Charging the Future: Kobby Osei-Kusi on Building Pirl Technology and Solving the EV Infrastructure Gap

On this episode of Financial Forward, Jim McCarthy sits down with Kobby Osei-Kusi, founder and CEO of Pirl Technology, to discuss the future of electric vehicle infrastructure, entrepreneurship, and solving real-world problems through innovation.

Kobby shares his journey from growing up in Ghana to working on Wall Street at Credit Suisse, earning an MBA from Harvard Business School, and ultimately launching Pirl Technology — a company focused on expanding EV charging access for renters and residential communities often overlooked in the clean energy transition.

The conversation explores the realities of startup life, the infrastructure challenges slowing EV adoption, and why practical innovation matters more than hype. Kobby also discusses the importance of resilience, mission-driven leadership, and the founder community inside Conscious Venture Lab Cohort 15.

Jim also shares why he believes Pirl Technology is positioned for long-term success and why companies focused on solving meaningful infrastructure problems will define the next phase of innovation.

In This Episode

•  Kobby’s journey from Ghana to Wall Street to startup founder 
•  Why EV charging remains a major infrastructure challenge 
•  The overlooked problem facing renters and urban communities 
•  Building climate-focused technology companies in uncertain markets 
•  The transition from finance professional to entrepreneur 
•  The importance of resilience and founder mindset 
•  Conscious Venture Lab and the value of entrepreneurial ecosystems 
•  Why practical infrastructure innovation matters 

About the Guest

Kobby Osei-Kusi is the founder and CEO of Pirl Technology, a company developing intelligent EV charging infrastructure solutions focused on residential accessibility and community-based deployment.

About Financial Forward

Hosted by Jim McCarthy, Financial Forward features conversations with leaders shaping the future of finance, technology, regulation, infrastructure, and innovation.

More from Jim: 
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/mccarthyhatch/
https://www.mccarthy-hatch.com/

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:03

Today on Financial Forward, I sit down with Kabi, founder and CEO of Pearl Technology, a company working to solve one of the biggest challenges facing electric vehicle adoption, accessible charging infrastructure for renters and residential communities. Kabi's journey is extraordinary. From growing up in Ghana to Wall Street at Credit Switch to Harvard Business School, and now building a climate-focused technology company. He brings a unique perspective on innovation, infrastructure, and entrepreneurship. Cobbie is also part of the Conscious Ventures Lab Cohort 15 alongside McCarthy Hatch. And after this conversation, I can tell you clearly, I believe Pearl is a company with real potential. In this episode, we talk about the future of EV charging, the realities of building a startup, leadership under uncertainty, and why solving practical problems is where true innovation happens. I'm Jim McCarthy, and this is Financial Forward. Let's get started. Hey Kobi, how you doing? It's great to see you outside of Baltimore. Wonderful device. Yeah, and you're here on Financial Forward. So listen, tell the audience who you are and um how you got to where you're at today, and then we'll dig into that.

