Tag: Tennessee

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Volkswagen’s $800M Tennessee factory expansion to include battery pack plant

Volkswagen said Wednesday it will build a battery pack assembly facility as part of an $800 million expansion project that will turn the Chattanooga, Tenn. factory into its North American base for manufacturing electric vehicles.

The Chattanooga factory expansion, which is includes a 564,000-square-foot addition to the body shop and is expected to create 1,000 new jobs at the plant, has been in the works for some time now. But the battery pack assembly announcement, while logical, came as a surprise.

“This is a big, big moment for this company,” Scott Keogh, president and CEO of Volkswagen Group of America said in a statement. “Expanding local production sets the foundation for our sustainable growth in the U.S. Electric vehicles are the future of mobility and Volkswagen will build them for millions of people.”

The automaker’s Chattanooga expansion is just a piece its broader plan to move away from diesel in the wake of the emissions cheating scandal that erupted in 2015. Globally, VW Group plans to commit almost $50 billion through 2023 toward the development and production of electric vehicles and digital services.

The Tennessee factory (along with the other new facilities) will produce electric vehicles using Volkswagen’s modular electric toolkit chassis, or MEB, introduced by the company in 2016. The MEB is a flexible modular system — really a matrix of common parts — for producing electric vehicles that VW says make it more efficient and cost-effective.

The company also built a European facility in Zwickau, Germany. Earlier this month, VW began production of the ID. 3 electric vehicle began at the Zwickau factory. By 2022, VW’s MEB vehicles will be produced at eight locations on three continents.

EV-production at facilities are expected to come online in Anting and Foshan in China in 2020, and in the German cities of Emden and Hanover by 2022.

Volkswagen currently produces the midsize Atlas SUV and the Passat sedan at the Chattanooga factory. Production of its electric vehicles is  set to begin in Chattanooga in 2022. First model will be a SUV of ID. family.

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Mars Curiosity Rover finds evidence of an ancient oasis on Mars

On its latest trek through the Gale Crater on Mars, the Curiosity Rover has discovered evidence that’s leading . scientists to believe that there was an oasis at the base of that 150-kilometer-wide crater.

Curiosity scientists described the scene in an article in “Nature Geoscience” published earlier this week. Researchers analyzing data from the Rover are extrapolating from the data that rocks enriched by mineral salts are evidence of briny ponds that went through periods of drying out and overflowing.  Those deposits serve as a watermark made by climate fluctuations as Mars’ climate changed from a wet one to the current frigid ice desert it is today.

The next step in their research is for scientists to understand how long the transition took and when it happened, according to a statement from NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, Calif.

The Gale Crater is the leftover geological formation from an impact that changed the surface of Mars. Eventually water and wind filled in the crater and the hardening sediment, carved by wind, created the Mount Sharp geological formation that the Curiosity Rover is scaling right now.

The Rover is taking samples of each layer as it climbs and sending that data back to reveal new information about the environment on Mars over time, NASA said.

“We went to Gale Crater because it preserves this unique record of a changing Mars,” said lead author William Rapin of Caltech, in a statement. “Understanding when and how the planet’s climate started evolving is a piece of another puzzle: When and how long was Mars capable of supporting microbial life at the surface?”

Rapin and his co-authors found salts across a 500-foot-tall section of sedimentary rocks that Curiosity first visited in 2017. The “Sutton Island” salts suggest that water had collected in pools across the formation in addition to the intermittent very dry periods that the scientists had already discovered.

Scientists speculate that the geological formations may have resembled the salt lakes in South America’s Altiplano. Streams and . rivers flowing . from mountain ranges lead to similar basins as the Martian terrain. And those lakes are similarly influenced by climactic changes.

“Finding inclined layers represents a major change, where the landscape isn’t completely underwater anymore,” said Team member Chris Fedo, who specializes in the study of sedimentary layers at the University of Tennessee. “We may have left the era of deep lakes behind.”

Future missions will see Curiosity driving toward more inclined layers to investigate rock structures. If they formed in drier conditions, that may mean a new phase of development for the crater — and reveal still more secrets about life on Mars from millions of years ago.

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The founders of Robin Healthcare think doctors need smart assistants too

Robin Healthcare,  a new startup founded by serial entrepreneurs Noah Auerhahn and Emilio Galan, is hoping to harness the power of personal assistants to make the business of healthcare easier for the physicians who practice it

The company’s technology, which works much the same way as a Google Home or Amazon Alexa or Echo, is placed in hospital rooms and transcribes and formats doctor interactions with patients to reduce paperwork and streamline the behind-the-scenes part of the process that can drive doctors to the point of distraction, the company’s co-founder said.

“I had a background doing claims data work in healthcare was at UCSF and finishing my clinical training,” says Galan. “And I was hearing lots of doctors telling me not to practice.”

