A well-known serial entrepreneur in Austin’s technology industry, Ben Lamm loves to solve big hard problems.
That led him to found Hypergiant Industries in 2018. The Austin-based company focuses on emerging tech with tentacles in a myriad of different industries including space, critical infrastructure and defense.
“I felt like the intersection of critical infrastructure, space and defense through the lens of AI was a pretty hard problem,” Lamm said.
“It is by far, the most ambitious thing I’ve done to date,” Lamm said during a talk on the Ideas to Invoices podcast.
And that says a lot for the 38-year-old Austin native who splits his time between his homes in Dallas and Austin. Previously, he was the founder and CEO of Conversable acquired by LivePerson and the co-founder and CEO of Chaotic Moon Studios acquired by Accenture and Team Chaos, acquired by Zynga.
Lamm jokes that a “massive series of character flaws that would make me unemployed at other places” led him to become an entrepreneur. But the real reason is he “loves to create.”
“It’s a way for you to be like this modern-day explorer and to explore new fields and you can constantly be learning and meeting new people,” Lamm said.
“There are always new challenges to go and tackle,” he said.
Hypergiant is an emerging technology company at its core, Lamm said. He sees a future where all companies are artificial intelligence companies that harvest data to make their operations smarter, he said.
Hypergiant’s North Star is working to demystify some of these things, he said. It helps companies and the military to leverage data in a more efficient and faster way, he said.
Hypergiant is almost structured like a private equity firm with subsidiaries that have their own profit and loss statements, Lamm said. Hypergiant Industries drives innovation through strategic partners, research and development, and strategic mergers and acquisitions, he said.
Hypergiant creates software and hardware products. And one of its big product is the Hypergiant Eos Bioreactor powered by algae, which pulls CO2 from the atmosphere faster than plants.
Hypergiant’s R&D group gets to solve problems and challenges we identify as a company, Lamm said. One of those things is climate change, he said. The company planned to unveil the latest Hypergiant Eos Bioreactor at South by Southwest earlier this year, but the Pandemic put those plans on hold. Hypergiant will put it on display either virtually or in-person later this year, Lamm said.
Also, recently Hypergiant Industries made big news with a partnership with the Air Force to create a new satellite configuration called Hypergiant Project Chameleon, which will ultimately include 24 to 36 satellites.
Hypergiant likes to focus on space because it helps to focus on solving hard problems on earth as well, Lamm said. And to quote Bill Nye “Space brings out the best in us,” he said. And space is moving from a hardware-based industry to a software-based industry, and Hypergiant can help to usher in this next wave of computing in space, Lamm said.
Texas has a long history in the space industry and is breed into the people and there’s a tremendous amount of generational and tribal knowledge, Lamm said. And Texas will continue to be in the forerunner in space, he said.
Hypergiant with 230 employees is dealing with the Pandemic by having everyone work remotely, Lamm said. Some of the changes that have been adopted by businesses like remote work, virtual events and meetings and flexible scheduling will remain after the Pandemic passes, he said.
“The Pandemic has caused people and businesses to become more humanized,” Lamm said.
Another big issue coming up this summer is the black lives matter movement with a focus on diversity and inclusion in the tech industry and that’ something everyone in our society should focus on, Lamm said. He thinks entrepreneurs are in a key position to change things for the better by providing equity stakes for African American employees and including them in leadership positions.
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