SPEAKER_01 1:44

Yeah, sure. Jim, thanks, thanks for this opportunity. Um it's really great to spend more time with you. Um and uh I'm always very inspired by your story. Um, but uh to start with my story, I I grew up in Ghana uh in the 80s, and um I'm the son of an engineer. And um in the 80s in Ghana, engineers didn't make a lot of money. So my dad um, you know, directed, you know, uh, all four of us of his kids to um head more in the direction of business. Uh, so I studied economics uh in high school, and I came to the US for college and continued to study economics and business and started my career on Wall Street. Uh, I was an investment banker at Credit Suisse, which no longer exists. It was acquired by UBS. And I had a really fantastic time on Wall Street. It was a really great um preparatory uh period. You built a lot of really strong skills uh really around how businesses are financed, but also how you present your understanding of business, right? So finance is just another communication medium for how an operating business uh works. And being able to be fluent in that was an incredibly uh uh uh strong um preparatory period uh for you know sort of what I've been able to do uh afterwards. Um I was fortunate to work on things like the Hertz IPO. Uh we raised over$2 billion for uh uh industrial companies. Uh one of my favorite projects was um we financed a company called Nina Fundry. They make the manhole covers. So when I'm walking on the street and I look down, I see Nina Fundry, and you know, we're about to provide over 300 million financing for them. Um so I just really had a really incredible time on Wall Street. Um, then I went to get my MBA and my natural instincts or direction of life started pulling on me, which was, you know, um becoming a builder, becoming an operator. Um, and again, being a son of an engineer, I think those started to pull in that direction. So um after I got my MBA, I um uh uh worked in project management for a power plant company. And specifically I joined the Africa group. Uh, and our goal was to take about 1500 megawatts to about 5,000 megawatts and uh list that company as a private entity, uh separate from the from the main company listed on, let's say, another stock market. Um, and it was a fantastic experience. I mean, I had some of the most fun in my professional career. So, as a project manager in that particular company, you're the mini-CEO of standing up a new power plan. So you work with engineers uh to build the plan, you work with the financing team, both internal and external, to raise capital for the power project. Uh, you work on the environmental assessment, right? Um, and all the certification and regulatory mechanisms. And so that company, AES, had because of the way it's structured as project development expertise, spawned off a lot of entrepreneurs because you have that training in standing up uh, you know, uh an infrastructure asset. And so uh the company just had this informal tradition of folks leaving to go build you know power projects or build different startups. Um, and so I you know fell into that. And uh after a few years at a company, I decided to leave and launch Pearl. And uh, you know, Pearl now is focused on uh delivering profitable EV charging systems, but I think I I am now sort of at the beginning of where I started, which is you know, I'm the son of an engineer, I'm a builder, I'm an operator, and I'm doing you know, something that is in my DNA, you know, that I was probably born with. Um, so that's sort of the arc of where my story is.

SPEAKER_00 6:16

That's fantastic, and I I love it. And as a father myself, um, and the advice that I give my children and the reason I give my children that advice, it's um it's nice to see that you heeded that advice from your father, and you took a path based on or at least gently guided by that advice from your father that took you through business boot camp 101 all the way through high-level finance. So ultimately where you ended up is the best of both worlds, is it not? I mean, you picked up the skills that he didn't have that he needed to be more um uh uh uh successful compensation-wise, outside of engineering, because he didn't see opportunities in engineering to make enough money. So he encouraged you and the family to get educations in business and finance. You did that, and now you're bringing his skills, his engineering mind, his his building and thought process mind into your financial skills, and you have the best of both worlds. As a father, that's a beautiful story. I'm sure he is amazingly proud of you.

SPEAKER_01 7:36

I I couldn't agree more. I feel uh I feel that I have um the toolkits from engineering and finance to be able to build um long-lasting businesses around infrastructure. And I think um, you know, one thing I've seen is sometimes people get an engineering degree and then they'll go into finance after, maybe get an MBA. Um, or you start with the way I start, which is I started, which was finance first and then uh engineering later. However, you sort of go at it, I think it's that intersection, it's that combination of both skills where you can thrive in the world of atoms and you can thrive in the world of bits, you know, which is just numbers on your screen. Um, so I feel really fortunate to be able to have uh uh the background. Um, I didn't know how it was, you know, how the dots were gonna connect to today, uh, but I couldn't be more happy and glad and grateful for that journey.

SPEAKER_00 8:47

That's fantastic. I like that a lot. So I do want you to talk about Pearl a little bit, but I want you to, in the in the context of when you tell us about Pearl and what Pearl is, I really want you to focus on what led you from large-scale energy development and investment banking into founding Pearl. I think some of it's obvious from your history, but not all of it. So I'd like to hear that story.