The problem, says Galan, was the overabundance of paperwork. After school Galan doubled down on his work in claims and billing launching a company called HonestHealth where he worked with institutions and companies . like The Robert Wood Johnson Foundation, Consumer Reports, and the New York State Department of Health to analyze health care claims data and develop consumer applications.

Galan met Auerhahn at the HLTH conference a few years ago just as Auerhahn was looking for his next challenge after the sale of his previous company, ExtraBux.

The two men saw the wave of smart devices coming and figured there must be a way to use the technology to build a fully billable clinical report from monitoring the conversations with patients.

The company currently has dozens of its smart devices installed in hospitals around the country including a large surgical practice in Tennessee, the Campbell Clinic; Duke University Medical Center’s Private Diagnostic Clinic; the University of California San Francisco Medical Center; and Webster Orthopedics in Northern California.

Robin integrates with the major electronic health records companies, Epic and Cerner, through third party integrations that are designed to make it easier to input data automatically as doctors are assessing a patient’s condition and delivering treatments.

“Part of why Robin exists is to avoid technology interrupting care,” says Auerhahn. “Having fewer interactions with EMR is a good way to do that.”

Robin’s service is human-assisted natural language processing to make sure that the data is input correctly.

The company’s early vision has been enough to attract investors like Norwest Venture Partners, which led the company’s $11.5 million Series A round.

In all, Robin Healthcare has raised $15 million in financing. The company’s other investors include Social Leverage, the early stage investment firm founded by Howard Lindzon.

 

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Getting a seat at the VC table

Monique Villa Contributor
Monique Villa is an investor at Mucker Capital, a seed and “pre-seed” stage fund investing in companies powering a software-enabled world. She is also the Founder of Nashville-based ModernCapital, a community of startup founders and ecosystem partners committed to company building in the Southeast (#BuildInSE).

We are witnessing the greatest paradigm shift in power since the advent of the venture capital industry. Since taking my first VC role in 2012, I’ve seen more change in the past year than all other years combined.

Six years after Ellen Pao’s landmark gender discrimination case against Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers, Mary Meeker announced her departure to start a new fund with three other KPCB investors. Arlan Hamilton from Backstage Capital graced the cover of Fast Company with the caption “Venture Catalyst.” AllRaise’s circulation of a growing list of job postings is regularly hitting the inboxes of female investment talent climbing the check-writing ranks. To quote Seth Godin, “When you put the right idea into the world, people can’t unsee it.”

What does it mean to have a seat at the table, and how many of us have needed to bring our own chairs rather than wait for someone to offer us one?

Here are a few reflections on what having a seat at the investors’ table means to me:

Representation is a competitive advantage.

Venture has operated in many ways like a club since its inception, where deals are shared within small, private circles, often comprised of people with more in common than not. When investment decisions are made by people who are not representative of our population — instead representative of the interests of a very small percentage of the population (in ethnicity, culture, education, and socioeconomic status) — our economy suffers. In other words, fewer wants and needs are addressed by the goods and services in the market, creating less economic prosperity as a whole.

According to the NVCA and Pitchbook, the total investment into venture-backed companies reached $57 billion in just the first half of 2018. To put this into context, $57 billion is more than 114 countries can claim in GDP. Given just how much money is invested — an increasing figure each year as more venture money appears from new participants — we should be concerned that just 9% of U.S. VCs are women despite comprising 50.8% of the U.S. population and driving 70-80% of all consumer purchasing.

#ANGELS and Carta exposed a staggering new statistic that just 9% of company equity is held by women, despite women comprising 33% of the founder and employee workforce.

The private and public markets are waking up to the realization that representation matters. A 2015 McKinsey study found that “companies in the top quartile for racial and ethnic diversity are 35 percent more likely to have financial returns above their respective national industry medians.” I’m in constant communication with a wide range of investors from established firms to new ones, and the feedback is overwhelmingly positive — having an investment team more representative of the population generates better deal flow. I have this conversation on a biweekly basis and know that the next generation of investors is watching to see what established VC firms are doing to remain competitive.

So, you ask, what’s next for venture capital?

Assimilation is a thing of the past.

I tried to blend in as much as possible when I first entered the venture world, not wanting to draw attention to the fact that I came from a very different background than the people I was interacting with. I didn’t know what ski week was, my parents didn’t belong to private clubs, and Ivy League schools were a distant concept. Yet, I found common ground with my new social circle because they were, in many respects, regular people with “access” broadly defined as the primary differentiator.

Fast forward to today, I see the greatest opportunity for those who are boldly unique. A seat at the table means I can be myself and draw upon my unique experiences to make decisions and support my portfolio companies in a way that only I can. Our industry thrives when contrarian views are developed over time and implemented without compromise. Conformity is the main villain when we decide to settle for the familiar, ultimately generating stagnant venture returns. After all, venture capital is, by definition, meant to be a high-risk asset class.

