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Ocean waves could be an enormous source of power for the grid: in the U.S., the motion of waves along coastlines could generate as much as 1.4 trillion kilowatt-hours a year, or around a third of the electricity that Americans currently use. But wave power lags far behind other renewable energy. While solar and wind dominate new power installations worldwide, wave energy remains confined to small pilot projects. This makes sense: Its more expensive to build. And harsh ocean conditions make equipment vulnerable to damage in storms. But in Morocco, one startup is pioneering new technology that could make wave energy more viable, with projects now moving forward at a port and a future data center. Compared to other wave energy systems, the initial cost is reduced by 70%, says Oussama Nour, CEO and cofounder of the startup, called ATAREC. To help bring down the cost of installation, the company attaches its tech to existing infrastructure rather than building from scratch. In its first pilot, at the Port of Tanger Meda massive port on the northern coast of Moroccothe startup installed one unit of its tech next to the ports breakwater, a wall built out into the water to shield the harbor from waves. The equipment uses a floating buoy that moves up and down with waves, converting the vertical motion into electricity that can be added to the grid. (Another wave energy startup, Eco Wave Power, also uses existing infrastructure to help lower its costs.) While solar and wind power are intermittent, wave energy is more predictable and more consistently available. The exact amount varies by location, and changes throughout the day based on conditions like wind and tides. But in its pilot, the company found that its tech produces energy around 62% of the time. Solar power in the region produces energy around 18% of the time, Nour says. We need to have a mix of wind, solar, and wave [energy], and also batteries, Nour says. By helping fill the gaps when wind and solar arent available, wave power has the potential to help the grid get closer to fully renewable in areas like the Moroccan coast. The companys technology comes in a range of sizes, with the biggest unit capable of generating 750 kilowatts. At the port, if the technology is installed along the full breakwater, theres room for more than 100 units, which could fully power the port and industrial areas behind it. A unique design helps make the system more resilient in storms. In bad weather, valves open and let water into the floating buoys so they sink underneath the surface, protecting them from damage. After the storm passes, the buoys rise back up. (For other wave energy tech, storm damage has been a major challenge.) Because the tech is installed next to breakwaters, it’s also easier to access for maintenance than systems that are built farther out in the ocean. The company, which has raised around $2 million in seed funding so far, is now planning a larger pilot and working on lab tests of its newest system. Its also part of a Microsoft incubator that will later pilot the technology at a data center on the coast. Since solar and wind have a much larger head startand can be used in more locationswave energy probably won’t end up taking away much market share from them. But it could be useful in certain niches. At a port or a coastal data center that wants to generate as much of its own electricity as possible, for example, solar panels would take up far more space than wave energy tech. Ports could also use the power to produce green hydrogen or ammonia or methanol to fuel ships. And while wave energy can’t provide grid power quite as steadily as geothermal, it also doesn’t involve expensive drilling deep underground, and it’s consistent enough to help make the overall grid more stable. “I think there’s always going to be a role for different options we can put on the table for different places, for different usage, for different reasons,” says Alexander Dale, the director of global challenges for MIT Solve, a program that leverages MIT resources to help startups like Wave Beat grow. “Helping solutions that are able to fit into different market niches to startand then as they come down the cost curve, more of those niches become availableis good.” Right now, the levelized cost of energy for Wave Beat’s tech is around 1.5 times more than wind and as much as three times more than solar. Still, Nour says that the cost can become competitive as the tech scales up. It’s already around three times cheaper to install than other wave energy tech, and about half the cost to run.
