Bloom Energy Server

The Bloom Energy Server (the Bloom Box) is a solid oxide fuel cell (SOFC) power generator made by Bloom Energy, of Sunnyvale, California, that can use a wide variety of inputs (including liquid or gaseous hydrocarbons[1] produced from biological sources) to generate electricity on the site where it will be used.[2][3] It can withstand temperatures of up to 1,800 °F (980 °C).[4] According to the company, a single cell (one 100 mm × 100 mm plate consisting of three ceramic layers) generates 25 watts.[5]

Bloom stated in 2011 that two hundred servers have been deployed in California for corporations including eBay, Google, Yahoo, and Wal-Mart.

History

In October 2001, CEO K.R Sridhar met with John Doerr from the venture capital firm Kleiner Perkins.[13] Sridhar asked for more than $100 million to start the company. Bloom Energy eventually received $400 million of start-up funding from venture capitalists, including Kleiner Perkins[8] and Vinod Khosla.[14]

The company, originally called Ion America, was renamed Bloom Energy in 2006.[15]

Sridhar credited his nine-year-old son for the name, saying that his son believed jobs, lives, environment, and children would bloom.[16] Michael R. Bloomberg appeared at the launch by video link.[17] Bloomberg’s business news network covered the event, but attributed every statement to “Bloom Energy”.[18]

The CEO gave a media interview (to Fortune Magazine) for the first time in 2010, eight years after founding the company, because of pressure from his customers.[11] A few days later he allowed Lesley Stahl of the CBS News program 60 Minutes to see the factory.[19] On February 24, 2010, the company held its first press conference.[15]

Bloom Energy’s well-known customers include Walmart, Staples, AT&T, Adobe, Coca-Cola, Ebay, Google, Bank of America, FedEx, Life Technologies,[20] Safeway, and Yahoo.[21]

In July 2014, the company announced a “long-term strategic partnership” with Exelon Corporation to finance “fuel cell projects at 75 commercial facilities in California, Connecticut, New Jersey and New York.”

K. R. Sridhar

K. R. Sridhar கே.ர. ஸ்ரீதர் (born c. 1960) is the founder and CEO of Bloom Energy.

Education

Sridhar was awarded a bachelor’s degree in mechanical engineering from the National Institute of Technology at Tiruchirappalli, Tamil Nadu, India in 1982.[3] He moved to the United States and gained a M.S. in nuclear engineering and a PhD in mechanical engineering from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign in 1989.

Career

Sridhar was the director of the Space Technologies Laboratory at the University of Arizona where he was also professor of Aerospace and Mechanical Engineering.