Watt It Takes: The Promise of Electric Buses With Proterra CEO Ryan Popple
Energy Gang
Wood Mackenzie
4.6 • 1.3K Ratings
🗓️ 22 August 2018
⏱️ 64 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
This week on Watt It Takes: How Ryan Popple’s experience in the military, Tesla and venture capital helped him lead electric bus maker Proterra.
“It’s good for the ‘keep calm and carry on mentality’ when people tend to bring me a box of broken parts. So if you’re the founder or CEO of an organization, you shouldn’t be surprised when most of what is brought to you is bad news.”
Proterra is on a roll. The company is a leading manufacturer of heavy-duty electric buses in North America, with over 50 customers, a one-year backlog and vehicles on the road in two dozen cities. The company’s current pipeline represents 10 percent of the US transit fleet.
It took many years to reach this stage. Proterra faced numerous difficult technical re-designs and slow customer adoption over the last decade. In this interview, Popple reflects on how the company moved through the valley of death.
Watt It Takes is a collaboration between Powerhouse and Greentech Media. The series is recorded in front of a live audience at Powerhouse headquarters in Oakland, California. Buy tickets for upcoming events.
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Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | This week on what it takes, from the military to Tesla to electric buses, how being deployed in the Army helped Pro Terra CEO deploy electric transportation fleets. |
| 0:11.0 | It's good for kind of the keep calm carry-on mentality. When people tend to bring me I refer to it as like a box of broken parts and so if you're the founder or the CEO of an organization |
| 0:21.1 | you like you shouldn't be surprised than when most of what is brought to you |
| 0:24.8 | is bad news. We'll hear from Ryan Popple about taking Pro Terra through the Valley of |
| 0:29.2 | Death to a top maker of EV buses. First though a quick quick word about our sponsor Mission Solar, how do we ensure our electric cars |
| 0:35.6 | and buses are using clean juice? |
| 0:37.6 | Well, solar is a really good option. |
| 0:39.6 | Better yet American-made solar. |
| 0:41.6 | Mission Solar is a top US maker of solar modules with a 200 megawatt |
| 0:45.2 | production facility in Texas. They are coming out with an even higher quality, higher powered |
| 0:50.0 | module later this year. So if you want the highest performing American made solar |
| 0:54.4 | panels on the market, go to Mission Solar.com. |
| 0:58.6 | Hey, welcome everybody to another edition of What It Takes, an interview series produced by Powerhouse and Green Tech Media. |
| 1:10.0 | I'm Stephen Lacy, and in this series we hear from founders of the most influential |
| 1:14.5 | clean energy companies about how they navigate this crazy market. This week |
| 1:19.2 | Powerhouse CEO Emily Kirsch talks with Ryan Popple, he's the CEO of Proterra. |
| 1:24.5 | And like a lot of guests on this series, Ryan is really open about some of the struggles he's |
| 1:28.3 | faced at the company and also as a venture capitalist and early employee at Tesla, and he talks a lot about his leadership |
| 1:34.3 | style in dealing with Proterra's stops and starts as it tries to break open the market for electric |
| 1:39.2 | buses. The conversation was recorded live at Powerhouse's headquarters. |
| 1:43.3 | To learn more about future speakers and attending a live event, |
| 1:46.1 | go to Powerhouse. Fund and click on the events tab. |
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