Safe environments matter. Full stop.

Having a seat at the table means I get to draw the line when male investors, entrepreneurs, and other industry voices choose to transgress or act inappropriately. I feel safe in assuming the male leadership I choose to invest in will have a lower probability of ruining their company due to issues with workplace culture and sexual abuse allegations.

As we witness one industry giant topple after another, spanning film and media, consumer brands, and investors, it has become increasingly apparent that poor judgment calls and mistreatment of talent will no longer be swept under the rug. I occasionally have meetings with entrepreneurs and fellow investors where you could say my “stranger danger” alarms are triggered by off-color comments and malapropos gestures. These are the instances where I will choose to avoid a situation or pass on a business opportunity that could, in time, become a ticking time bomb and, long-term, a poor investment.

There are no more rules.

A close friend in VC often states, “The new rule is: there are no rules.” This means new people arriving to the table, chair in hand, to direct investment decisions, whether top-down as a company builder or bottoms-up as a content creator and micro-influencer. No rules means new faces showing up as limited partners in VC funds, and new managers of VC funds sharing their own unique stories of building their less-conventional careers. No rules also means that VC firms are going to look, act, and feel different, throwing out convention in favor of creativity and inclusivity.

Build it and they will come.

Arlan Hamilton of Backstage Capital said it best during her 36|86 AMA in Nashville with The JumpFund: “We will make our own club!” I nearly fell out of my seat applauding, laughing, and cheering. My own interpretation of this statement has to do with the can-do energy that is showing up in venture. In 2018, we are no longer waiting for someone to save a seat for us at the table or invite us into the room at all. We are showing up with our own chairs, building new tables, and creating new spaces and environments that foster the exchanging of ideas and deal docs.

Early in 2018, I set out to learn more about the startup and venture capital landscape in my new home city of Nashville, Tennessee, and in the broader surrounding geography of the Southeastern U.S. I quickly found that the entrepreneurs and investors I met were surprised by me — a relatively young, half-Mexican, female face did not immediately trigger the words ‘venture’ and ‘capital’.

Questions followed, such as, “How did you end up in venture capital?” and statements like, “People must tell you all of the time that you don’t look like the typical VC.” A few minutes into the conversation and those questions and statements dissipate, though I knew there must be a broader local community sharing my interests and lack of conformity in physical appearance and style. So, I set out and launched ModernCapital to make the venture capital industry more accessible to new talent. Our team of 4 (3 venture fellows plus myself) is 100% female and 50% Latina. As we spend more time digging into the entrepreneurial landscape of our region, more entrepreneurs and future investors from a wide range of backgrounds are contacting us wanting to join the community we are building.

Considering just how much has changed in the dialogue around venture capital and where the greatest next investment opportunities will arise, I am confident this is only the beginning.

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VW’s futuristic all-electric dune buggy embraces its 1960s’ roots

Volkswagen has added another member to its ever-expanding I.D. line of concept electric vehicles that’s meant to showcase the automaker’s electric future. This time it’s the I.D. Buggy, an all-electric dune buggy with some 1960s California subculture flair.

The I.D. Buggy, which made its global debut Monday at the 89th Geneva International Motor Show, is meant to show the versatility of the automaker’s modular electric drive toolkit chassis, or MEB. The MEB, which was introduced in 2016, is a flexible modular system — really a matrix of common parts — for producing electric vehicles that VW says make it more efficient and cost-effective.

For instance, the two-seater buggy can be converted to a 2+2-seater and an additional electric motor can be added to the front axle in order to make four-wheel drive possible, the company said. The modular design allows for the composite upper body to be detached from the MEB chassis, which VW argues will open up a “world of possibilities for third-party manufacturers, as the original Meyers Manx kit did for the first buggies.” The Meyers Manx kit was the creation of California engineer, boat builder and surfer Bruce Meyers who modified the original Volkswagen Beetle to make it suitable for desert racing. 

The I.D. Buggy is equipped with a a 62kWh lithium-ion battery and a 201-horsepower electric motor in the rear to give it an expected range of 155 miles on the WLTP cycle, the company said. There are no doors or a roof in the two-seater, which VW says gives drivers the “purest experience of classic beach cruising.”

The vehicle has three-dimensional oval LED headlights and taillights and an LED VW logo. The automaker also touts the buggy’s body that seems to “float above the chassis,” an effect achieved by how its painted.

Volkswagen has been showing off its I.D. line of concept electric vehicles for several years now.  And some of them are even going into production. There is the electric all-wheel drive microbus called I.D. Buzz, a futuristic take on the family camper van that VW introduced as a concept in 2017, the I.D. Vizzion self-driving sedan concept, and of course, the I.D. Crozz SUV concept that was first shown at the North American International Auto Show  last year.

