What It Takes to Fund Deep Tech | Sean Joseph, Co-Founder @ Altilium

Oh, today on the show, special episode, we have a CFO for one of the first times. The reason that's exciting to me is because the more founders, investors, corporate buyers that the Grove talks to, the more obvious it becomes that there is an interesting conversation to have around how to actually fund hard tech climate

tech startups. So, Sean Joseph is the guest for today from Altilium Tech. They are a company that has an innovative approach critical metals from batteries and other sources, and this is an incredibly asset intensive company to scale. So, from a CFO's perspective, first of all, what financial vehicles are at your disposal, and then how do you leverage those

financial vehicles to create the environment for a company like this to have enough time to grow to the scale that they're at now, actively commercializing, have a proven technology, and the ability to impact the world positively. So, uh there will be more conversations like this on the Grove. This is uh the first one. Sean

was extremely knowledgeable, and so it was very educational for me. I know it will be for you as well. Thank you as always to our sponsors, Cleantech Growth Lab. If you're looking to grow in cleantech, they're the people to do it with. And the producers of this podcast, Crazin Friends. And with that, I give

you Sean. Oh, welcome to another episode of the Grove. Shout out to our sponsors, mentioned just before this, but without them, it would not be possible to interview awesome people doing awesome things like Sean. Welcome. >> Thanks, Blake, and it's really great to be here this morning or this afternoon, wherever you are in the world.

>> [laughter] >> That's right. That's right, cuz we're definitely in different places, and I especially I thank you. I know it's early where you are, so I I appreciate you taking the time. But I'm like I was just saying, I'll say it again, I'm excited to talk more about this.

I want more content like this to be out there the world, how to structure your finances and we're talking about slowest moving industries, deep tech. So, before we get into it, if you give a brief introduction of yourself and what you're building.

>> Okay, thanks Blake and my name's Sean Joseph. I'm one of the co-founders of a UK based battery cycling business known as Altilium Clean Tech. We've been in business since about 2019. We incorporated in 2020. My background is I'm an investment banker, so I apologize in advance.

But uh my background is 20 plus years in investment banking. I spent time in Singapore as head of investment banking for an Australian bank known as ANZ. And I was very much attracted to when I left banking building in something building something that's truly one great, two, you know, marries with what the world needs and three

makes a difference. And I'm happy to say that we've been today successful in building that business in the UK. We're a company of 60 strong now in the UK and we are just embarking on our first commercial scale battery cycling facility in Plymouth.

>> Let's go. That's amazing. Congratulations. So then I guess it's safe to say you successfully done your job in in managing the capital stack putting money where you're receiving it, putting it where it needs to go. So um so I guess before we get I just start peppering you with questions cuz I'm very very interested in all this and

not as knowledgeable. Did you ever imagine yourself being a founder, being an entrepreneur or did something happen at some point? >> Um it's a good question. I you know, when I left banking I was looking for something more meaningful. I'm not saying banking can't be meaningful for some people, but I've been in banking 20

plus years and I was looking for something more meaningful. I think, you know, our journey started with one of the other co-founders, Christian Marsden, who has a PhD in metallurgical engineering calling me up saying, you know, this energy transition is, you know, the next industrial revolution. You know, there's a real opportunity here to build something that

is probably not possible in this current environment where carbon is the, you know, main game in town and it's pretty much crowded out. And so, you know, we started noodling on where that opportunity may be. It's funny I started this with him on a, you know, advisory basis where, you know, you would get there's no money so

you would do get shares in a company as part of the advice you would give and it just blossomed from there. So, it is quite a, you know, uh opportunistic story. I never thought I'd be, you know, kind of the co-founders of this company, but, you know, that's where we are and it's turned out to be

the right call in relation to where the world's headed and the trend in relation to carbon neutrality and, you know, moving away from a carbon-based economy. >> Yeah. So, so you so you said it came out of an interest in being a part of the energy transition.

>> Yeah. >> So, was there a specific experience that you had or your co-founders had that were in metals and mining or was this just something that you guys decided to go after? >> So, I was I was as I said I'm a banker so I was a bit of a generalist, but the

two other co-founders, one was a commodity trader and that's Cameron Madavi and Christian as I mentioned he's a metallurgical engineer so he is, you know, the sort of the science brain behind this. Um and so the combination of uh chemical engineer, commodity trader, um and a banker seemed to be a good fit. Um

but both Cameron and Christian had mining and metals experience in relation to um mostly carbon products, actually. >> Awesome. So, so was the was the idea for the business generally the same as what it has turned out to be or has it changed pretty drastically?

