Venios Revenue, Valuation & Funding (2024)

[00:00] Guys, venios has just hit $350,000 per month in revenue, up from $250,000 per month a year ago. They're working with over a 100 power grid operators spread across Germany, Netherlands, Austria, Switzerland, India, South America, Pan powering over a million substations to help these power grid operators optimize their systems and most importantly, decentralize the power grid, which is more sustainable. They're growing quick. They might raise, call it, 2 to 4,000,000 here. I call it a 40 to [00:24] 50,000,000 valuation. We'll see what Jonas does. Hey, folks. My guest today is Jonas Danzeisen. He's building a tool called venios. That's venios.com. It's power grid real time operating system. Jonas, you ready to take us to the top? [00:38] >> Yeah. Yeah. Hopefully. Yeah. We're working on that. We're working [00:40] on So how'd you get who are you selling to? Are you selling to governments, or who's using this? [00:45] >> So so our solution is used by grid operators, by DSOs or DNO's, distribution system operators. So the owners of the local monopoly, the owners of the grid, the the suppliers, the utilities, basically. Yeah. [00:57] All around the world, are you focused on a particular geo? [01:00] >> Oh, we started in Germany, then rather fast went into Netherlands, Austria, and Switzerland. Now we do have activities whole Europe and also first activities in South America and also in India. So expanding because we are solving a physical problem by using IT, and the physical problem is everywhere where you start to integrate renewables locally into your infrastructure. [01:25] So I'm a I'm a power grid operator in in The Netherlands. What am I paying you to help me with? [01:32] >> So the the point is that the the old infrastructure, the grid, is built like a champagne pyramid. So this is the old perspective. Having the pyramid, having big bottles of champagne, filling it from the top, and then it goes down. Now if you start to transform your arm system into a decentralized renewable system, then you have it's like filling up the champagne pyramid from the bottom line. So you need to know where are glasses, how full [02:00] >> are the glasses, where is some more champagne needed, where do I have too much champagne. And so this complexity, we help with our solution to handle and this is exactly the pain we are solving. So integration of EVs, integration of heat pumps, integration of AC. AC is less a topic in The Netherlands, but a big topic in India. Integration of PV, of course. Decentralized generation is a big topic. Combined heat and power integration. All the decentralized [02:32] >> assets, because in the old world, we do have big power plants, coal, nuclear, gas, and now we're building this system or we're transforming this system into decentralized system with small assets. So Understood. What is the [02:47] what is the average power grid operator pay you per month or per year to use your technology? [02:53] >> Oh, this is based on the amount of substations. So in the utility domain, on the monopoly side, on the infrastructure side, normally you have a payment based on counting points, like households or industry, and we do, to differ a little, have option to be [03:12] >> referring on the amount of substations. And it depends on how many substations you have, and so basically how big is your grid. So in So what is the price per substation? So what is the price per substation? [03:29] >> So let me say it like this. If we if you have a project volume of $100 an estimated project volume of $100 you have implementation fee for the first [03:44] >> year, and you have a SaaS fee, and the SaaS fee is roughly 30% to 35, and the rest is implementation, and the SaaS fee is ongoing. And it can depend if you have a small utility from several €10,000 SaaS fee up to, if you are a big utility in India or big utility in The Netherlands, to several 100,000. Jonas, try and simplify [04:06] this is this is this is complex. I get it. You have a lot of different options, but try and simplify this for my audience. On average, what is a power operator paying you per month or per year to use your technology across all their substations? Are we talking 20,000 a year, 2,000,000 a year, 20,000,000 a year? Where are you generally? [04:20] >> No. It's between so it's between depending on the size, it's between 50 to 300. [04:27] $300,000 per year? [04:29] >> Yeah. [04:30] Okay. Okay. [04:31] Got it. [04:31] >> From 50 to 300,000. [04:33] And if someone's paying you $300,000 per year, how many substations do they have? [04:39] >> Then you are in the in the area of several 10,000 