The I.D. Crozz and I.D. Buzz are going into production. It’s not clear if the I.D. Buggy will ever be anything more than concept.

Earlier this year, VW announced plans to spend $800 million to expand a U.S. factory in Chattanooga, Tenn., that will produce the automaker’s next generation of electric vehicles.

VW’s Chattanooga expansion is just a piece of the automaker’s broader plan to move away from diesel in the wake of the emissions cheating scandal that erupted in 2015. The company is also building a European facility in Zwickau, Germany, set to begin EV production in 2019 and adding EV-production at facilities in Anting and Foshan, in China, in 2020, and in the German cities of Emden and Hanover by 2022.

The Tennessee factory (along with the other new facilities) will produce EVs using Volkswagen’s MEB chassis. Volkswagen of America says it will offer the first EV based on the MEB platform to customers in 2020. Electric vehicle production at the Tennessee site will begin in 2022.

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Inside Tesla’s solar energy astroturfing

Tesla has been masking its lobbying efforts on solar panels and battery storage through the Energy Freedom Coalition of America, a trade association that is little more than a front for the automaker and alternative energy company, public documents suggest.

SolarCity, which Tesla bought in 2016, began the practice of using the EFCA to promote its products and services without acknowledging it was the only significant member of the organization. EFCA was initially portrayed as a solar advocacy group with grassroots support.

When rule changes threatened payments to Arizonans with domestic solar panels in 2016, EFCA knew just what to do. It launched the Arizona Solar Pledge for citizens “to demonstrate their support for energy choice and add their names to the growing coalition determined to protect Arizona rooftop solar customers.”

Anyone signing the petition would “demonstrate to … the broader political community that the people of Arizona stand with rooftop solar and energy choice,” wrote an EFCA spokesperson at the time.

EFCA noted that its list of members included Silevo, SolarCity Corporation, ZEP Solar, Go Solar, 1 Sun Solar Electric, and Ecological Energy Systems.

However, far from being a grassroots environmental advocacy organization or a broad trade body, the EFCA seems to represent little more than the lobbying arm of Tesla’s energy division.

Three of its named “member” businesses  — Silevo, SolarCity and Zep Solar – are actually subsidiaries of Tesla. Two of the remaining companies are small regional solar installers. TechCrunch could not immediately identify Go Solar LLC.

Tesla would not answer questions about EFCA’s membership, funding or control. However, a spokesperson wrote, “Since the [SolarCity] acquisition, Tesla has been winding down its involvement with the coalition, and to the extent we have worked with them, it’s largely been limited to legacy dockets that have already been in progress for multiple years.”

The EFCA is a non-profit corporation formed in Delaware that describes itself blandly as a “national advocacy organization that seeks to promote public awareness of the benefits of solar and alternative energy.”

It was slightly more forthcoming in a filing with the Minnesota Public Utilities Commission early in 2017, discussing proposed community solar gardens. EFCA wrote that it “represents a broad range of businesses that are fully integrated providers of distributed energy resources (DERs) products and services.” These, it wrote, could include rooftop solar, distributed generation, thermal and battery energy storage, and smart energy services, for residential, commercial, industrial and government customers.

Although EFCA’s legal representative for filings in New Hampshire has an EFCA email address, her LinkedIn profile shows that her job title is Campaign Projects Coordinator at Tesla. Recent filings on behalf of EFCA have been made by a senior policy advisor at Tesla. In fact, EFCA itself is listed as a Tesla subsidiary in filings with the SEC.

EFCA’s roots

Tesla lobbies under its own name in many parts of the country, so how did it come to be working under the guise of the EFCA, and why is it continuing to do so?

The story goes back to 2006, and the formation of SolarCity by two of Musk’s cousins, Lyndon Rive and Peter Rive. SolarCity took the novel approach of installing photovoltaic systems for no money down, instead leasing them to homeowners in exchange for decades of payments for cheaper, greener electricity. Musk invested in SolarCity and took the role of chairman.

SolarCity grew quickly, becoming the largest solar installer in the United States by 2013, despite a business model that required taking on mountains of debt. The company regularly sparred with traditional utility companies, often as part of a rooftop solar trade association called the Alliance for Solar Choice, or TASC.

In late 2015, rooftop solar was facing a tough situation in Nevada. NV Energy, the state’s monopoly electricity provider, wanted to slash domestic solar incentives, and the solar industry was fighting for its life. While SolarCity took a collaborative approach, its main rival, SunRun, suggested suspicious ties between the utility and Nevada’s governor.

SolarCity ultimately withdrew from TASC, saying that its focus was moving beyond residential solar. The new EFCA would “capture more of our interests,” a spokesperson told Utility Dive at the time. SolarCity persuaded a small Las Vegas company called 1 Sun Solar Electric, among others, to join EFCA. 1 Sun, which installs five to 10 residential solar systems in the city each month, was keen to protect its local business.

