When Joe Wolfell heard on the news that a U.S. Navy submarine had crashed into an underwater mountain, he was astonished at how little government and private organizations knew about the ocean floor. That impression stayed with him throughout his time in the Navy, and a few years later he founded a company dedicated to seafloor restoration.
Wolfel, co-founder and CEO of Terradepth, a startup working to map the ocean floor while also building a platform to make that data more accessible and usable, said on a recent episode of TechCrunch's Found podcast that it's a big problem to solve, but one worth tackling.
“What this problem needs is someone to take a bigger piece of the puzzle, and that piece of the puzzle has to look at the problem from a holistic perspective,” Wolfel said. “We have to become vertically integrated, and by vertical integration I mean we have to make significant investments on the hardware and robotics side so that we can significantly expand our ocean data collection capabilities.”
Wolfel talked about how the company was able to develop a robot that could help with mapping but still require a human “babysitter,” adding that the company is working on developing autonomous robots, but is currently using existing robots so it can work with customers and gather more data for the platform in the meantime.
“One of the things you learn quickly in combat is you can't pilot something that's not moving,” Wolfel said. “There's no substitute for learning on the ground, so we're using technology that we've developed every day. We're out at sea, we're collecting oceanographic data, and we're ingesting that into our own data platform.”
Wolfel also talked about how the company was funded and how it was initially very difficult as venture capitalists were not interested in the sector and it was generally difficult to fund hardware startups, adding that the rise of American dynamism in venture capital has brought more attention to the sector, but challenges remain.
Finally, he spoke in depth about his leadership style and the difference between leadership and management.
“Leadership is about inspiration and management and often about control,” Wolfel said. “How do you balance operating with the right amount of risk? That means being accountable to shareholders but also executing. Something I always tell my team is that you have to be humble enough to learn but arrogant enough to execute.”