Ajay Kochhar On Raising $1.3 Billion To Solve The Global Manufacturing Scrap And End-Of-Life Lithium-ion Problem

Before others saw the need or believed it was possible, Ajay Kochhar was working on how to recycle EV batteries. He’s now turned that into a billion-dollar, global, and public company. The venture, Li-Cycle, has attracted funding from top-tier investors like the US Department of Energy, Koch Strategic Platforms (“KSP”), and Glencore.

In this episode, you will learn:

• Recycling EV batteries
• How Li-Cycle is championing this space
• The benefits of going public

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About Ajay Kochhar:

Ajay formerly worked at Hatch in progressive roles with the Advisory and Industrial Clean Tech practices. During his time at Hatch, Ajay particularly developed expertise in the Lithium industry.

For example, he has evaluated hundreds of lithium projects for a potential acquisition by a key lithium producer. His engineering experience spans the entire project lifecycle, from studies to construction and commissioning.

Ajay gained entrepreneurial experience from a young age as part of a multi-generational family business named Ashlin BPG Marketing. Ashlin supplies high-end leather accessories to the e-commerce and promotional product industries.

In late 2016, Ajay co-founded Li-Cycle Corp., a clean technology company. Li-Cycle is on a mission to solve the global spent lithium-ion battery problem and meet the rapidly growing demand for critical battery materials.

Ajay originally graduated from the University of Toronto in Chemical Engineering with honours.

Connect with Ajay Kochhar:

• Crunchbase
• LinkedIn
• The Company Check
• Bloomberg

Read the Full Transcription of the Interview:

Alejandro Cremades: So alrighty hello everyone and welcome to the dealmakerr show. So today. We have a really exciting founder. We’re going to be talking about building scaling all the good stuff that we like to hear you know also taking you know he took his company public. So I think that you know it’s going to be very interesting to see there. The differences between. Running a private company versus now running a public company. Ah, but in any case you know I think that you’re all going to find this interview very inspiring so without further ado. Let’s welcome. Our guest Today. Aj kochhara welcome to the show. Thanks.

Ajay Kochhar: Thanks all Andrew great to be on. Thank you.

Alejandro Cremades: Oh aj so give us a little of a walkthrough memory lane born in Oakville in Ontario canada so how was life growing up there.

Ajay Kochhar: Life growing up there would to be Frank was typical suburb upbringing. Ah you know look I come from you know, family of entrepreneurs that a family business and you know personally always had a propensity towards stem you know science technology engineering math. So. Always wanted to go into that sort of field and ah and you know had a passion for chemistry in high school and sometimes I say in life you know sometimes it’s your teachers that you remember had some great teachers at the times. That’s why I got very interested in it in part and decided on the back of that either 1 to become a doctor actually. But. Go down the path of doing health sciences or do engineering and so I chose out of that to do chemical engineering and life evolved from there but pretty pretty normal upbringing. But I’d say very entrepreneurially drone even at a young age.

Alejandro Cremades: That That’s Amazing. So Let’s talk about Let’s let’s talk about the entrepreneurial. Um, you know drive there. So How how how was that experience for you of being able to see your family. You know the ups and downs of running a business in. I Mean did you know at that point that you wanted eventually to run your own company or or did that develop you know, anywheres more clear down the line.

Ajay Kochhar: Yeah, and everybody’s different I think for me personally I did know I actually knew I think even from high school and I eventually want to do something primarily on my own look I think having been exposed to family business import expert business selling to retailers the time as other products so you know I. I Saw the ups and downs I saw at the same time though I saw the flexibility that it gave them but also the pride of owning something and making it happen I think that was all evident and everything I was observing so I knew for me that was something I wanted to do I Think the main gap of course you don’t want to be a entrepreneur you want to know. Is it something that you actually potentially your passion about hopefully but also is there some sort of key skill key reason that you’re bringing to the table. Why you should be the one to start a company I think that’s important. Ah so I didn’t know that part I didn’t know obviously at that time but I always knew that I wanted to start something and build it even from younger age.

Alejandro Cremades: And obviously that ended up happening I we’re gonna be talking about that in just a little bit but you go to Toronto as you were saying chemical engineering and then eventually what happened from there because it took you some time to you know to really to really go out it as an entrepreneur. So what needed to happen for you to. To know that it was time. So.