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E-Commerce
When Vlad Drguin founded his mid-century inspired toy car company, Candylab, in 2013, he had a Kickstarter page and a dream. His goal was to create wooden model cars inspired by hot rods and classic American car designs; toys that would be both durable enough for play and sleek enough for display. As it turns out, theres a major growing market for that kind of thingand Candylab just rebranded to capture it. Since its founding, Candylab has secured retail placement in stores like Londons Design Museum, MoMa, the Guggenheim, Barnes & Noble, and the cult favorite apparel brand Kith. Its also notched major brand collabs including with Saint Laurent, Zara Kids, Criterion Collection, The New York Times, and, most recently, Netflixs Stranger Things. [Photo: Courtesy of Candylab] In recent years, Candylab has expanded its product offerings into two categories: one is its original line of premium, heftier cars, designed with collectibility in mind, and the second is a new line of smaller, less expensive, more lightweight cars engineered for play. Candylabs toys naturally fit into an increasingly bifurcated toy industry that, over the past few years, has begun targeting two different audiences: kids who want to play with toys, and adults who want to collect them (and maybe play a bit, too). The companys issue, according to Johnny Selman, founder of the design agency Selman, was that Candylabs branding didnt draw a clear distinction between its core products, making it difficult for customers to understand its offerings. So, his team worked with Candylab to create a new logo, brand positioning, product names, and visual identity that streamline it for a future where toys are meant for every kind of customer. [Photo: Courtesy of Candylab] What’s a ‘kidult,’ anyway? Candylabs products are a prime example of items beloved by a niche that some might refer to as the kidult segment, or an emerging consumer base of adults who are investing in toys of their own. According to a 2024 Circana report, adults accounted for more toy sales than preschoolers, with 43% purchasing a toy for themselves in the previous year. Companies like Lego and Mattel have increasingly begun tapping into this trend with new, nostalgia-driven items specifically designed for an adult audience. John Paul Chirdon, a creative director at Selman, says Drguins goal has always been to make nice, design-forward toys for kidsand adults interest in the product naturally comes alongside that. As an adult, you dont really punch down to make something attractive for kids, you just make something really good for kids, Chirdon says. Selmans challenge, then, was to design a brand architecture that was both really awesome for kids and really premium for adults. [Photo: Courtesy of Candylab] Designing a new brand for Candylab When Selman began brainstorming a new brand identity for Candylab, the core problem quickly became clear. Because the company had been built piece-by-piece over time by a small team, it was overflowing with great retro imagery and branding concepts, but lacked a consistent overarching brand story. Across some of the packaging, Johnny says, his team found at least six different versions of the Candylab logo. [Photo: Courtesy of Candylab] Selman streamlined the broader branding using past iterations of the Candylab logowhich themselves pulled inspiration from chrome typography on vintage carsto create one retro-yet-legible wordmark that represents the company. From there, it also identified a core color palette for the brand and narrowed its font options to just one type family called Space Grotesk. This simplification process opened the door for Selman to address the fact that, online, customers had trouble distinguishing between the brands more kid-centric line of cars (then called Candycars) and its more premium, adult-focused large cars (then called Midcentury Americana). Online, that branding didn’t exist, Chirdon says. The Americana and Candycar lines weren’t visually distinguished from each other or the overarching Candylab brand, leaving consumers confused about the difference between all three. Ultimately, Chirdon adds, we were like, You’re one brandCandylab. Now let’s deal with just making all the products clear. Looking ahead to new kinds of cars To start, the team decided to fully rename the premium car line Mints, while the smaller cars are still called Candycars. Now, though, the two lines look entirely distinct on shelves and online. Mints are universally displayed against an white background, both in packaging and digitally, to keep a cleaner look. Meanwhile, Candycars are packaged and edited onto colorful backgrounds in hues like pastel blue, tangerine, and teal. Mints and Candycars also have their own dedicated logos, each inspired by different eras of car typography. What we tried to do was push that a little more whimsical for the Candycar line and then push it a little bit more classic grown-up with the Mints line, Johnny says. [Photo: Courtesy of Candylab] Candylabs new identity has already appeared online, and it will start rolling out on packaging as new cars debut over time. More importantly, Johnny and Chirdon say, this brand architecture means that Candylab can start introducing new product lines without confusing customerslike an accessory pack of toy roads called Roadworks and a fresh car design called Toons, both of which are part of Candylabs current fundraiser on Kickstarter. We helped them create the platform to keep going with clarity, Chirdon says.
