The Future Is Now: Christopher Maiwald of Wasserstein Home On How Their Technological Innovation Will Shake Up The Tech Scene
An Interview With Fotis Georgiadis
Persistence pays off. It’s easy to want to quit when things don’t come easily, but getting back up again after falling is the key to success. It takes trial and error to figure out what works and what does not, and failure is where you learn the tools to bring it all together. Sticking to your goal and never giving up will bring you to great places.
As a part of our series about cutting edge technological breakthroughs, I had the pleasure of interviewing Christopher Maiwald.
Christopher Maiwald is the Founder and Managing Director of Wasserstein Home, which is a company that solves issues faced by consumers in smart home technology, such as insufficient battery life, limited mounting options and poor video quality. Maiwald created the first accessory for the Dropcam Pro, now known as the Google Nest Cam. As a leader in smart home accessory manufacturing, Wasserstein offers products such as smart lighting control, smart thermostats, smart home security, wireless cameras, doorbell cameras, and much more.
Thank you so much for doing this with us! Can you tell us a story about what brought you to this specific career path?
I was born in Germany and I went to university in the UK. Prior to founding Wasserstein, I was working in M&A for Lazard & Rothschild. I founded Wasserstein because as a user of one of the first Dropcams, I wanted to have the same accessories that we ended up building as a first-generation product. Wasserstein’s very first product was an accessory for the DropCam Pro, which was later bought by Google and rebranded as the Nest Cam. Now we manufacture thoughtful accessories and products to specifically work with Google Nest, Ring, Arlo, Blink, and many other smart home devices. Our products are available on Amazon across the US, Canada, UK, and Germany, as well as in Best Buy, Target, The Home Depot, and Lowe’s in the United States.
As a company, we have extended the concept of thoughtful accessories beyond smart home products and three years ago started Lectron, a brand specifically focused on a similar concept of thoughtful accessories in the electric vehicle space, more specifically charging stations and adapters to make various EV charging standards compatible in North America.
Can you share the most interesting story that happened to you since you began your career?
In March 2020, I had just flown to Dubai after the country started going into lockdown due to the Covid-19 pandemic. Only once the lockdown hit did it dawn on me that the ramifications of Covid-19 on our business would be huge. I flew back to Hong Kong, where a tracking device and two week mandatory home quarantine was waiting. In the weeks that followed, our year over year sales dropped by over 50%. Without intervention, we would have been bankrupt within two months. Since I personally guarantee all loans for the business, I would have personally been wiped out as well. That was scary. It seemed like the world was ending.
At that time nobody anticipated a V-shaped recovery and the huge growth in online sales that would follow. Working from home in quarantine enabled us to work on cutting costs. We were able to reduce operating expenses by hundreds of thousands of dollars within a few weeks without cutting salaries (except me) or letting go of staff. We also started supplying PPE to the US and Europe thanks to our manufacturing & supply chain capabilities. Early on, we were able to supply 1 million hospital gowns to the State of Georgia and also supplied masks to major US corporations such as Southwest Airlines, Greyhound Buses, and others. This was particularly intense because we were still working on our core business at the same time. We did this for 4 to 5 months until supply chains for PPE normalized and sales for our core products recovered to pre-shutdown levels due to stimulus programs and an increase in online shopping. The company ended the year with record revenue but it was a valuable lesson that things can change very quickly and to never get too comfortable.
Can you tell us about the cutting edge technological breakthroughs that you are working on? How do you think that will help people?
At Wasserstein, we develop thoughtful accessories to complement smart home technology and improve the experience of the consumer. For example, our Solar Panel for smart cameras (such as Google Nest) conveniently attaches to your home and allows for your device to stay charged, eliminating the need to change the batteries. It also enables you to place the devices in more noticeable locations for potential burglars to see, since you don’t have to worry about connecting to a power source. Our accessories make great smart home products even better. What we’ve learned is that the most successful products are not necessarily the ones that possess the latest cutting-edge technologies. We start with the customer’s problem and try to solve their problem instead of trying to apply technology in search of a problem.
Lectron is more demanding from a technology perspective, since we are dealing with electric vehicle charging technology. But again we mainly focus on the benefit to our customers, versus the technology itself. We work on technology that makes different charging protocols accessible to all EV owners. J1772, Tesla, CCS, and Chademo are the most prevalent charging standards in North America and we build products that increase accessibility to these charging networks. Our R&D is focused on bi-directional charging features for our next-gen charger and we are hoping to be one of the first companies to offer these charging stations.