>> It's changed quite a bit, actually. Like and you know, you got to recognize that we had COVID in between these periods of time as well. So, uh that >> [clears throat] >> that was certainly a bit of a shift, but originally we wanted to actually own the physical assets.

The concept was that there's infinite demand going forward in relation to um you know, these critical metals and there's finite supply in relation to um the critical metal supply chain. You know, as you know, you know, China controls 80 plus percent of the critical metals of the world. You know, the you know, 80 plus percent of the critical

metals come out of Congo of cobalt comes out of Congo. You know, these aren't all ethically mined places and I think you know, our view was if you walk if you want to walk the walk, you got to talk the talk. So, you know, originally we thought we'd set up ethically ESG compliant mines and we do

have some of those assets within the group. But then COVID hit. Um Christian went back to university, designed the the process flow that we have today, and we started thinking, you know, where's the opportunity? You know, there surely needs to be a recycling opportunity here as well um in terms of reusing and repurposing

what we've got. >> So, is it So, then where does the the UK connection come in? Is it just are one of you based there or was that where the first commercial opportunity presented itself? >> Um look, I think uh they are um a number of reasons why the UK turned out to be the opportunity. The first one

is where we got our our first government support. Um you know, we got a in the middle of COVID our first technical center down in in uh Tavistock. We got uh 40,000 pounds of government council support to build a technical um um processing facility there. So, that's the start where we first got a little

bit of money through COVID. But actually, the UK as a place is very uh prospective. It's like the highest um second-hand car market in Europe. Um it's got 2.4 million EVs floating around the UK today. I think the latest stats were one in three new registrations are EVs in the UK. Um you know, it's got

gigafactories. It's got two uh Nissan and Jaguar Land Rover are both building gigafactories in the UK today, which I don't know whether your listeners know, but about 30% of the critical metals used when you start up a gigafactory are wasted. So, there's a whole big supply of critical metal um recycling you know, it there.

Um the regulations are really tailwind for us in the UK. So, you know, by 2031, no new diesel or petrol cars are allowed to be sold in the UK. Um so, there's a whole bunch of reasons why the UK is a very prospective place for us to be. But the actual truth of the matter is we

started because we got a little grant from the from a council in the southwest of England. >> Okay, and that was and that was you finding that grant, you know, doing doing something like >> Christian did. Christian's from Tavistock. So, uh we we all went to our separate corners of the world Um

and then there was this grant so we just opened up what we thought at the time was a huge warehouse but now seems tiny and you know we started you know we did our series and we're sort of moving into financing from here now but we did our series A from there with the just the beginning and we had a

group called SQM which is the world's largest minor of lithium at a Chile investing in us through our series A and we were we were away basically as far as it all >> Great. Hey, we're getting into it but that's great cuz I'm very happy about it. So so you just spoke so you just

spoke about this again in in my ignorance. So so you apply for a grant and you utilize the grant to position yourselves in order to raise a series A you know in in a very short time period. Like what do you how do you utilize the grant that you received to put yourself

in a position to then raise a series A? >> That's a good question and look I think >> [clears throat] >> you know we started this tech center so we opened up this warehouse where we could process kilogram scale of this product called black mass which I'm happy to get into but which is

basically shredded end of life EV batteries and we started working on our process flow through this technical center and the grant that we received. We ended up getting another grant reasonably shortly after that which enabled us to buy some technical equipment and we started producing and getting results in terms of our performance

on the outputs from recycling the black mass that we're able to purchase through the grant as well so you know we had results, we had some physical assets as I said there's some mining assets in the group so we could leverage that a little bit around the valuation side of it all.

And then we started our series A because I think in general once we get into it that you know the the the sort of macro element or the the bigger story you know, I think holds together very well. You know, I think it's very much you know, I think by 2035 there's equivalent to

you know, five Wembley stadiums a year of end of life EVs that need recycling in the UK itself. And so you know, there's a there's an upstream problem. There's a downstream demand and there so there should be technically a business in the middle that enables that to happen. So that concept works well.

What we really needed was people to support us and take faith in us in relation to us delivering that. And SQM did that very early. Now it wasn't quick. It took us probably 12 12 months to get that funding in place.