SPEAKER_01 9:14

Yeah, sure. Um, when I was uh working at AES uh developing power projects, one of the earliest things I saw was that um the capacity and the the capacity of batteries were increasing and the price uh per power of batteries was also dropping. Uh, this was you know around uh the early 2010s. Um around 2010, one of my professors' daughter uh was one of the earliest employees at Tesla. And so he had a Tesla roadster. Uh I got to drive that. Uh it was one of the earliest cars. Um it was the first car that Tesla had built, but one of the earliest, uh, you know, a few people had them. And so, you know, being uh a project developer, but also seeing, you know, what the infrastructure-wise around batteries and the impact of that, um, you know, you started to get some insight on this is going to be a transformative 30, 40, 50 year transition. Um, and uh, I started to think of what are ways where I could directly actually be part of this transition. And so um when I was ready to uh start Pearl, uh the decision was to, you know, should we go directly into uh working with batteries, uh building something that uses batteries, or go into supported infrastructure for battery-enabled technology? And uh to build a battery company, you know, uh the financing, the permitting, the process is fairly large. Uh, but to build the type of company we're building around charging infrastructure, supportive infrastructure of battery-enabled technology, that seemed to be something we could bootstrap and get off the ground fairly quickly. And so that was the decision point was that um uh we could build charging infrastructure with a small team and get something off the ground and still be uh uh sort of ride in that 30, 40, 50 year wave transition to you know a future of electrified uh uh transport, but also just battery-enabled infrastructure.

SPEAKER_00 11:52

Okay, interesting. So Pearl is a charging infrastructure for batteries, specifically automobile charging stations. Correct?

SPEAKER_01 12:12

Correct, correct.

SPEAKER_00 12:14

And what is um what is we'll get to this in a few of the questions coming up, but what's different about your model?

SPEAKER_01 12:25

So I'll I'll start off by saying that um, you know, before I talk about the technology, um typically when we interact with you know uh infrastructure, let's say our homes, from uh uh from from the standpoint of um you if you think of homes, until homes became long-lasting assets, right, you couldn't write 30-year mortgages, right? So if if a house sort of degraded, decayed in two, three years, you really couldn't build, you know, uh uh sort of the mortgage infrastructure that allowed a lot more people to have homes. So when I think about what Pearl is doing, I usually always sort of come from the standpoint of that uh we're providing a long-durable asset, right, for um battery-enabled technology. And um and really sort of the key part of it is to make it a stable financial asset. Once something becomes a stable financial asset, like a home, like a car, then things like mortgages and leases could be layered on top of that. And that financial technology accelerates the underlying asset, right? Uh, because we have mortgages, we can build more houses, more people can afford more homes. And so Pearl's approach is to turn um is to really start with how do we turn EV charging into a stable financial asset? And that is going to unlock a lot of demand and actually close that significant gap that we face in the US between EV adoption and EV charging. And so specifically, when we move away from you know the technology from the financial driver to the technology itself, what makes Pearl different is we've developed a modular EV charging uh system that allows EV charging to be profitable on a single unit basis for the first time. So currently, EV charging, the current EV charging operators, the publicly traded ones, operate at a negative 57% operating margin. And that has been the case for the last 14, 15 years since the industry started. And uh, we believe that until we move the industry to per unit profitability, um, it's it's we're still gonna have that huge uh infrastructure gap between EV adoption and EV charging. So in the US, we face a deficit of about 20 million charging stations over the next four or five years. That's just how far behind we are. Um, and so Pearls Technology is a modular EV charging system that allows owners to do upgrade repairs uh themselves, which reduces reliance on expensive certified electrician labor and also allows in-2 uh uh upgrades. And so as we bring newer technology into the market, whether it's bi-directional charging, for example, you don't have to do the current model, which is rip and replace. You can, with the charger installed, simply replace the charging component, and boom, within 15 minutes, you have an upgraded uh uh charger. And so we bring predictability, stable cash flows, and profitability to an industry that has not experienced that to date.

SPEAKER_00 16:15

Which will lead to that stability, that economic factor that allows those leases and financing to be layered on top of that to scale and grow the environment. Individual ownership, profitability, um, marketability, um, adaptation, growth, and everything else follows behind that. That sounds absolutely great. So, where where do you see the biggest disconnect today between EV adoption and charging infrastructure availability?