substations between depending on the infrastructure quality and and what is happening between, [04:50] >> I would say, 30 to a 100,000 substations. [04:54] Okay. And if someone's only paying you $50,000 per year, how many substations do they likely have? [05:04] >> Fully full rollout is in the should be in the area of [05:14] >> from a 150 to five 100, depending on on the complexity of the of the infrastructure. [05:20] Oh, what's going on there, YouTube? Good to see you guys. Now imagine this. You love watching these interviews with SaaS founders, but imagine if we took all of the valuation data out from over 2,807 interviews I've done manually. Saves you a lot of time. Well, we've done this. We've built it into the beautiful interface inside of Founderpath. Check this out. I'll show you how you can access this in a second, but you log in, you connect [05:43] your Stripe account, you see your valuation real time. You can see what it changed over the past eighty eight days and even set goals for valuation this year. Now the secret evaluation is there's many different ways to value a SaaS business. So the reason you're gonna see three or four different valuations inside of your Founderpath dashboard, this is all free by the way, is because depending on who's doing the buying of your SaaS company, you're gonna [06:07] get a different valuation. A VC is gonna pay a different valuation, Private equity firm is different. If you're gonna do a minority sale, that's different. And if you sell the whole business, that's a different valuation. You can see all those when I hover over here, right? So the teal is what a VC would pay. Yellow is what private equity And red is if you sold the whole thing outright. Now what's cool about this is this is [06:29] not built off random data. Again, you guys hear these interviews on YouTube. All these datas are built from real time valuation data points founder share with us on the show. So traction 1,200,000 seed round 3.7 raise. They sold 22% of their business. Go in here and filter by the event. Maybe you only wanna see companies that have sold the whole business. Well, here are a bunch that have been acquired the valuation and the multiple. Maybe you're [06:55] going out right now and you're raising your seed round. We'll go in here and look at all this recent seed deals that went down, what they raised, what valuation they raised at and what percent that they sold. There's never been a larger dataset of SaaS valuations than what you can get now inside of Founderpath. And we're thrilled to bring it to you. All right, we're gonna go back to the YouTube video here in a second, but [07:17] if you wanna check this tool out, if you wanna jump in and sign up, you can check it out for free to get your valuation at this link. This link, founderpath.com/products/valuations. Or if you go to founderpath.com and hover over products, click on get your valuation here, and go ahead and sign up to give it a whirl. Again, all that valuation data live right inside the platform. I hope to see you there. Alright. Let's jump back into [07:43] the interview. And then to keep building that out. So let's say I have 500 substations. I'm paying you a SaaS fee of $50,000 per year. You're also then gonna charge me an implementation fee of about what? [07:56] >> So so as mentioned, so implementation is is one. We do have 30% implementation, 70 [08:06] 30% of what we what percent you're taking? So 30% of the ACV you just gave me? [08:11] >> If 50,000 is SaaS fee, then you have an implementation project of roughly a 150 to 200. [08:21] Okay. Got it. So the setup just to go live is a 150,000, and the recurring fee on the back end is $50,000 per year. [08:27] >> Yeah. And you should have on this? [08:30] You should have really, really high net dollar retention then because after someone pays a big setup fee, they never should cancel. Right? [08:37] >> That's so we do have a so we don't have a churn rate. Churn rate is zero. [08:43] When did you launch the company? First customer was in what year? [08:47] >> We started ten years ago. [08:49] Okay. So call it 2012, 2013? '12. And since then, you've had no one has started using you and then stopped using you, or started you with a thousand substations and then de churn down to a 100 substations? [09:03] >> So we so with small customers, we we start normally with a full rollout. So and with big customers, we normally start in one region, like having a region A and then going from A to B to C and then growing into the infrastructure because it's highly profitable. And if you have already started with one region, then it's relatively cheap to because we