But you know, once we had that we're able to be confident enough to one build out and finish the technical center and two start on our bigger plans for the pilot plant that we're building. >> Great. Okay. Yeah, awesome. So um So what so so what you were just speaking to which I think is amazing is

you're very detailed in the story of the problem that you're solving. You you laid out the market and you laid out where you sit in relation to that. A lot of founders in the in deep tech in in this space they're they're they're extremely technical technically knowledgeable because that's what they're developing is some is some very

you know, intense technology and that and and then on the other end that that they either lack in or in in one of or both strong financial strategy or strong storytelling strategy. So it's interesting and which is why you know, I'm doing a lot of the work that I'm doing. So, it's very interesting to me

to hear you talk from like financing perspective very specifically about the story. So, as far as the you know, again with the series A and and and you said SQM >> Yep. >> Yeah, so back to the series A and the SQM investment, how much again, you know, in in as much financial technical

details as you want, but how much of positioning yourself for that investment was a really strong story? You guys had the science, you had the you had the the flow. How much of it the strong story and how much of it is like financial technicalities needing to have your books in place?

>> Um >> [sighs] >> look, I think the story is is a big one, especially when you're doing your series A. You know, I think people tend to understand that you're probably pre-revenue and that there is quite a bit of journey to go. I think interestingly you know, and I don't want to paraphrase SQM, but

I think they invest in the people at the time and I think your comment a good one, you know, in terms of it's a good combination between a trader, a banker and scientist from a founding group perspective. And so, we could tell quite a you know, when you're giving the pitch, you could give a

you know, story which I was okay at and then you could get the technical person to describe the process flow and all the elements attached to that and then you get the trader saying how we going to move this stuff around and how we going to sell it. And so, you know, I think

the people early on some of us fake it till you make it, right? You know, this is a sort Um you know, this is a new industry um and and we hopefully can get into some of the challenges we've had um in relation to financing, but you know, this is genuinely the beginning of a

recycling industry, but it you know, there's a criticality to this that sort of emerged as we've gone along, you know, whether it's geopolitical, um you know, certainly places like the UK don't have the benefit of a saying Australian um natural resources that they have in the ground or Canada or other people or even

the US or even China. So, they're reliant if they want a you know, healthy automotive industry which is effectively going to be a battery industry. You know, they're relying on third parties to supply them the critical metals to support that which in the end means jobs um and and and economic economic security and you know, our pitch to them

is that there's 2.4 million or bodies driving around the UK today that can be recycled. And that can be used directly into >> [snorts] >> um your your supply chain and you know, I think they've they've uh definitely uh saw seen that and you know, as a result you know, once we sort of got our you

know, first we sort of got we got going um you know, uh the government's been very supportive of building what we are hoping to be building. >> Okay, got it. So, so I'm so I'm hearing uh as far as DTech goes especially with critical minerals uh government partnerships are are crucial again cuz it's a it's from a

national security standpoint a lot of areas. So, that that makes a lot of sense. Uh the the investment received from a corporate entity is is especially great, you know, with uh someone who's who's leading uh in the sector uh as as SQM is. So, a a little bit outside of this specific journey with the the company

which we'll return to, but I think uh an important question for you is that VC gets a lot of attention and I think it gets outsized press relative to where it can sit in a financial stack for especially deep tech uh especially deep tech. So, it has a place, but I think it's not well understood what the place

can be especially for a hard tech like hardware, you know, hard assets, things like that. So, what's your opinion about where the DC sits, how do you utilize it correctly, how to think about it, and alternatives to? >> Like, I think that's a really good comment, you know, and I think, you know, VC, you know, our

you know, once we move into hard tech, VC are out effectively. You know, they want to put in two or three million, they want 30 40% of the company, and, you know, they want to a pathway to control generally, you know, and it's been, you know, so, when you're talking, you know, when you're talking tech, it's

possible that they're, you know, quite relevant, but they do get a lot of noise for what I've seen from an output perspective, but once you move from deep tech to hard tech, you know, I think it does very much preclude them from being an active participant. You know, the reality is, say with recycling,

there physically needs to be a chemical refinery that physically recycles these end-of-life EV batteries. There physically needs to be something that moves it from A to B to the B to the C, and all that all requires capital. And so, you know, I think especially as I said, in in new new industry, and

I'm not saying our tech is, you know, like rocket science, but it's certainly proprietary and and certainly newish in terms of there's not a 20-year history of performance. You know, VCs have been extremely conservative in relation to supporting us, and, you know, quite frankly, you know, we're building this plant in the UK today, which is

around 60 million US, as a founder, you need [clears throat] someone who can scale with you. And typically, I found VC the follow-on and the amount of capital that's required into hard tech, it's sort of scares them a little bit.