SPEAKER_01 16:54

The biggest disconnect now is um in destination charging. So, destination charging is we can break it down into short-term and long-term destination charging. So, short-term destination charging is when you go to your coffee shop or you go to a park and you're spending three, four, or five hours there. Um, and then you know moves into medium-term, which is you stay at an Airbnb or a verbo, you know, for a few days, and then long-term destination charging is you know, I'm renting a property or I'm living in a in a condo, uh, and you know, I'm staying there for months, uh, if not years. So that destination charge-in, that is the biggest uh gap that we have. 30% of Americans uh uh live in condos and apartments, and um so they don't control the parking space, you know, as in a single family home. That 30% of the customers uh of the market now is significantly underserved. Where the market is maturing is on en route uh uh charging. So um highways, you know, the previous administration uh with a bipartisan infrastructure law passed three billion dollars for fast charging along highways and transportation routes. That has you know deployed significant numbers of charging, and so we're closing that gap. So when I'm traveling from DC to New York, for example, I'm able to stop frequently and charge, and there's no issue. Um, you know, I'm not experiencing any uh charging gaps. But when I'm booking an Airbnb in upstate New York, you know, it's hit or miss whether they're going to have a charger in that particular Airbnb. So it's a destination charging across, you know, short-term, medium-term, and long-term charging. That's where we're seeing the biggest gap.

SPEAKER_00 19:05

It's interesting to hear it articulated like that. That's very interesting. I remember when my son graduated from college, um, and it was I worked with my kids in a car at that point in their life, and I had offered my son a Tesla, and um, he was moving up to an area, and um he came back and said, Dad, I I I just don't want the Tesla. I'm like, why? It was a really cool car. And um he said, Well, I'm living in an apartment now, and I have one plug-in outside, and and uh it's a long ways away from my vehicle. I don't have any charging ability in the town that I'm in. And he said, I would be I would have a beautiful car that I could sit in and never drive. And so he had to go for a he went for a hybrid situation where he had gas and and electric. So this that you describe is real life, it's really um it's happening. We don't maybe see it in the news, but that this is how that market is working, um for sure. So how does Pearl's approach turn EV charging into a viable stream of income for small businesses?

SPEAKER_01 20:27

So we we uh focus on um predictability. Um when when you have a predictable cash flow uh stream, um then you become something that businesses or you know owner operators uh as we call them are able to uh uh install it on their site and actually embrace that. Um so the really focus on our business model is to remove uncertainty and make the revenue stream from charging predictable. Um and and the way we do that first is um uh uh by extending the shelf life of EV charging. So current public charging, you you know, because people it's in the sun, people are using it occasionally, people's cars will drive into it, the built environment experiences dramatic wear and tear. And so people are replacing these chargers at a three to four year rate, right? Um, with Pearl, we're using premium components, and so our expected shelf life is somewhere in the eight to ten year range. That gives a lot of you know uh uh stability for a new owner operator who's interested in installing charging. So durability is really sort of the first key component uh of what we're bringing to market. Uh, the second one is lowering the capital expenditure and the operating. Expenditure so lowering your uh uh capex and opex, right? So um from the capex perspective, after the charger it's installed, that durability means that you're not gonna have to spend a lot of capex, you know, going forward. And then really what we have the patent for is lowering the opex, where the owner themselves, without skilled labor, uh, can actually do most of the maintenance and the upgrades. So the analogy is that think of a light bulb, right? When you need to swap out a light bulb in your home, you know, you don't call your favorite electrician, right? If we had to do that, um, I think fewer people would have you know light or light bulb-driven light in their homes. And similar to your son, right, um, you know, that sort of lack of availability uh uh makes it very hard to adopt uh EVs. And so what we've done is um say you are uh a small coffee shop owner, or maybe you own a few property rentals, you know, um, and um uh you want to repair the charger, all you have to do is similar like a light bulb, unscrew the charger module and we'll ship you a new one uh and you put it back in. And within 15 minutes, you're back online. Now, the current paradigm uh is that when a charger is broken, you have to call an attrician, uh, schedule a visit, they take a first visit to look at what is wrong, then they come back and hopefully fix it. And that takes about two to three weeks. Um, with our approach, uh, we within 15 minutes, the owner themselves uh can actually bring the charger back online if something happens to it. And so that is a very uh, first of all, we you know strip down about 70% of the total cost of ownership of a charger over that time period of ownership. And that gives the owners tremendous predictability, right? In saying that, you know, if my light is off, I can unscrew the bulb and put it back in. Within a couple of minutes, I'm back online. We're bringing that approach to charging, and so that gives owners another layer of predictability. And then the third piece is uptime. So 29% of the time, uh uh uh on average, public EV chargers are down, right? Um, and so you know if you think about that as an owner operator, about a third of the time you're not making money. Um and it's usually because something in electronics in a charger is down. Now, with our approach, um, we we estimate that we can get you to 99% uh uptime. In fact, our pilots that we have installed now are responding at 100% uptime rate. Uh, and so as an owner operator, that means that that third of the money, that third of the time when you charge it, wasn't making money, that is gone now. And now, again, we move you to predictability, to stable cash flows, and then to something that now you can actually finance the installation of EV charge in at your property. So that's really uh you know, at a higher level, we're bringing a level of predictable cash flows into an industry that so far has been quite unpredictable and very unprofitable.