are you can see our solution like the enterprise service bus kind of solution because [09:36] >> we are connected to GI, geoinformation system, to asset information system, to SCADA system, to all the solutions that are existing at the utility, and building then up a real time virtual twin for planning and for control of the infrastructure. And, yeah, the value is so we have customers with return of invest of less than one year. [10:00] With what less than one year? [10:03] >> Return of invest. [10:05] I see. My my my question, I mean, I under I appreciate the extra context you gave, but that wasn't my question. My question was, has anyone started in region a, b, and c and then downgraded to only using you in region a? [10:19] >> No. [10:20] So in ten years, you've had nobody even down not not cancel completely, but you haven't even had anyone downgrade one substation across your entire base? [10:29] >> So we do have structural changes within the infrastructure, of course. Then assets go out and new assets are coming in. But if you started to integrate our solution normally, we are in regions with a high criticality, so a lot of PV, a lot of dynamics in the infrastructure, and that our solution gives the value to bring transparency and controllability. And [10:54] then I understand the product. I'm just asking about net dollar retention. That's all. Okay. Got it. So so how many if you add up all the individual power grid operators that currently rely on venios, how many of them are there [11:07] >> today? Roughly a 100. [11:10] A 100. And if you add up all the substations that is are connected to your technology, how many is it it's gotta be in the millions, right? [11:20] >> It should be roughly a million, maybe maybe more. We we are working on that actually because we we do have a strong growth phase actually. And just imagine having, so we have two of three DSOs in Delhi in India, and one one street of Delhi is roughly like, 80%, 90% of Scandinavia. So Mhmm. Delhi is, like, massive. [11:47] Jonas, talk to me more about your team. How many folks are full time? [11:51] >> Roughly thirty thirty people. [11:53] 30 people. [11:54] >> Small time. [11:54] And what's the breakdown? How many are engineers? [11:58] >> Most of them. Basically, all of them. [12:00] Oh, okay. Are you an engineer? [12:03] >> Yes. I studied physics, and I've done my doctor in production science at the in the automotive industry at Dyna. [12:11] Who sells? [12:16] >> In the beginning, I was a salesman, CEO and salesman, and then now we have a small sales team and growing. So we plan to double the team within the next twelve months. [12:27] And are you bootstrapped to there? Have you raised capital? [12:31] >> From a US perspective, we are more or less bootstrapped. We have, like, investment of less than 1,000,000 into the company. [12:37] And when did you raise that capital? [12:40] >> We do have some business angel that founded with started founding, and in the last decade, we do have one founding round and collected some money. [12:51] What what year [12:52] >> was that? Actually, [12:55] >> it was in 2018. [12:57] So 2018, you did, like, a million dollar pre seed round? [13:01] >> Less. Because we do have, of course, the the angel round. So all in, there was investment of less than 1,000,000 into the company. [13:08] Less than 1. Okay. That's great. So so capital efficient. And then just to confirm, you've got these subsidies power grid operators, they're all paying you again somewhere between 50,000 a year and $300,000 per year. Right? [13:21] Yes. So if we take a 100 of those operators, and let's say they're all paying you the minimum of $50,000 per year, that would put you at MRR today of about $420,000 per month. Is that accurate? [13:34] >> This is a realistic region. [13:36] It's what? [13:38] >> It's in this region. Yes. [13:41] Oh, your your monthly revenue is in the 400 it's above $400,000. [13:45] >> It's a little less, but the the region is is correct. [13:49] Can you break $400,000 a month this year, you think? [13:53] >> Sorry. I didn't get the question. [13:55] Can you break $400,000 per month in revenue by December? [14:00] >> Break? Sorry. I I I [14:02] Jonas, what do you plan to grow by this year? How much can you grow revenue this year? [14:07] >> Yeah. We're doubling. [14:08] Okay. Doubling. Okay. And did you double so if you're doing, call it, $350,000 a month today, what were you doing exactly one year ago? [14:17] >> I have to check your numbers. Sorry. I'm I'm I'm on the forefront. So so I'm I'm at that point, we are we're planning to more or less double the next Jonas, I'm asking [14:30] my question was