Ajay Kochhar: Yeah I always felt that I needed to bring build some real fundamental chops. You know in terms of either to be technical business learn. What’s what? Um and I think it takes time people always say even in the young age and often said now hey find your passion It’s so hard I think to do that. Think what we can more easily do is find your curiosities right? What are you actually curious about and so I was always curious about I mentioned chemistry I was always curious about I think sustainability was important I went to school at a time where that was starting to grow to become a a theme and. And so you know through engineering chemical engineering. It was interesting. It was right at the cuspy moment I’d say where historically that industry was a lot of petrochemical so like oil and gas but is around the time where there started to be new careers or new areas opening up like environmental engineering sustainability. So I was interested in that and. And through ah through that program I actually got a job. Um and through meeting some folks at a company named hatch so hatch is a global engineering firm ended up working there even while I was at school through the summers and that firm they’re global firm based in Canada but they have divisions of metals mining energy infrastructure. So. A lot of the things I was quite interested in. They did a lot of it and it’s really the engineering aspect of it in consulting on that so work through through the summers and ended up just happenstance. Sometimes it’s how these things happen in the metal space. So I was working on nickel projects copper projects rare earths. Ah.

Ajay Kochhar: You know Lithium came in a bit later which is the theme here but I just was interested in how you could take really complicated technical design of these facilities. But how do they work as businesses. Ah, these are Mega capital Projects. You know at the time very Fascinating. So That’s what got me interested from there and so I went to work there full time and of course. Left that eventually you start lifecycle.

Alejandro Cremades: And I was you know the the experience here in this company gave you me your other half in business tim a hundred percent

Ajay Kochhar: That’s right, very important right? Very important I always say I’m I’m a big fan of of 2 in business I know I know many founders that are you know, just by themselves. But you know look I think you can always make a powerful duo when you find somebody that you have great complimentary. Skills with and frankly get along with and can help make things happen. So I met Tim. Ah at hatch when I was working there. So the story of this is was working in as I mentioned base metals and was a very ah complicated group at the time the title was I believe non fers off gas handling I didn’t even know what it meant when I joined the group. Really what it is is ah pollution control equipment. So these are in like nickel smelters copper smelters where they have emissions and you’re trying to scrub them and clean them to be suitable for the environment. So that’s where I started but that gave me exposure to those spaces now. Fast forward of course nickel copper. Coba and all these materials are very important for evs I didn’t quite know that at the time but that’s how our worlds evolved through that also did some work in lithium so all this is metallurgy at the end of the day. It’s metallurgical processes to make metals and salts. So lithium came in I met Tim. Project I was doing the project execution planning he was managing the project. This is the lithium project in Europe so good became very fascinated because now of sudden I could relate to look where is this actually going what is it going into this case predominantly batteries. That’s why these projects were being built so that is very interesting because now you can relate technical design with the end market.

Ajay Kochhar: You know, use work through that. Um and then made a switch within hatch to more magic consulting. So at Hatch. It’s a pretty niche focus in that space. It’s really just transaction advisory. So now of sudden you’re taking this skill set of saying okay I know how that facility is designed what if now you’re advising. Ah, fund or a strategic who’s looking to invest or acquire it. They need to do a technical review dd to support them on that but you need to be able to link up technical know-how with economics what does that mean for the business case. What does I mean for the business so that was great. That’s why I joined that group I was very interested in that tim also had joined the group at the same time. So he told me at the time he said hey ij you really should is recommendation to me so you know focus your energy on lithium. It’s a growth space. You’re clearly interested in it I’m doing a lot of this space. Let’s do more together and so that did lead to doing more studies projects looking at. Again, screening different assets for potential acquisition investment. So lots of work in the lithium space at the time what happened was and I’ll tell us that I’ll pause. You know we were looking at different gaps we were seeing gaps in any maturing industry. There are gaps so one of the gaps we saw was recycling and. But we looked at other mature commodities lookedium out a commodity but look at other materials we’ve worked in like copper aluminum pretty mature recycling supply chains. But in the case of lithium you know so new development was even there yet. So we were saying hey we’re the business models or the technology to do this. We didn’t see that and so.