“There’s no way that a small company like ours would be able to go toe-to-toe with NV Energy,” Louise Helton, the company’s vice-president, told TechCrunch. “EFCA gave us standing with the public utility commission, and their attorneys are just stellar.”

Despite the resources EFCA could bring to bear, Nevada did reduce solar incentives at the end of 2015. Many national solar companies, including SolarCity and SunRun, subsequently left the state.

Towards the end of 2016, Tesla bought SolarCity for $2.6 billion, and EFCA along with it. State records and filings indicate that EFCA has now been active in over 30 proceedings in 16 states, and has retained lobbyists in at least Arizona, Utah, Montana, Florida, New Hampshire, Massachusetts and Washington. It does not appear to have initiated any filings that would not benefit Tesla or its subsidiaries.

EFCA had no fewer than 23 lobbyists working for it in Arizona in 2016, while the organization spent $110,000 on lobbyists in Florida the next year, both according to Follow the Money. It has also hired multiple law firms to help it draft and submit filings across the nation.

None of the money for these activities came from 1 Sun, Helton told TechCrunch, nor has EFCA asked 1 Sun to work on the coalition’s behalf. “I would be available to do whatever, but they have not needed anything else from us,” Helton said. “It’s good to be part of something that is fighting the good fight, and giving that entity a flavor of not just being one giant organization, even though Tesla is definitely doing the heavy lifting. We’re very happy to help make it a little bit more diverse.”

EFCA’s recent activity

EFCA’s website is no longer active, and the coalition has not tweeted since early 2017. However, one exception to the organization’s low profile is in Hawaii, where EFCA initiated new filings in 2018 because, Tesla says, the coalition is a known entity there. Even those recent filings, however, are vague about who is actually lobbying in the state.

An EFCA filing in August 2018 stated, “EFCA Members provide solar and storage facilities and services in the State of Hawaii and/or are interested in expanding their provision of those services in the State.”

The only identifiable non-Tesla companies, 1 Sun Solar Electric and Ecological Energy Systems, are based in Nevada and Tennessee, and show no signs of expanding to the Pacific. Tesla, by contrast, has a massive solar plus storage facility on the island of Kauai.

Some of EFCA’s newer filings do reference Tesla, generally to note that the company owns SolarCity.

Tim LaPira, Associate Professor of Political Science at James Madison University, notes that it is virtually unknown for a trade association to be owned and controlled by a single company.

“It’s probably not illegal, but from a transparency perspective, it’s far, far from being ethical,” LaPira said. “When corporations lobby directly, there’s an understanding that they’re asking the government to do something to increase their profits. It’s a very different story when a credible trade association asks the government to do something because they’re not going to benefit directly — they’re asking for some common good. Tesla is trying to get the best of both worlds.”

EFCA continues to lobby state utility commissions, for example proposing changes to net metering and energy storage rules in California last month. That document did not mention Tesla at all.

Posted on

Inside Tesla’s solar energy astroturfing

Tesla has been masking its lobbying efforts on solar panels and battery storage through the Energy Freedom Coalition of America, a trade association that is little more than a front for the automaker and alternative energy company, public documents suggest.

SolarCity, which Tesla bought in 2016, began the practice of using the EFCA to promote its products and services without acknowledging it was the only significant member of the organization. EFCA was initially portrayed as a solar advocacy group with grassroots support.

When rule changes threatened payments to Arizonans with domestic solar panels in 2016, EFCA knew just what to do. It launched the Arizona Solar Pledge for citizens “to demonstrate their support for energy choice and add their names to the growing coalition determined to protect Arizona rooftop solar customers.”

Anyone signing the petition would “demonstrate to … the broader political community that the people of Arizona stand with rooftop solar and energy choice,” wrote an EFCA spokesperson at the time.

EFCA noted that its list of members included Silevo, SolarCity Corporation, ZEP Solar, Go Solar, 1 Sun Solar Electric, and Ecological Energy Systems.

However, far from being a grassroots environmental advocacy organization or a broad trade body, the EFCA seems to represent little more than the lobbying arm of Tesla’s energy division.

Three of its named “member” businesses  — Silevo, SolarCity and Zep Solar – are actually subsidiaries of Tesla. Two of the remaining companies are small regional solar installers. TechCrunch could not immediately identify Go Solar LLC.

Tesla would not answer questions about EFCA’s membership, funding or control. However, a spokesperson wrote, “Since the [SolarCity] acquisition, Tesla has been winding down its involvement with the coalition, and to the extent we have worked with them, it’s largely been limited to legacy dockets that have already been in progress for multiple years.”

The EFCA is a non-profit corporation formed in Delaware that describes itself blandly as a “national advocacy organization that seeks to promote public awareness of the benefits of solar and alternative energy.”