>> Okay. So, so then what what in your mind, I mean, you guys have set yourselves up with um uh the institutional partner and and government partnerships, but what in your mind are are alternatives to or or a a a a well-designed capital stack for deep tech hardware startups that that that people should be considering?

>> Look, I think, you know, um the challenge is always um and I'll I'll talk about hard tech maybe in terms of If you have to raise large amounts of capital and you don't want to be diluted down to very small amounts, because if you start trying to raise 60 million against a 80

million market cap or whatever it is or evaluation, you know, it you're pretty much getting almost diluted out of the company straight away. So, you know, one thing that does need to evolve is debt. Um the ability to debt finance some of these hard tech projects, you know, I think a lot of banks have talked about,

you know, having targets of zero carbon, having sort of ESG groups, having, you know, all these people, you know, but you know, in our experience, it always goes back to classic um project finance and, you know, quite frankly, you know, when you're in a new industry, it's difficult to um tick all those boxes for one of the

better word and, you know, there's things like, you know, fully off-take, you know, supply agreements or EPC um building contracts. All these things are probably very regular in, say, a wind farm or a solar farm or whatever project finance that, you know, people do. Um but in a sort of hard tech, you know, um

it's not quite as available. So, there's debt the debt side of it all really does need to evolve. Um you know, the equity side is pretty hard as well. Um but we have bought support um you know, from places like SQM. We've also done our series B where we got a Japanese group, Marubeni Corporation,

coming in as a supporter and we've had a bank Mizuho Bank come in as a supporter as well. So we have had some international support. But you know, in terms of the evolution, you know, I think debt needs to evolve a little bit because that will help build these things.

>> Okay, so so so so two questions about that cuz that's a great point. How early in in a in a company's journey should they be entertaining that and how do you think about it? >> It's a great question and it and it's and it's not an easy answer, but they should be like my view as a banker,

you know, we're we're engaging with banks now for financing in 18 months from now. You know, I think you know, some of this stuff is relationship driven. A lot of like so when we started and it sounds like an like an old man kind of statement, but you know, when we started we're we're sort of educating

people on what it what is black mass? What is recycling? So if you're starting at the very very beginning in terms of what is actually you know, what are you doing? It's a long way to get you know, through equity into debt and get them up the curve to a degree point where they can lend you

some money. So you know, there is an education element to starting the conversation. You know, I think the other challenge is revenue, right? You know, I think bank I guess investors like it as well, but you know, we're pre-revenue today.

You know, should we you know, we're very close to getting the financing place for our first commercial plant. You know, we generate about 25 million EBITDA US dollars, which I think transitions us into a different sort of investor class, but you know, I think from a bank's perspective, >> [clears throat] >> early understanding what their

requirements are and also educating our own company around what their requirements are Um, of contracts cuz I think contracts is what, you know, banks really want to see, which is me when I mean contracts, I mean upstream, you know, supply contracts and off-take contracts and the middle as well if they can get that.

>> Amazing. This is so cool. >> [laughter] >> Thank you so much. So, this and so this next question is getting very out of my wheelhouse, so I'm not even sure that this is going to be articulated in the way that it needs to, but um, when we're talking about debt what the

I I guess I'll ask this first. There are a number of different vehicles that you can use with under the umbrella of debt. And so when we're talking about debt and we're talking about financing, uh, you know, hard hard tech and and deep tech, what kinds of vehicles are best suited for this type of investment?

And and then after that, just a bigger question like what how could the industry be better in supporting this kind of technology? >> Yep. Look, I think, [clears throat] you know, um, people if we're moving from a deep tech to hard tech, I think, uh, project finance is the type of debt that

I think probably is going to be most available in the near term. Um, which is when I say project finance is very project specific, um, types of financing. So, you say, for example, you know, we have a number of different, um, stages in our company. We call them acts, which is an acronym for Algal

Titan Plant Tech, but, you know, act one was our um, uh, technology center. Act two was our pilot facility. Act three is our first commercial plant and act four is our mega scale recycling facility. So, for example, uh, we would look to raise, say, 400 million um, for that project specifically, um, in the next 18 months. You would set

up a special purpose vehicle where banks would lend into that project specifically. Banks would lend against, you know, the the off-take agreements that we would enter into with um suppliers or purchases of our product which could be OEMs, which could be trading houses, which could be you know, anyone who makes a battery. Um

and we would finance that hopefully with the level of gearing in it because the challenge with borrowing money if you don't have any revenue is how do you pay the interest? And so, you know, the way you you know, kind of do it is you do it a project specific way. Once you as a

group generate enough revenue, you can probably borrow at a corporate corporate level, which was, you know, at the top. But the way we would do it originally is via a project finance in a non-recourse vehicle for a big project.