the last [14:31] >> twelve months. Last twelve months was so we did have upgrows of 250% in 2021 and restructured and yeah. Restructured the company last year, so there was up growth of roughly 20%. I have to check the numbers in detail. [14:58] Okay. So like a year ago, you were doing something like $280,000 per month, then you grew 20%. Yeah. [15:03] >> Two fifty to 80 something. [15:05] Two fifty. Okay. That's great. Well, this is this is you have very efficient revenue per employee. Right? I mean, you're doing between, call it, 4 and 5,000,000 in ARR annual revenue today with a team of 33. That's a lot of efficient or team of 30. That's a lot of efficiency. How do you get that much revenue per employee? [15:23] >> By offering valued solution to our customers and having a highly efficient implementation [15:33] >> work. So normally, we could do an implementation of a customer up to 10,000 substations, was is roughly a million counting points within less [15:47] >> than ten days, including all the infrastructure data and our competitors. Or if you go into the normal situation in this market, it's it's, like, half of the time, our competitors need to set up a PMO. [16:03] Understood. And I got my math lot wrong. [16:04] >> And you're saying 90% implementation. [16:07] Sorry. Yeah. [16:09] I got my math slightly wrong. Sorry. If you're doing 5,000,000 run rate today with 30 people, you're doing more like a $160,000 per month in term I'm sorry, per year in revenue per employee, which is pretty standard for a private capital efficient SaaS company. So those numbers all check out. They look good. I mean, how do you go from a million substations to 2,000,000 substations? What's your expansion strategy, especially if you're the only one doing sales? [16:32] >> No. I'm not the only one. We do have a sales team. [16:34] Well, you just told me that all 30 employees were engineers. [16:37] >> Yeah. But engineers could so engineers could only [16:43] >> so from the background, they're engineers, but there, we do have people with an engineering background also in in sales. [16:50] So of your full time team, how many folks are actually writing code on a daily basis? [16:56] >> We do have 18 people working in co development, and the rest is [17:06] >> working with customers [17:10] How many are sales reps with how many are sales reps with the quota? [17:13] >> Three. [17:14] Okay. And how did you every SaaS one is listening right now. They always struggle with how to hire and structure their first sales hire. [17:21] >> How did you come up [17:21] with the quota for your first sales hire? [17:24] >> So my first sales hire was now our chief sales officer, and so he was coming from the industry, and he supported me. We went both into the market, and now he is the head of the sales team, and we do have two colleagues within the sales team, and sales team will grow up to four to five people within the next twelve months. [17:48] That's great. Any plans to raise capital, you're gonna stay bootstrap basically bootstrapped? [17:53] >> We're thinking about for accelerating [17:57] >> the market entrance also in North America? And [18:00] How much would you consider raising? [18:03] >> We think about between two and four. [18:06] And and do you think you can get, like, a 40 or 50,000,000 valuation? [18:10] >> That would be an interesting range. [18:13] Mhmm. How do you get there today? I mean, it's has nothing to do with you. It's just the macroeconomic trends right now are just no one's writing checks. [18:22] >> So it's so being in the field of critical infrastructure, being in a field where customers couldn't go bankrupt, and being and and having super solid cash flows from our customers, we don't we are not faced with any liquidity problem at the moment. We do have a lot of [18:41] >> capital institutions, I would say, that are asking about if it's possible to to invest in venios. [18:48] And if you if you had a choice of raising 2,000,000 on a 40,000,000 valuation or taking 20,000,000 all cash upfront today to sell the whole company, which one would you take? [18:58] >> No. Selling the company is no option. So it's a multibillion dollar market. And so in Germany, the investment in the infrastructure in the next ten years is roughly 100,000,000,000. So European wide investment in infrastructure only on the electricity side is roughly 1,000,000,000,000. Globally, something between three and five, and there should be enough room for having several 10 or 100,000,000 revenue [19:29] >> for IT to operate this critical infrastructure. [19:32] >> Yeah. But you have to go capture that market. [19:34] I understand it's big. It's