It was slightly more forthcoming in a filing with the Minnesota Public Utilities Commission early in 2017, discussing proposed community solar gardens. EFCA wrote that it “represents a broad range of businesses that are fully integrated providers of distributed energy resources (DERs) products and services.” These, it wrote, could include rooftop solar, distributed generation, thermal and battery energy storage, and smart energy services, for residential, commercial, industrial and government customers.

Although EFCA’s legal representative for filings in New Hampshire has an EFCA email address, her LinkedIn profile shows that her job title is Campaign Projects Coordinator at Tesla. Recent filings on behalf of EFCA have been made by a senior policy advisor at Tesla. In fact, EFCA itself is listed as a Tesla subsidiary in filings with the SEC.

EFCA’s roots

Tesla lobbies under its own name in many parts of the country, so how did it come to be working under the guise of the EFCA, and why is it continuing to do so?

The story goes back to 2006, and the formation of SolarCity by two of Musk’s cousins, Lyndon Rive and Peter Rive. SolarCity took the novel approach of installing photovoltaic systems for no money down, instead leasing them to homeowners in exchange for decades of payments for cheaper, greener electricity. Musk invested in SolarCity and took the role of chairman.

SolarCity grew quickly, becoming the largest solar installer in the United States by 2013, despite a business model that required taking on mountains of debt. The company regularly sparred with traditional utility companies, often as part of a rooftop solar trade association called the Alliance for Solar Choice, or TASC.

In late 2015, rooftop solar was facing a tough situation in Nevada. NV Energy, the state’s monopoly electricity provider, wanted to slash domestic solar incentives, and the solar industry was fighting for its life. While SolarCity took a collaborative approach, its main rival, SunRun, suggested suspicious ties between the utility and Nevada’s governor.

SolarCity ultimately withdrew from TASC, saying that its focus was moving beyond residential solar. The new EFCA would “capture more of our interests,” a spokesperson told Utility Dive at the time. SolarCity persuaded a small Las Vegas company called 1 Sun Solar Electric, among others, to join EFCA. 1 Sun, which installs five to 10 residential solar systems in the city each month, was keen to protect its local business.

“There’s no way that a small company like ours would be able to go toe-to-toe with NV Energy,” Louise Helton, the company’s vice-president, told TechCrunch. “EFCA gave us standing with the public utility commission, and their attorneys are just stellar.”

Despite the resources EFCA could bring to bear, Nevada did reduce solar incentives at the end of 2015. Many national solar companies, including SolarCity and SunRun, subsequently left the state.

Towards the end of 2016, Tesla bought SolarCity for $2.6 billion, and EFCA along with it. State records and filings indicate that EFCA has now been active in over 30 proceedings in 16 states, and has retained lobbyists in at least Arizona, Utah, Montana, Florida, New Hampshire, Massachusetts and Washington. It does not appear to have initiated any filings that would not benefit Tesla or its subsidiaries.

EFCA had no fewer than 23 lobbyists working for it in Arizona in 2016, while the organization spent $110,000 on lobbyists in Florida the next year, both according to Follow the Money. It has also hired multiple law firms to help it draft and submit filings across the nation.

None of the money for these activities came from 1 Sun, Helton told TechCrunch, nor has EFCA asked 1 Sun to work on the coalition’s behalf. “I would be available to do whatever, but they have not needed anything else from us,” Helton said. “It’s good to be part of something that is fighting the good fight, and giving that entity a flavor of not just being one giant organization, even though Tesla is definitely doing the heavy lifting. We’re very happy to help make it a little bit more diverse.”

EFCA’s recent activity

EFCA’s website is no longer active, and the coalition has not tweeted since early 2017. However, one exception to the organization’s low profile is in Hawaii, where EFCA initiated new filings in 2018 because, Tesla says, the coalition is a known entity there. Even those recent filings, however, are vague about who is actually lobbying in the state.

An EFCA filing in August 2018 stated, “EFCA Members provide solar and storage facilities and services in the State of Hawaii and/or are interested in expanding their provision of those services in the State.”

The only identifiable non-Tesla companies, 1 Sun Solar Electric and Ecological Energy Systems, are based in Nevada and Tennessee, and show no signs of expanding to the Pacific. Tesla, by contrast, has a massive solar plus storage facility on the island of Kauai.

Some of EFCA’s newer filings do reference Tesla, generally to note that the company owns SolarCity.

Tim LaPira, Associate Professor of Political Science at James Madison University, notes that it is virtually unknown for a trade association to be owned and controlled by a single company.

“It’s probably not illegal, but from a transparency perspective, it’s far, far from being ethical,” LaPira said. “When corporations lobby directly, there’s an understanding that they’re asking the government to do something to increase their profits. It’s a very different story when a credible trade association asks the government to do something because they’re not going to benefit directly — they’re asking for some common good. Tesla is trying to get the best of both worlds.”

