Hydrobee appointed Warren Evans, former World Bank Environmental Department Director, to its board of advisors. According to Hydrobee, Evans has spent more than 20 years as one of the world’s leading environmental officials.
Evans shared the following message following the announcement:
"At the request of an old buddy/inventor from Seattle, and because I think he has a great idea that could help a lot of poor people without access to electricity, I am attempting to support his start-up company- Hydrobee SPC. The company was founded by my friend Burt Hamner, who was a consultant on clean tech and environmental accounting in SE Asia for USAID and ADB in the 1990s, and has become a renewable energy entrepreneur. The Hydrobee is a can-size device that harvests energy from wind, sun, fire, water currents, bikes, farm carts and muscles. It's mobile-enabled so it is affordable by micro-financing over cell phone networks and Pay-As-You-Go systems. Micro finance of micro power is a huge and growing area, estimated by one source to be a $20B market next year, and I think the Hydrobee technology is a breakthrough for affordability and scalability.
Hydrobee recently announced five award wins in 2014. In December, the Global Cleantech Cluster Association, representing more than 10,000 cleantech companies, named Hydrobee SPC a Top 30 Cleantech Company for its Universal Backup Charger. The company also won awards in the American Startup Challenge of the Kauffman Foundation, the Business for Good contest of the Social Enterprise Alliance, the Innovative World Technologies Contest from the SXSW V2Venture conference, and the Cleantech Open, the world’s biggest contest for cleantech companies.
Hydrobee is currently running a crowdfunding campaign on IndiGoGo to develop the world’s best USB renewable energy charger and help millions of people in energy poverty have better lives. The soda-can sized Hydrobee turbine battery harvests renewable energy from any natural energy source, including water pipes, rivers and streams, wind, fire, sun, bikes and muscles. It puts out USB power for phones, LED lamps or any USB device. Once attached to an energy source, the battery in the Hydrobee can be "hot-swapped" with another battery or taken away with you for power on the go.
Only a few days remain to support the campaign and secure a limited edition Hydrobee charger at a 50 percent discount and other offers.