SPEAKER_00 25:40

Amazing. Yeah, that's that's amazing. It's just it's a great vision. So, what role does the modular design and predictive AI play in making your solution cost effective and reliable? I'd like to know a little bit about that.

SPEAKER_01 25:54

Yeah, the the modular design simply means that it works like Lego blocks. And so we have our charging cable, uh uh, we have the cable that goes into your power source, uh, you have the mechanical module that holds all of them together, and then you have the charging module where the electronics are. Now, all of this is connected in a Lego-like fashion. And so you can go and strip out each component, you know, you can remove your charging cable and replace it with a new one. Let's say a customer accidentally drove over the charging cable, the owner themselves can you know, literally by turning on and off a few levers, pull it out and put in a new one. Same with a charging module with electronics, that is enclosed in a separate uh uh uh enclosure that plugs in into the base station. And so, again, you can pull it out by pulling down a lever. Um, and so by making it almost like Lego blocks, right? We can all put Legos together and disconnect them, right? That is that is that is the modularity uh that we bring.

SPEAKER_00 27:08

That's fantastic, and again, the I so you you have increased the life of the unit, which is a friendlier CapEx environment, right? So you can stretch that investment out, those earning years out longer. You've decreased the downtime through your modular design and the ability to isolate the problem, replace only what is broken, and in a modular fashion, snap and play. Yeah, um, which gives you more uptime. Right. And you've you've created this business model where an individual owner through these technical components you've or the aspects that you've talked about, an individual owner can cash flow, can make money on on owning a unit. All of this works together to make it economically feasible for that coffee shop to have a charging unit outside of its facility. Um I just think that's uh I just think that's absolutely uh brilliant. So how should all of that considered, how should financial institutions and regulators think about infrastructure investments like EV charging in terms of uh in terms of risk and opportunity, thinking thinking at a high level?