>> Amazing. I love this. >> [laughter] >> Thank you so. So so okay, so back to you guys' journey. So we talked about you just mentioned you guys raised a series B, you you brought a couple additional investors on, very cool. How did you and and what can you say towards raising a

series A, having this money, having this plan, these these acts in this way? How did how did you guys deploy the capital resources effectively enough to set yourselves up for a successful series B? >> Yeah, and I think the best, you know, Christian's one of the co-founders best way to describe it is I think being

scrappy. I think you need to be extremely cash flow focused. You know, I think if you you've got to have a decent runway because all these things take time and there's, you know, the challenge is, you know, sometimes you got to you know, you don't really it's uncomfortable to run before you can

walk, but you know, you got to build your pilot, you got to build a team, you got to build you know, the hard all with the envelope that you've got from a cash flow perspective. So, you know, businesses in general and certainly on in my experience on tech and hard tech, you know, they fail when they run out of

money. And so, you know, I think you know, you need to be extremely tight on cash flow. And then you got to you know, my counsel is you got to move before you think you're ready in some respects. You're going to get a lot of no's like you know, let's let's not pretend we probably got we've got

hundreds of no's in terms of you know, asking for investment. But the advice would be is just cuz you get the money don't go buy a new car. Don't go like you know, spend frivolously cuz that money's got to last you until you can get the next round of money and the next round of

money's only going to come if you deliver on the things that you said you'll deliver on in the first round of money. So, you know, very very um laser focus and relentless drive to get to the next stage because unfortunately when you think you've climbed the mountain you got to you look up again

and there's another mountain to climb. And so, that's the the challenge with you know, having entrepreneurs but certainly in the environment where you've got a fairly capital heavy um program. You got to keep hustling the whole time. >> Was it Was that almost immediately after you secured a round you guys settled into series A you said I'm preparing for

the next round. >> Correct. Literally. Um probably >> So, you started doing outreach and building relationships that type of thing? >> Yep, we did. Um all the while while we're building you know, metric ton scale battery recycling facility you know, including leases and scaling up to people and putting HR policies in place and treasury policies in place and

you know, becoming a real company you're straight away moving into the outreach stage for series B because you know, I think the the world we're in Um it takes a while to get people's um money. >> Is Is there uh Is there some Is there anything specifically different about raising a Series B

relative to a Series A that you would uh that you would focus on? >> Um Look, I think you're obviously slightly more evolved. You Well, we were a lot more evolved and I think, you know, you got to really tighten up your plan, tighten up your strategies. But what, you know, you got to show people

what you did with your Series A money. >> Okay. >> I guess that's really like, you know, the trick is under promise, over deliver, you know, is what I would say. Um So you just to deliver on the things you say you will deliver on and you point to that and there's a confidence element

attached to it all and actually it's probably and and and the B is less about the founders and more about the company. Um I think the A is quite a lot about, you know, supporting what they thought was a good management team.

Um the B is very much around where's this company going? Um What have you done? >> Got it. >> Show me the results type story and the C only gets harder, I think. >> Yeah. So Well, I've already thinking about it now, I guess, right? We're in the middle of >> I know we we definitely are.

>> That's right. So uh so bigger question, you know, before I get to cut my last uh last questions at for whatever perspective you have, I mean, you guys have been deep in it, you know, post COVID where there's a very uh very favorable um funding environment as as far as I know and then completely

tightened up in the last two or three years, you know, going through all of that. What's your perspective on uh where the industry is at now from a funding perspective uh in climate tech? >> Uh look, I think it's hard. I think uh, you know, and this is not, uh, putting shade on anyone in in North