EFCA continues to lobby state utility commissions, for example proposing changes to net metering and energy storage rules in California last month. That document did not mention Tesla at all.

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To fight election meddling, Google’s cyber unit Jigsaw extends its anti-DDoS protections to European politicos

Jigsaw, the cybersecurity-focused division owned by Google parent Alphabet, is now allowing political organizations in Europe to sign up for its anti-web-flooding technology for free.

Until now, the free-to-use technology designed to protect political campaigns and websites against distributed denial-of-service (DDoS) attacks — dubbed Project Shield — was only available to news sites and journalists, human rights sites and elections monitoring sites in the U.S.

Now, Jigsaw is extending those protections to European political operators ahead of contentious parliamentary elections later this year.

The anti-DDoS technology aims to protect websites and services from being pummeled with tons of junk internet traffic from multiple sources at once. It protects against several types of DDoS attacks — and not just the traditional layer 3 or 4 protocol-based attacks but also the more powerful layer 7 attacks that involve large volume, often thanks to DNS amplification.

By caching a website, the technology absorbs a lot of the malicious traffic, and filtering harmful traffic keeps sites running.

Jigsaw’s move comes at a time when highly anticipated elections are expected to adjust political powers across the continent — particularly in what’s left of the European Union, after the controversial British departure from the EU, known as “Brexit.” Anti-political actors and nation-state hackers have long worked hard in Europe to disrupt elections and sow discord in an effort to discredit results.

Some have outright launched flooding attacks to down websites at a time when they’re most needed.

In the last year alone, several flooding attacks left critical websites downed for hours and longer. Election sites from Tennessee to the Czech Republic were downed in an effort to disrupt the voting process.

Project Shield said it’s offering the service for free to all European political organizations and campaigns, said Jigsaw’s Dan Keyserling in an email to TechCrunch. That’s in contrast to existing providers, like Cloudflare, that sell DDoS protection.

“The spread of DDoS attacks is a global issue,” said Keyserling. “Just scanning the news showed us it is a growing problem.”

Google’s cyber unit Jigsaw introduces Intra, a new security app dedicated to busting censorship

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VW investing $800M in Tennessee factory to make next-generation electric vehicles

Volkswagen will spend $800 million to expand a U.S. factory that will produce the automaker’s next generation of electric vehicles.

The factory in Chattanooga, Tenn. will be the company’s North American base for manufacturing electric vehicles, VW CEO Dr. Herbert Diess said during a presentation at the Detroit Auto Show on Monday. The expansion is expected to create 1,000 jobs at the plant.

VW’s Chattanooga expansion is just a piece of the automaker’s broader plan to move away from diesel in the wake of the emissions cheating scandal that erupted in 2015. Globally, VW Group plans to commit almost $50 billion through 2023 toward the development and production of electric vehicles and digital services. The Volkswagen brand (so not including its Audi or Porsche brands) alone has forecasted selling 150,000 EVs by 2020 worldwide, increasing that number to 1 million by 2025.

The company is also building a European facility in Zwickau, Germany set to begin EV production in 2019 and adding EV-production at facilities in Anting and Foshan, in China, in 2020, and in the German cities of Emden and Hanover by 2022.

The Tennessee factory (along with the other new facilities) will produce EVs using Volkswagen’s modular electric toolkit chassis, or MEB, that was introduced by the company in 2016.  The MEB is a flexible modular system—really a matrix of common parts—for producing electric vehicles that VW says it make it more efficient and cost effective.

Electric vehicle production at the Tennessee site will begin in 2022. However, Volkswagen of America says it will offer the first EV based on the MEB platform to customers in 2020.

This EV will be a series-production version of the ID. CROZZ SUV concept that was first shown at the North American International Auto Show last year. This vehicle will have the interior space of a midsize SUV in the footprint of a compact SUV. Volkswagen of America will also offer a multi-purpose EV based off the ID. BUZZ concept.

Volkswagen builds the midsize Atlas SUV and the Passat sedan at the Chattanooga factory, which opened in 2011. A five-seat version of the Atlas, the Atlas Cross Sport, is slated to begin production in Chattanooga later this year.

“Volkswagen is continuing to invest in the US to broaden its manufacturing and R&D footprint,” Diess said. “Projects like the electric car production announced today and changes in our sourcing decisions are in line with the current direction of trade policy including the USMCA.”

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Scaling startups are setting up secondary hubs in these cities

America’s mayors have spent the past nine months tripping over each other to curry favor with Amazon.com in its high-profile search for a second headquarters.

More quietly, however, a similar story has been playing out in startup-land. Many of the most valuable venture-backed companies are venturing outside their high-cost headquarters and setting up secondary hubs in smaller cities.