SPEAKER_01 28:39

Yeah, let me let me add something to uh um you know uh the uh uh the previous um uh uh sort of expansion on uh uh uh what we're delivering and then we'll move into how um you know financial institutions can think about the risk and opportunities. Um one key piece is predictive AI. And I mentioned that because if we, based on the data that we're seeing from the charger usage, can tell you ahead of time that, Jim, perhaps you should stock up on a couple of charger modules because this is what we're seeing from the data, right? Then we're not even we're we're helping you see ahead of time. Um, uh, because people are using and driving cars uh to your chargers, they're pulling the cables, right? Uh so we can measure voltage differences to say that based on the data that we have, this is what you probably need to replace. And so you should stock up, you know, ahead of time. And if you sign up for a particular service that we will offer, we can actually automatically ship that to you ahead of time. And so that that again adds all to that peace of mind and predictability uh for owners. And um another thing I want to mention is um, you know, when when you're starting off, uh you want to focus on a narrow beachhead market, right? Um, but and then you keep your eyes on uh uh the much bigger markets. So um, you know, commercial parking lots are really, really large uh market that we would love to partner with and grow into. Um and so while we're starting with sort of like the destination charge and you know, and you know, the short-term rental and long-term rental uh folks, uh there are other much bigger markets such as corporate parking lots, commercial parking lots that we would love to partner with uh in the future. Um now back to you know how financial institutions you know should think about you know EV charge. And I think I think it always helps to uh use reference points, right? So um one reference point is uh cell towers, right? Um now, you know, that was an emergent industry, right, with a mobile phone industry. Um, and now it's a stable asset, right? You know, a lot of private equity play into that realm uh of buying, owning, operating, you know, cell towers that supports you know mobile mobile phone adoption, right? It's the back, it's the back end that allows you know iPhone sales and Samsung sales to up, you know, to be, you know, it and it allows Apple to be Apple and Samsung to be Apple, uh, Samsung to be Samsung. Right. So um, you know, we we we we we use that as a reference point to say that um you know when when when we think of making charging into a stable, predictable financial asset, that allows, you know, from a financial institution standpoint to actually layer on all the financial tools that can actually accelerate adoption, right? Whether it's you know direct financing, project financing, leasing models. Um, from a risk perspective, um, the risk, you know, it's it's all embedded in your cash flow, right? So the first, you know, sort of risk is usually uptime. You know, is the asset going to be operating at a high enough uptime, right, to generate enough cash to pay off uh the debt? Um, cyber risk is another risk that is increasingly uh potent, you know, especially with all the new AI tools, um, you know, cyber, you know, malicious cyber actors uh uh might be able to do some damage. And so, you know, would they be able to break the sort of the charge-in network and prevent it from operating, for example? So uh that's one one risk to you know uh uh keep in mind. Um you know, permitting is another is another significant risk. Uh, unfortunately, you know, for for large scale and even small scale projects, right? You know, so in a condo, for example, the condo association needs to approve, and then you know, the local authority having jurisdiction needs to approve. And these permitting processes, you know, at even the condo level can be six, nine, twelve months, right? Now, when you go to DC fast charging and you install in you know large you know charging uh uh systems along highways, the permitting can be up to three years. So permitting is another you know uh big bottleneck now uh for you know uh uh uh for for deploying uh these systems. Um and I would say maybe the the the last risk is SIDE-in. Um so making sure that you know you're putting uh the charger networks in high utilization areas. Every day and every year, SIDEN risk goes down significantly. So um every year we're adding a million EVs uh in the US, and we're and that's 25% growth, right, year over year. And so we're getting to a point where um there are gonna be so many EVs, right, that um, you know, almost regardless of the location that you put them in, you're gonna hit the minimum utilization level needed for profitability. So I'd say Sidon is there, but it's really significantly, you know, uh being being reduced uh uh every day. Um one thing that people used to think was a risk was demand um for you know for charging and also for cars. And we're adding we're adding a million cars a year. That is even after the federal incentives you know have been you know uh uh removed. Um and so I think I think some of those risks are being sort of solved, and some of them I think are below the threshold of what we would call a risk factor.

SPEAKER_00 35:21

That's absolutely fantastic. So you're what I and I I just am curious. I'm I'm just curious. What's the capital someone would need to start a project with you? I have a corner out here, I'd like to put one in. I want to talk to Cobbie and I want to uh start the process of getting this put in. You know, what's the capital? Forget the permitting and all that. That's those expenses are ridiculous. But um assume we have the permit and and we're ready to go, or we're buying an existing station that we're gonna transfer. Look like what kind of capital are you talking about for a small business owner to get into something like this?