America, but I think you're right. It was very liquid there for a long time. You know, I think the Inflation Reduction Act, you know, created a lot of liquidity in recycling. Um, so people went, you know, from a sort of small technical center to doing or trying to do mega scale recycling, um, which it

wasn't the right thing to do, but was thing you do when you get given billions of dollars and you've got to kind of deliver on that sort of stuff. So, you know, we've had some, you know, false starts for one of the better, you know, Ascent and others, um, which has created a level of

conservativeness, um, uh within uh the investment community for, um, recycling businesses. That said, I feel that we're sort of moving back into it. You know, Northvolt is another good example that created, you know, some uncertainty. We even though we're not a battery producer, we are purely recycling and selling critical metals to the end user. Um, you

know, it's it's I guess the answer is timing is everything, isn't it? Like, uh it's um you know, sometimes it's better to be lucky than smart, but, you know, I'd say persistence um it's it's it's you got to be very very persistent and you got to have a relentlessness to chase the money, um,

and you got to be able to take a no, um, because I think the investment community is uh, pretty pretty hard in this sort of hard tech, um, scenario. Uh, um, so you just need to you need to find you need to find your right partner, partner, but you need to kiss a lot of frogs. So, I think

persistence is a big one. >> Nice. Uh, well, with with, uh, at the moment as far as scaling, you know, fundraising, uh, managing finding whatever you want to take it, what's the biggest hurdle that you're experiencing and how is it also an opportunity?

>> Um >> [clears throat] >> look, I think fun- funding is the biggest hurdle. Um I think we have, you know, very deep um relationships with the OEMs. We have very strong tech and, you know, very much a lot of data on what we're doing, but funding is always going to be the

challenge. And I think um you know, that is uh what we're focusing a lot on right now. You know, I think execution is another one that so I think we're going to need to focus on when we build our first commercial site. You know, I think there's always, you know, deliver- as I

mentioned, delivering on that, I think will open up another round of you know, uh investment opportune- or investor opportunities once we get our first commercial site in the south. Um I think there's going to be a lot of interest uh potentially for um you know, so at some stage you move from um

you know, hard tech to infrastructure. Um you know, I think and I think we will move, you know, every think comfort tree in the world is going to need its own recycling infrastructure. And so this will become a core piece of the, you know, UK's infrastructure in terms of dealing with the problem of 2.4 million

um EVs that are driving around today. >> Well, when when when when when you say transition from hard tech to infrastructure, do you mean as a business category or >> Sort of, yeah. I think once [clears throat] the tech gets established, I think it'll become an infrastructure story where you will just >> Okay.

>> um you know, the return expectations are probably going to taper a bit um and then people having longer term um expectations in relation to the investment um that they're making. So I think that might transition at some stage.

>> Awesome. Well, last question for you, Shai. I mean, this has been great. Like this has been like a a course for me. Yeah. And and I just got to ask all the questions, so it's great. Uh with with all the work that you have done and all the work that still needs to be done.

I'm curious what inspires you. >> Um >> [sighs] >> the people, you know, I really have, you know, the people that we've got within our organization, the people we interact with, the people like yourself. I get to talk with people like yourself and, you know, I think that is really people inspire me. You know, I think you know,

you need we need to be positive about the future. There's lots of things going on in the world that aren't so positive. Um but I think what we're building is truly a positive contributor to what the world needs today. And so, you know, if I couple having great people um and building something that's, you know,

I think um significant and positive, um that inspires me. >> Nice. Well, it inspires me, too, Sean. If it's If it's inspiring anyone else that's listening, what's the best way to follow along with your journey or get in touch?

>> Uh look, I think uh we do a lot of updates on LinkedIn. You know, I think there is a lot of good information on there and it's real time. Christian has a big following on LinkedIn. So, you know, he updates regularly as well. I think that, you know, our website's fairly well up to date. So, there's lots

of information on there if you're interested and you can just uh reach out to me directly um as well. That's completely fine. >> Great. Is well, is Is there anywhere to get some of this uh swag that you're wearing, any of this company merch?

>> I know. I know. It's uh It's It's pretty good. It's pretty cool. I know. I know. It's uh um It's an interesting story there is that, you know, Patagonia doesn't allow uh anyone to put their brand next to uh their brand. So, we had to apply to uh get our brand uh lo- logoed onto their

swag. So, uh that took a little while, but yeah, we got there. But, um you know, maybe maybe we can uh you know, maybe >> [laughter] >> Hey, cool. Great. Well, you let me know. Well, uh Sean, thank you for your time.

This has been awesome. I'm definitely going to have more questions, so I look forward to the next one. >> Thanks, man. See you.