taken you ten years to grow to $4.55000000 bucks in revenue. So what are you changing? Like, how do [19:40] >> you Now go it's kick starting. So the point is it's comp it's not selling books. It's a it's a complex technology. It's needed to work. You need to so we actually have platform generation four. So we we we put away our old platforms. So now we are we can compete with a big yeah, with the with the classical competitors, like Siemens, like ABB, like a Schneider. And now it's, like, doubling every year or more profitable is [20:12] Well, you didn't double the past twelve months, just to be clear. You grew 20% the past twelve months. That's what you just told me. [20:17] >> Yeah. But the year but the year before, we more than doubled. [20:21] Understood. Understood. Let's we're rooting for you, obviously. I'm just pushing you here. So let's wrap up with the famous five. Number one, what's the last book that you read? [20:35] >> It's it's Faust from from Greta. It's a German r. It's a German book. [20:40] Number two, is there a CEO you're following or studying? [20:45] >> So Is there a founder [20:47] is there a founder that you're following or studying? [20:52] >> From a technology perspective, I think Elon Musk is pretty interesting. [20:59] Number three, what's your favorite online tool for building venios? [21:05] >> Excellent. [21:07] Number four, how many hours of sleep do you get every night? [21:11] >> Oh, last night, it was, like, three, but normally, I try to get between five or six and a half. [21:17] And what's your situation? Married, single, kids? [21:20] >> I do have two kids and I have a wife, but we're not married. [21:23] Two kiddos? Okay. Great. And how old are you? [21:27] >> I'm [21:30] >> 43. [21:31] 43. Last question. [21:32] Something you wish you knew when you were 20 years old? [21:38] >> Knowing that founding a company is not searching after the right vision or idea, it's just the will to form markets, and that is important. The will to form something, to do something, not waiting on the brilliant idea. So we started with optimizing of EV and EV charging infrastructure. Now we are on the other side. So it's just do something. It's important. [22:08] Guys, venios has just hit $350,000 per month in revenue, up from $250,000 per month a year ago. They're working with over a 100 power grid operators spread across Germany, Netherlands, Austria, Switzerland, India, South America, Pan powering over a million substations to help these power grid operators optimize their systems and most importantly, decentralize the power grid, which is more sustainable. They're growing quick. They might raise, call it, 2 to 4,000,000 here. I call it a 40 to [22:33] 50,000,000 valuation. We'll see what Jonas does. But in the meantime, Jonas, thanks for taking us to the top. [22:38] >> Thanks. [22:39] One more thing before you go. We have a brand new show every Thursday at 1PM central. It's called Shark Tank for SaaS. We call it deal or bust. One founder comes on, three hungry buyers, they try and do a deal live and the founder shares back end dashboards, their expenses, their revenue, ARPU, CAC, LTV, you name it, they share it and the buyers try and make a deal live. It is fun to watch every Thursday, 1PM [23:04] Central. Additionally, remember these recorded founder interviews go live. We release them here on YouTube every day at 2PM Central. To make sure you don't miss any of that, make sure you click the subscribe button below here on YouTube, the big red button, and then click the little bell notification to make sure you get notifications when we do go live. I wouldn't want you to miss breaking news in the SaaS world, whether it's an acquisition, a big [23:26] fundraise, a big sale, a big profitability statement or something else. I don't want you to miss it. Additionally, if you want to take this conversation deeper and further, we have by far the largest private Slack community for B2B SaaS founders. You want to get in there. We've probably talked about your tool if you're running a company or your firm if you're investing. You can go in there and quickly search and see what people are saying. Sign [23:48] up for that @nathanlatka.comslashslack. In the meantime, I'm hanging out with you here on YouTube. I'll be in the comments for the next thirty minutes. Feel free to let me know what you thought about this episode. If you enjoyed it, click the thumbs up. We get a lot of haters that are mad at how aggressive I am on these shows, but I do it so that we can all learn. We have to counter those people. We got [24:08] to push them away. 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