niche Customer Needs

33:23 • 2min

Molly Yang is CEO and co-founder of Hgen, a company that develops clean hydrogen to decarbonize heavy industry. Specifically, they are working on alkaline electrolyzer technology to make it have higher efficiency and higher power density, which they claim will allow them to produce hydrogen with a smaller footprint and lower cost, using a modular, mass-manufacturable design.

Based in Los Angeles, Hgen has raised capital from Founders Fund, Fontinalis Partners, and Seven Seven Six among others. Prior to starting Hgen, Molly was on the Product team at Tesla, where she led initiatives across Tesla's industrial and residential energy products. Her co-founder and childhood friend, Colin Ho led actuation & power system for Starship and propulsion components for Crew Dragon at SpaceX.

In this episode, Molly and Cody talk all about Hgen's origin story, technology and market. Toward the end of the conversation, she offers her thoughts to other climate tech startup founders and climate tech investors about how to approach a market.

In this episode, we cover:

[3:13] Molly’s background at Tesla and her motivation for starting Hgen
[6:09] Exploring different solutions for hard-to-abate sectors
[8:30] Hgen’s focus on distributed hydrogen production through alkaline electrolysis
[9:24] Comparing alkaline vs. PEM electrolyzers
[14:16] The challenges and advantages of alkaline electrolyzers
[16:10] Targeting markets that use hydrogen today and displacing gray hydrogen
[22:10] Various use cases for hydrogen
[25:06] Hgen’s progress and business model
[27:49] Hgen is hiring!
[28:08] How different investors view hydrogen
[34:25] Molly's advice for entrepreneurs

Episode recorded on July 11, 2024 (Published on Oct 10, 2024)

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*Editing and post-production work for this episode was provided by The Podcast Consultant