SPEAKER_01 36:09

Yeah, it's um it's four thousand dollars, you know, on the upper end. Uh, so about two thousand dollars for our product and software, and about two thousand dollars for the installation. And um, we conservatively estimate that um most sites are going to be generating about five thousand dollars per year per charger. And so, you know, within the first year, we expect you to break even. Um, and you know, Jim, my um uh part of my retirement plan is for me to own hundreds, if not thousands, of these charging stations, right? Because I see the EV transition, it's gonna be plain out for the next 30, 40 years. I want to be owning, you know, uh uh uh, you know, uh hundreds of uh uh charging stations that are generating passive income, you know, uh for myself. When we think of passive income opportunities right now, um in the built in the fiscal environment, right? It used to be ATMs, right? We don't use cash as much anymore. So that opportunity is declining. Um, laundry mats are not growing 25% year over year, right? And so EV charging represents one of it's an emergent asset class. Uh, and I think it's an emergent opportunity for um people to generate stable passive income. And I want to be one of them, right? Uh right alongside our customers.

SPEAKER_00 37:45

Absolutely. And if somebody wanted to get a hold of you or get a hold learn more about this, I know you're you're you're building and you're the business is coming together. You and I are working together through Conscious Ventures Lab Um and doing good work there, good partnership. Thank you for your partnership in that lab. You've been very helpful to me. But um, yeah, talk to me about how someone might just learn more, maybe reach out to you.

SPEAKER_01 38:14

Yeah, if you go to pearlcharger.com, you can sign up for uh early pilots. Uh so pearlpirlcharger.com. You can sign up for early pilots, sign up for notifications uh when we launch. We expect to launch uh Q1 next year. Um and uh I'm easily available on you know LinkedIn or even via email. It's cobby at thepearl.com, so k-o-b-y at t-ep-irl.com. And uh we love to talk to you know uh uh uh all kinds of potential partners uh and see how we can you know um assist folks to be part of this uh ongoing transition. So um, you know, Jim, I I've um really loved you know uh working with you uh in Conscious Venture Labs and hearing about your personal story uh and the depth of authenticity that you bring to everything you touch is very palpable, right? Um and very quite inspiring, to be honest. Uh so I'd love to turn this to you and ask you um, what has um this podcast and all the interactions that you've had, what has it meant to you personally?

SPEAKER_00 39:39

Well, I want people to succeed, and there is no better time to and also no more of a nervous time than to talk to people who are who are building motivated and personally invested in some direction in their life. I don't care if they're preparing for a marathon and that's what they have in front of them, or if they're if they're um cobby building a EV business. Um, I love the idea that people invest themselves and their energies into a dream, something they want to do. And I have the tendency to admire projects that will improve the human condition, have some value to human life. Um and so the podcasts and meeting the company owners and and and meeting different um entrepreneurs and and uh founders is is energizing to me because I can feel their energy for what what they're trying to put forth, and and I'm not sloppy in how I do it, right? So I'm not um there are just come to me to my neighborhood bar um some afternoon or night, and I can show you a whole group of people that don't have the acumen to take an idea to market, right? They have all the ideas, but they don't have the acumen to take it to market, and so I I pick guests that I think get it and understand it, and you come at the highest on that list uh in terms of not just understanding your product, but understanding the market effects of that product. So um and in the history that you have behind it, from the in your youth watching your father as an engineer and learning those um very systematic skills and processes that your father, I'm sure, went through to do everything he did, and um, and then moving through the finance industry and seeing how the world of finance works. Um, you've taken something that can be very complicated to a lot of people, and you've simplified you've simplified it down to a business model. Um, and so these these podcasts and the people that I meet mean something to me personally, and I kind of surf off of their energy, and I try to find ways that I can personally assist them if in any way I can. And so I think by coming out and talking about what you're doing and hearing that story, people this is how seeds grow. Someone hears this and says, that man knows what he's talking about. He's thought this through. I don't have to rethink that. So the capex is already thought through. Um, the extension of the life of the asset is two and a half, three times, four times what we we're seeing in the market today. The modular components allow for lower costs of repair. Um, the simplicity of the modular components or add to that lower cost of repair. The person can do it themselves, or a lower-paid electrician can make the switches. Um, and and then and then framing it in a way that an individual investor could develop a uh a cash cash flow or a return on investment over time after the first year. Um these are all components of a good business person, and and that's what you have, and that's what the people that are in the lab have, and and that's why I like to talk to them and and hear the stories and give them an opportunity to get that story out there so people can hear that. You as an example, uh, I grew up in banking, you know, and um back in the early days in the eighties when I was in banking, it was community banking. And I had a lot of Customers that owned laundry mats. And one of the biggest and laundry mats were a great investment. Let's face it. They were a cash cow. And uh, but one of the problems were the machines don't last. When they break, you don't know about it until someone calls you, or you happen to go in and see that it's broken. Um, you have breaks and and um damages that can be caused by water and um and other components of the machines that are in there, and there's no intelligence coming back to you telling you that a component's about to break, you might want to stock up on this, or we're seeing this in other areas, you might want to stock up on this. So it's a great investment for a person that I have a lot of um admiration for in the market, a small investor that can generate wealth. Um, but I can also see my friend at Prudential Capital in Dallas, Texas, my attorney who who papers up all the windmill financing around the country and uh uh liquefied LP gas and all the energy ventures around the country through Prudential Capital? This is what he's looking for. This is how you securitize an investment. These components that you've talked about are scalable to a very, very high level to make it a very attractive asset to a very large pool of money. Um, how hard would it be to really go hard on this and say we're gonna we're gonna do 10,000 of these around the country this year, right? And that would take large level financing to do that, and you've put together a program that makes that act actually possible. Yeah. So from an individual investor being able to get a quality investment that's helping you know the earth through electric electrical use and drop of carbon use, um, and um and and doing it in a way that is responsible. Um and uh and and then once you've proven that individual owners can cash flow on these investments, then you've got the securitization aspect of it where you can start layering other financial components on top of it. So that's why I do it. I know that's a long story, um, but I do it because I admire you, I can see your passion, and um, I can see your dad in you. Um, and the the one the when I say I can see your dad in you is not your dad, but what your dad told you, how to be cautious about your career, you know, and you and you're being thoughtful and cautious, you're not pigeonholing yourself somewhere. Um, you're being you're you're broadening out across many industries, finance, um, engineering, um, you know, securitization and all that. So I'm I'm quite I'm I'm quite honored to to to know you. I know I'm a better person for having heard you and and seeing the work that you're doing. So I I thank you very much.