Where are they going? Nashville is pretty popular. So is Phoenix. Portland and Raleigh also are seeing some jobs. A number of companies also have a high number of remote offerings, seeking candidates with coveted skills who don’t want to relocate.

Those are some of the findings from a Crunchbase News analysis of the geographic hiring practices of U.S. unicorns. Since most of these companies are based in high-cost locations, like the San Francisco Bay Area, Boston and New York, we were looking to see if there is a pattern of setting up offices in smaller, cheaper cities. (For more on survey technique, see Methodology section below.)

Here is a look at some of the hotspots.

Nashville

One surprise finding was the prominence of Nashville among secondary locations for startup offices.

We found at least four unicorns scaling up Nashville offices, plus another three with growing operations in or around other Tennessee cities. Here are some of the Tennessee-loving startups:

When we referred to Nashville’s popularity with unicorns as surprising, that was largely because the city isn’t known as a major hub for tech startups or venture funding. That said, it has a lot of attributes that make for a practical and desirable location for a secondary office.

Nashville’s attractions include high quality of life ratings, a growing population and economy, mild climate and lots of live music. Home prices and overall cost of living are also still far below Silicon Valley and New York, even though the Nashville real estate market has been on a tear for the past several years. An added perk for workers: Tennessee has no income tax on wages.

Phoenix

Phoenix is another popular pick for startup offices, particularly West Coast companies seeking a lower-cost hub for customer service and other operations that require a large staff.

In the chart below, we look at five unicorns with significant staffing in the desert city:

 

Affordability, ease of expansion and a large employable population look like big factors in Phoenix’s appeal. Homes and overall cost of living are a lot cheaper than the big coastal cities. And there’s plenty of room to sprawl.

One article about a new office opening also cited low job turnover rates as an attractive Phoenix-area attribute, which is an interesting notion. Startup hubs like San Francisco and New York see a lot of job-hopping, particularly for people with in-demand skill sets. Scaling companies may be looking for people who measure their job tenure in years rather than months.

Those aren’t the only places

Nashville and Phoenix aren’t the only hotspots for unicorns setting up secondary offices. Many other cities are also seeing some scaling startup activity.

Let’s start with North Carolina. The Research Triangle region is known for having a lot of STEM grads, so it makes sense that deep tech companies headquartered elsewhere might still want a local base. One such company is cybersecurity unicorn Tanium, which has a lot of technical job openings in the area. Another is Docker, developer of software containerization technology, which has open positions in Raleigh.

The Orlando metro area stood out mostly due to Robinhood, the zero-fee stock and crypto trading platform that recently hit the $5 billion valuation mark. The Silicon Valley-based company has a significant number of open positions in Lake Mary, an Orlando suburb, including HR and compliance jobs.

Portland, meanwhile, just drew another crypto-loving unicorn, digital currency transaction platform Coinbase. The San Francisco-based company recently opened an office in the Oregon city and is currently in hiring mode.

Anywhere with a screen

But you don’t have to be anywhere in particular to score jobs at many fast-growing startups. A lot of unicorns have a high number of remote positions, including specialized technical roles that may be hard to fill locally.

GitHub, which makes tools developers can use to collaborate remotely on projects, does a particularly good job of practicing what it codes. A notable number of engineering jobs open at the San Francisco-based company are available to remote workers, and other departments also have some openings for telecommuters.

Others with a smattering of remote openings include Silicon Valley-based cybersecurity provider CrowdStrike, enterprise software developer Apttus and also Docker.

Not everyone is doing it

Of course, not every unicorn is opening large secondary offices. Many prefer to keep staff closer to home base, seeking to lure employees with chic workplaces and lavish perks. Other companies find that when they do expand, it makes strategic sense to go to another high-cost location.

Still, the secondary hub phenomenon may offer a partial antidote to complaints that a few regions are hogging too much of the venture capital pie. While unicorns still overwhelmingly headquarter in a handful of cities, at least they’re spreading their wings and providing more jobs in other places, too.

Methodology

For this analysis, we were looking at U.S. unicorns with secondary offices in other North American cities. We began with a list of 125 U.S.-based companies and looked at open positions advertised on their websites, focusing on job location.

We excluded job offerings related to representing a local market. For instance, a San Francisco company seeking a sales rep in Chicago to sell to Chicago customers doesn’t count. Instead, we looked for openings for team members handling core operations, including engineering, finances and company-wide customer support. We also excluded secondary offices outside of North America.

Additionally, we were looking principally for companies expanding into lower-cost areas. In many cases, we did see companies strategically adding staff in other high-cost locations, such as New York and Silicon Valley.

A final note pertains to Austin, Texas. We did see several unicorns based elsewhere with job openings in Austin. However, we did not include the city in the sections above because Austin, although a lower-cost location than Silicon Valley, may also be characterized as a large, mature technology and startup hub in its own right.