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E-Commerce
Three months ago, I fired up ChatGPT and asked it to design a highly aggressive, short-term investment portfolio, selecting five stocks that were most likely to make me fabulously wealthy in six months time. Then, I threw good sense to the wind, transferred $500 of my actual money into a Robinhood account, and bought the stocks that ChatGPT had pitched. Since then, its been a wild ride. My portfolio has flown to new heights, giving me serious FOMO about the fact that I didnt put all my money into ChatGPTs picks. Then, it singed its wings, falling Icarus-style to lows that had me almost ready to bail on the whole thing and redirect the charred remains of my money to the kind of boring stuff (car payments, dental work) that I probably should have used it for in the first place. Were halfway through my six-month experiment. Lets dig deeper into how things have gone. First, a disclaimer. Nothing here should be considered investment advice. As youll see, stocks picked by chatbots are incredibly volatile, and theres a solid chance I could lose most of my investment. Always consult a professional before making your own financial decisions. A Crazy Strong Start When I asked ChatGPT to pick a portfolio of five high-growth stocks back in September, it spent almost 10 minutes doing research before returning its picks. The five it chose were Palantir, AppLovin, MicroStrategy, Agios Pharmaceuticals, and Hut 8. The bot felt that Palantir and AppLovin had strong, AI-powered businesses that would continue to dominate their markets and grow. Agios Pharma, the bot reported, was awaiting the results of an FDA trial for a new drug. If the trial was successful, ChatGPT felt its value would soar. And finally, Hut 8 and MicroStrategy were essentially leveraged Bitcoin plays. Both companies held a lot of Bitcoins on their balance sheets, and so their valuations should swing along with the value of those coinsonly on steroids, because of the effects of leverage. I hadnt heard of many of those companies. Still, I decided to blindly trust ChatGPTs advice and sink $500 into them, dividing the money evenly across ChatGPTs picks as it suggested. At first, things went well enough. In the first three weeks of my experiment, my portfolio climbed by about 12%. That was promising. Then, all of a sudden, things started going very well. In October, my portfolio took off. Each morning when I opened the Robinhood app, I was greeted by a delightful swirl of green numbers, climbing ever higher. By the beginning of November, my portfolio was worth $652a gain of almost 1/3 in just two months time. Extrapolating that out to the full year, my gains would have been 180%+ if the momentum continued. And at the time, it wasnt just continuing. It was accelerating. I started quietly wondering whether I had been too cautious with this experiment. Maybe I should have put $1,000 into ChatGPTs picks instead of $500. Maybe I should take out a second mortgage and put that money into the bots picks, too. Or maybe I had discovered a whole new way of investing, and soon every quant fund would be knocking down my door, offering me a $900,000 per year salary (before bonus, of course) to teach them my Thomas Smith AI Stock Investing Method. And an Equally Crazy Fall Then, all of a sudden, everything went horribly wrong. Just as October had been a sea of green, November was nothing but blood-red numbers each time I fired up Robinhood. By the 20th of the month, my portfolio had plummeted from its peak of $652 to only $451. Thats a 30% decline in about 3 weeksa spectacular fall. It was also the first time I was genuinely in the red, and had actually lost my own money (on paper, anyway) through my AI investing experiment. And the losses seemed to be piling on, accelerating just as fast as the gains had done before. That was unsettling, and not something I relished explaining to my accountant at the end of next tax year. I could imagine the conversation: So Tom, you have a $500 loss attributed to Misc Investments here. Tell me about that. Well, I asked ChatGPT to invest money for me, and then blindly followed its exact recommendations. And then I didnt cut my losses when it started going poorly, because I was afraid my readers would yell at me. **long pause** I see How Will it All End? As I write this in early December, my portfolio has stabilized a bit, and Im back in the black, with a total gain of $14. Theres still three months left in my experiment, so its possible that my portfolio will rise from the ashes and fly again. But Lambo money is looking increasingly unlikely. What went wrong? On a basic level, ChatGPTs picks were bad. Bitcoins value has plummeted over the last few months, and the bots portfolio isby designvery exposed to Bitcoin. ChatGPT also bet on Agios Pharma getting positive results from its clinical trials. In fact, those results were mixed. The stock duly dropped. AppLovin was likewise doing great, until the SEC launched a probe into its data gathering practices. Bad picks arent necessarily the real problem, though. Human investment managers mis-call the market or make bad picks all the time. Risk is part of investing. The real issue is how confidently ChatGPT backed up its picks with bold, assertive language. Overall, the portfolio aims for explosive upside rather than stability. Each stock has recent momentum o an upcoming catalyst, so this mix could significantly outperform if trends continue, the bot told me when it selected its portfolio. The whole thing was tilted for maximal growth the bot assured me, bolded text and all. About Agios, it said A positive FDA outcome or even renewed optimism could spark a significant rally, and about MicroStrategy it insisted Analysts project that a BTC surge to $150K could yield ~6570% stock gains. Even its disclaimer (Actual outcomes depend on market moves but all are supported by the cited fundamental and market trends.) isnt really a disclaimer. The bot essentially interrupts itself mid-sentence to further reassure me that its making good choices, and invalidate any sense of caution it may have inadvertently introduced. Chatbots overconfidence is a well-documented issue. In many cases, the certainty with which bots deliver their responses is annoying, but not damaging. ChatGPT recently swore to one of my family members that Philadelphias 44 Bus doesnt run on weekends. It was Saturday. As it was telling her this, the bus passed by on the street outside. That makes for a funny story about bots failability. But when chatbots are performing mission-critical functions related to our health and money, their baked-in overconfidence is way riskier. I knew what I was getting myself into with my investing experiment. But a naive investor might not read a chatbots stock advice critically. Believing its confident language, they could lose serious money by trusting the bot too much. As for me, Ive still got my $500 invested, for better or worse. Perhaps ChatGPT will ultimately prove prescient, and a late-stage Bitcoin rally will save my dreams of unbridled wealth. Or, maybe the rest of my half-grand will evaporate. In another three months, Ill know!
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E-Commerce
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