Energy-savings startup doubles sales, looks to boost from Smart City initiative
Originally published in Columbus Business First by Carrie Ghose
A sustainability startup that helps large facilities reduce energy bills through behavioral changes rather than expensive equipment upgrades doubled its sales in 2016 with hopes to do so again this year.
JadeTrack LLC, which started with Central Ohio school districts as its first clients, has grown to 35 clients throughout Ohio including the Ohio Department of Rehabilitation and Correction, Cincinnati Public Schools and providing the City of Columbus’ GreenSpot certification program. Revenue figures aren’t disclosed.
“Our goal is to keep doubling up as much as we can,” founder and CEO Ryan Prestel said. “We want to strategically grow this outside of our core market in Columbus, (but) a lot of the cool stuff happening with (Columbus) Smart Cities ( initiative) is going to drive a lot of growth too.”
Prestel spun the company out of Marysville-based Scotts Miracle-Gro Co. in 2011 and launched the software four years ago. JadeTrack monitors clients’ utility bills and real-time sensors of water, gas and electricity usage – automating the process to plan and quantify savings from changes such as programming thermostats and timing lights.
Olentangy Local Schools has saved $1 million over two years, Prestel said, and a network of physician practices can lower its electric bills by 70 percent just by changing how it shuts down buildings after hours.
“It has absolutely been easier to implement in the public sector than the private sector to date,” Prestel said. “It’s starting to shift a little.”
JadeTrack also has opened new sales opportunities by teaming up with heating-cooling companies and other contractors, who use the software to help their clients achieve savings that then can be applied to installing more energy-efficient equipment – and programming it correctly. So far it has four resellers.
“We look at these partner networks as a way to scale quickly,” Prestel said.
The company has grown to nine people from two in 2015. It’s housed at Rev1 Ventures in Columbus.
Carrie Ghose covers health care, startups and technology for Columbus Business First.