SPEAKER_01 47:19

No, thank you, Jim. I think your um your passion for um improving people's lives in whatever way, whatever touch point, I think comes very through very, very clearly. And I think this podcast is one of many platforms that I think you have to really elevate, you know, people that you feel are contributing meaningfully to the human condition. Um so really thank you for uh for your work.

SPEAKER_00 47:53

Yeah, I want people to be heard. There are a lot of stories out there, and as you know, my business listens to the written word, the written communication. And um and it's a passion of mine that we start to listen. We have the technology today to listen to that written communication in a in a very um organized, um uh valuable manner. Um, and and we need to we need to be able to do that. So I I want people to be heard. Um and there's a lot of value in that, I think. And you you've done a great job in finding your market and you understand it, and um I appreciate this.

SPEAKER_01 48:37

Yeah, no, thank you.

SPEAKER_00 48:39

All right, well, that thanks very much, and uh we'll see you uh around the corner, I'm sure.

SPEAKER_01 48:45

Yeah, see you in Baltimore soon.

SPEAKER_00 48:48

All right, thanks, Cobbie. Thanks for joining us on this episode of Financial Forward. I want to thank Cobbie for taking the time to share his story, his vision, and the mission behind Pearl Technology. Conversations like this are important because they remind us that innovation is not just about technology, it's about solving real problems for real people. The transition to electric vehicles and sustainable infrastructure is one of the defining economic and societal shifts of our time. Companies like Pearl are tackling the hard and practical questions that determine whether that transition actually works at scale. And personally, I've watched Cobbie operate within Conscious Ventures Lab Cohort 15, and I can say he represents the kind of thoughtful, mission-oriented founder that innovators, communities, and industries should pay attention to. I believe Pearl Technology has a very bright future ahead. If you enjoyed today's episode, please subscribe and share the show and follow Financial Forward for more conversations with leaders shaping the future of finance, technology, infrastructure, and consumer innovation. I'm Jim McCarthy. Thanks for listening, and we'll see you next time on Financial Forward.