February 26th, 2010

Bloom Energy IPO Compared to Google IPO By Bloom Backer John Doerr.  Everyone has been talking about the Bloom Box by Bloom Energy ever since Sunday night’s episode of “60 Minutes.”  The Sunnydale startup company has been operating in stealth mode to create a so-called portable power plant.

Not buying it? Well, there’s a crazy IPO buzz going on –especially since companies such as Coca-Cola, eBay, FedEx, and Google all seem to be excited about the innovation.  There are rumors that an airport has a Bloom Box, and that there could be governmental contracts in the works for the technology.

The portable power plant currently costs $800,000 and up – hardly affordable for the average American house hold. However, as the technology advances the company hopes that an affordable unit will be available for household use, allowing the average Joe to unplug from the power grid.

Unplugging from the electrical grid will do to household utilities what cell phones did to telecommunications and what laptops and wireless networking options have done to computing.  It’s an amazing innovation, and it’s really not all that surprising that there is a Bloom Energy IPO buzz, as no one wants to miss out on the next get-rich quick company.

Still yet, an IPO buzz doesn’t make sense on some levels.  Click here to find out why it really doesn’t make sense to frantically search for IPO information.

So where did the world get the IPO buzz? Well, venture capitalist John Doerr who is a private backer of the Bloom Energy Bloom Box recently compared the innovation to “Google IPO.” 

So why not think that there will be an inevitable IPO? Well, Doerr wasn’t referring to an actual IPO where Bloom would file an S-1 with the SEC, he was referring to the way the company handled their innovation.

Like Google, Bloom Energy has kept their Bloom Box close to home and very secret until the kinks were worked out.  Of course, Doerr probably shouldn’t have used “IPO” in his comparison, as that sent a frenzy of excited people to their bewildered stock brokers.

Source:

Washington Post

Photo Credit: Stock photo