How do you think this might change the world?
Home security devices enable us to keep our homes secure and safe so we can go about our days without worry. Whether that be keeping an eye on pets at work, watching kids from other rooms, or recording security footage in hi-definition, these possibilities give people peace of mind in their homes. Wasserstein accessories complement devices by providing a brighter light, stopping water leaks in their tracks, improving the experience with smart thermostats, and much more. Our goal is to provide solutions to consumers for possible mishaps before they even arise. People can go to work or away on holiday and not have to worry about the well-being of their home.
With our Lectron products, we hope to make a small contribution to the adoption of electric vehicles by making electric vehicles easier to charge and use. Range anxiety remains one of the key factors that keep people from switching to EVs and we hope to make a meaningful contribution and deliver products that make public charging more accessible and in-home charging better and cheaper.
Keeping “Black Mirror” in mind, can you see any potential drawbacks about this technology that people should think more deeply about?
Our smart home accessories themselves have little to no ‘Black Mirror potential’ but it is always important to evaluate any smart home technology you utilize in your home to ensure they are made with privacy in mind. That’s why we are proud to partner with Google who takes privacy and encryption extremely seriously.
Was there a “tipping point” that led you to this breakthrough? Can you tell us that story?
I don’t necessarily believe in breakthroughs and tipping points. A lot of product and business innovations are rather the result of a long, iterative process of trial and error. There is rarely a light bulb moment but rather a hypothesis followed by an experiment, followed by learning, and a slightly (or vastly) different experiment. For example, our work for the Made for Google program may feel like a little bit of a breakthrough, but the process actually took 3 years! We still are just beginning to scratch the surface of what we can do for Google and other partners.
What do you need to lead this technology to widespread adoption?
On the smart home side of the business: the technology is already being widely adopted and a large part of the early smart home adopters are already on a regular replacement cycle. Late adopters are quickly coming into the fold as prices are decreasing.
On the electric vehicle charging side of the business, we have likely seen an inflection point where electric vehicles will become the dominant form of transportation in the next few years. Three aspects that could further accelerate the adoption of electric vehicles and hence Lectron products are:
1. More investment in charging infrastructure. That means more, powerful and more affordable level 2 in-home chargers (Amazon / Website) like the ones Lectron manufactures.
2. More investment in public fast-charging stations: more CCS Charging stations and more Tesla SuperChargers. This is already happening via Tesla and companies such as: Electrify America and the upcoming infrastructure bill in the US will likely accelerate the process.
3. Harmonization of EV charging standards or the mandatory inclusion of adapters in every EV that rolls of the assembly line, as opposed to Europe and China, which have mandated a single charging standard for all EVs. The US and Canada are some of the few countries where you have two competing charging standards J1772 & CCS1 vs Tesla. Additionally, there are companies like Rivian that introduce an ‘exclusive charging network’ only accessible to their customers. This fragmentation stymies the charging infrastructure and slows EV adaptation. It is unlikely that that at such a late stage, we will see a return of a single charging standard — that’s why Lectron is working hard on developing adapters for different charging configurations Tesla to J1772, J1772 to Tesla and CCS to Tesla. Including these adapters in all EVs would go a long way in eliminating range anxiety and accelerating adoption.
What have you been doing to publicize this idea? Have you been using any innovative marketing strategies?
As a company, we have built a robust advertising plan incorporating our partners including Amazon, to ensure that most of our Wasserstein or Lectron accessories are positioned to rank highly in relevant product searches and frequently purchased together sections. Aside from the conventional advertising and shopping platforms (Amazon, Google, etc), we also work with leading key opinion leaders to help inform our product development across both businesses.
None of us are able to achieve success without some help along the way. Is there a particular person who you are grateful towards who helped get you to where you are? Can you share a story about that?
I am very grateful to my parents and grandparents who have been very supportive in all of my endeavors. At the age of 16, I could have either skipped a grade or gone abroad and they had the foresight to send me to boarding school in Beijing. This was Pre-Olympics Beijing in 2005/2006, so it was a LOT wilder than the shiny mega-City you see now. That year abroad made a huge difference in my outlook on life and gave me a lot of confidence. Obviously, as a 16–17-year-old you don’t have the foresight to understand this, so you need your family to make great decisions for you until you are able to start making great decisions yourself. Now — 15 years later — a large part of our company is based in Hong Kong with operations in the US, China, and the Philippines. Maybe all this would have been much less likely to happen without that school year in Beijing.
How have you used your success to bring goodness to the world?
