The Munich startup founded in 2014 Sinn Power is developing a wave power plant. The patented technology is designed to provide people on all coasts of the world with affordable, reliable, and easy-to-use renewable electricity. The founder, Dr. Philipp Sinn, answers our seven questions and talks about his vision, "Weißwurst" (white sausage), and wave power.
1. Who are you and what do you do?
My name is Philipp Sinn, and I am the founder of Sinn Power. Even though the idea is unusual for a Bavarian startup, we are developing a wave power plant that will supply people on all coasts of the world with affordable, reliable, and easy-to-use renewable electricity.
The idea came to me while sailing, where I had often experienced the power of the oceans firsthand. As a mechanical engineer, I naturally wondered why this enormous available energy wasn't being used to generate electricity. I subsequently developed and patented a technology in my dissertation. Today, almost four years and several prototype series later, SINN Power, with our technological expertise, is a global leader in wave energy.
2. But that's been around for a long time!
Unfortunately not! And we want to change that! Every child is familiar with solar and wind energy these days – and that's a great step forward toward green energy for everyone. Wave energy, on the other hand, is hardly known to anyone, despite its enormous potential. The few attempts to harness it have failed due to technical and economic challenges.
Wave energy pioneers with modular, floating system
We have therefore developed a unique, modular, floating system that avoids these problems and generates electricity simply and inexpensively from the up-and-down motion of ocean waves. Our goal as wave energy pioneers is that, in just a few years, the entire world will recognize the oceans as an infinite source of energy and, ideally, that large portions of this energy will be harvested from them.
A short video shows what the system can look like:
3. What are the three main ingredients for your recipe for success?
A large part of our success to date is, of course, due to our innovative technical approach. The simple, modular design of our wave power plant allows for extremely rapid innovation cycles. As a result, we have made more progress in just a few years than other developers had in the decades before.
But Sinn Power's recipe for success is based above all on its exceptionally dedicated and motivated team, which represents the company's most important pillar. Whether in design, electronics, or marketing – everyone puts a lot of heart and soul into their work, which shows in the results!
Finally, we are all driven by a common vision: to usher in a new phase of energy supply.
1 million research grants plus 4.7 million funding
4. Let’s get down to business: How is business going?
Last year, we secured €1 million in funding from the German government for a wave energy research project in Heraklion. We'll now be able to test our wave power plant there over the next two years. We already have our first commercial customer: an organic shrimp farm in Cape Verde, which we will supply with electricity from ocean waves – a flagship project in the field of wave energy!
All this is only possible because we Since April, it has been supported by an investment of 4.7 million euros from the Swiss capital Global Impact Fund AGThis will allow us to bring our technology to market by 2022. So it's ready to be served (although here in Munich we prefer the white sausage with sweet mustard 😉).
5. What does Munich mean to you?
As a company developing a wave power plant, Munich isn't the most obvious location at first glance. But since I consider myself a true Bavarian, Munich is definitely home to me! At our company, this starts with the obligatory white sausage breakfast with pretzels on Fridays, continues with the lunchtime discussions after the last FC Bayern game, and ends with the Bavarian equivalent of "savoir-vivre" or "We just know how to do things."
In addition to the "let's just get started" mentality, which is particularly great for startups, we also benefit from our proximity to outstanding technical universities such as TUM and the Munich University of Applied Sciences, with which we work closely. This allows us to absorb a great deal of knowledge from top-class engineers. We also draw on the excellent network of university-affiliated innovation promoters such as U-TUM, BayStartUp, Strascheg CenterAnd, conveniently, in Munich, an industrial location, many of our suppliers and service providers are located right next door.
6. How will your startup become the next unicorn? Or will we see you soon at Epic Fail Night?
You certainly won't see us at Epic Fail Night anytime soon: We've been able to build a strong network of investors and business angels, not least thanks to the €4.7 million investment from Swiss-based Global Impact Fund AG. This means our development is secure until our wave power plant's planned market readiness in 2022.
Just six months after our founding, we were able to prove that the concept of our wave power technology works with a full-scale prototype. Will this make us the next unicorn? Perhaps one that magically solves the energy problems of the future… — who knows?
7. Hiking or beer garden?
Both! At Sinn Power, the whole team enjoys going on hikes or bike rides together. We also do sports once a week at lunch, and every Friday there's a little get-together with a beer.