I would like to think that we bring goodness to the world by creating great products that improve our customers’ lives. I feel that we must focus most of our attention to bringing great products to our customers. In order to build great products for our customers, you need a great team that consists of talented individuals who have lots of options to work at other companies, so in turn you have to create a great work environment to attract and retain these people and a similar logic applies to suppliers and other stakeholders. In order to do good for your customer you need great people and the best people are going to make sure that you do well in the process. Nobody likes working with jerks.
What are your “5 Things I Wish Someone Told Me Before I Started” and why. (Please share a story or example for each.)
- Get very comfortable with failure! Most things that are desirable are hard and most things that are hard will require you to try and fail many times before you see the first signs of success.
- Spend more time building a strong network: I am not referring to running around and giving random people your business card. In order to be able to network effectively, you also need to value others’ offers. But I am starting to realize that at a certain point in your career who you know and how you bring people together becomes as important as the quality of your judgment and your skills.
- Don’t expect overnight success. Oftentimes the media tries to paint a picture of overnight success, but that almost never happens. A lot of companies and their leaders have been in business for a long time, usually 10–15 years plus before achieving truly meaningful traction. GoPro is one example (maybe a slightly dated one) of a company that was always presented as an overnight success, but when they went public they were already in business for over 12 years and already launched more than 10 generations of their action cameras.
- Persistence pays off. It’s easy to want to quit when things don’t come easily, but getting back up again after falling is the key to success. It takes trial and error to figure out what works and what does not, and failure is where you learn the tools to bring it all together. Sticking to your goal and never giving up will bring you to great places.
- Be adaptable. Especially in the times of Covid-19, things are changing every day. Being flexible to change during normal times, gives you the ability to shift gears more seamlessly during difficult times. This pandemic has taught us that as the world changes, you need to be able to change with it.
Can you please give us your favorite “Life Lesson Quote”? Can you share how that was relevant to you in your life?
“50 NO’s and one YES means, YES.” I have spoken about persistence A LOT in the course of this interview, but this is another reminder to keep going and not too easily give up and take no for an answer. A great story to illustrate this was the long-winded journey of Wasserstein products getting into Best Buy. Back in 2017, we had a team of three and two products for the Nest Cam Indoor and I thought we were ready for the big leagues. We started emailing merchants at Best Buy and nobody responded the first couple of times or the few people that did respond told us to stop contacting them. After a few iterations we got a response from the departing smart home merchant who then passed us on to his successor in the role. This merchant indicated that he was interested in the products and agreed with our products thesis that there is room for a best-in-class 3rd party accessory brand in the smart home space.
He knew that volume for these products was going to be very low initially, so he suggested that instead of becoming a direct vendor to Best Buy we try our products with one of three distributions that were already set up with Best Buy. Two of those three distributors ignored us or said no right away. The third distributor was willing to entertain a program with Best Buy, but in order to meet the margin requirements we had to sell the products at zero or negative margin. We continued in this setup for around two years and lost some money back then, but it provided the merchant team at Best Buy with the proof of concept they needed to bring us on as a direct vendor. First only for the website and a few years later with a number of Wasserstein products in-store and more to come. Later when we launched Lectron we were able to use our relationship with Best Buy to become the first electric vehicle charging brand on Best Buy (link). This multi-year process entailed a LOT of No’s and few Yes’, but the few yes’ made all the difference.
Some very well-known VCs read this column. If you had 60 seconds to make a pitch to a VC, what would you say? He or she might just see this if we tag them 🙂
Our company has a track record of successfully building omni-channel hardware brands. Our main brands Wasserstein (smart home) and Lectron (electric vehicle charging) operate in some of the fastest-growing hardware segments. We combine thoughtful and nimble product design with a best-in-class omni-channel retail strategy. The initial capital for the business was only US $15,000 and we are now on track for a revenue run-rate of US $40m annually — all without taking on any outside investors. We will continue to build more impressive products for Wasserstein and Lectron with the potential of starting other brands in high-growth markets where we can apply our expertise in product development and retail strategy.
How can our readers follow you on social media?
Wasserstein Instagram — https://www.instagram.com/wasserstein.home/
Lectron Instagram — https://www.instagram.com/LectronEV/
LinkedIn — https://www.linkedin.com/in/christophermaiwald/detail/recent-activity/
Twitter — https://twitter.com/chrismaiwald?lang=en
Thank you so much for joining us. This was very inspirational.
The Future Is Now: Christopher Maiwald of Wasserstein Home On How Their Technological Innovation… was originally published in Authority Magazine on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.