Ajay Kochhar: We said um we think we can do something here. Ah you know make it more fit for purpose make it economically viable. So fast forward to 2016 I had this entrepreneurial bug I wanted to do something I didn’t know what it was so all this is perfect. You know we have the skill sets of how to design these technologies these plants execute them importantly, not just the technology. But all the aspects of executing it. Um and we think we can work out the business model site. So we said hey ah this is very worthwhile was 2016 at that time very early electtrification days. So yeah I left hatch Tim Mufter on the same time we started the company.

Alejandro Cremades: And and and that’s incredible and what what do you? think you know made you guys so complimentary because you were alluding to it. You know, not only from a business perspective but then also from a personal perspective.

Ajay Kochhar: And that was now seven years ago almost

Ajay Kochhar: Yeah, yeah, I mean we worked together couple years there. Um yeah look I think my propensity and this is what we discovered as time went on as an example of how you can you know join forces and get 2 things done in parallel. I mean I I definitely get in love and Tim and I started both on the technical side. So. That’s where I’m rooted. But I love the communication side I love the external facing aspects. You know, different stakeholder Relations Tim can do that absolutely tim also is ah the sort of guy that you know back when we were much smaller. And we’re building our first facilities we have a 2 face model where we shed batteries then we refine them. He’d be the guy standing right? behind beside the team fixing the shredder it’ something that’s rough. So I mean I’m happy to do that. But maybe I’m not the right person I won’t necessarily do it right? So very complimentary in terms of our propensity of where we want to focus so as it’s evolved. You know Tim has kind of the core of the business under his wing be it. The operations building up the projects. You know some of the hr aspects at time to that and I’m very focused on with him. You know, making sure that’s all good and then also the external aspects so we’ve discovered how we both have propensly different areas. I could see if you were just one person. Um, you could definitely do it. Um, but there’s only so many hours in the day and 2 is if it works well more powerful than one. So I think it’s been great.

Alejandro Cremades: Absolutely now for the people that are listening to really you know, get it What ended up being the business model of lifecycle. How do you guys make money. Okay.

Ajay Kochhar: Yeah, so we just really simply put when we looked at the space and when we left catch what we were seeing was like a lot of waste oriented handling of these batteries at the time you can imagine so with my batteries just so people know. These are like the rechargeable batteries in your smartwat all the way to your smartphone but importantly also in evs what we were seeing in the market was more of a waste approach so we were seeing them treated a little bit like a waste. Maybe even people had to pay at the time go to this to get rid of the batteries and for us it was like wow like. We just we’re helping these clients dig up the stuff from the earth refine it and then do all this complicated manufacturing and make these batteries and then it’s not worth anything in the like that doesn’t make any sense so that’s a 2 part problem. It’s the business model and the technology. So what we do? How we ultimately make money. Is by extracting the materials from the batteries and then selling those and products but it’s important how you can get back to a high recovery and portly get the lithium so lithium’ is a lot of the value in the batteries when we were looking at the historical technologies a lot of them are wasting lithium just getting nicocobalt. It’s really about maximizing your revenue stream from what you recover being able to sell that but doing it in an efficient way at a low cost yet environmentally friendly and also safely so that really requires fit- for-p purpose technology that took some years to develop scale up raise money you know, get through that very initial phase and then scale.

Ajay Kochhar: And start to commercialize and build the commercial versions of that.

Alejandro Cremades: And the I know at the early days Aj were not easy. You know the ups and downs I mean what were some of those ups and downs that you guys were dealing with and then also how did you guys embrace them to to keep going.

Ajay Kochhar: Yeah I mean I just to paint the picture you know left hatch ah typical engineering or advisory type schedule very busy and just to put like a real life point on it. You know you leave and just on a practical point like your schedules a boyid I mean what you’re going to be doing next week up it’s open so So yeah this is a great idea right? Great idea like really excited. Obviously that’s all good, but then you leave and it’s the shock right? Especially if you know you’re used to a certain pace you’re used to certain things. So I think at the beginning at the same time we knew where we needed to go in terms of the technical aspects like when do we need to get done to prove this thing out. But was missing was and what we had to learn was how do you then? backfill that and accompany with it. The business model aspects how which then leads into how are you going to raise money and why do need the money. So look I think some of the trials tribulations at the beginning if you rewind to 2016 through like 2019 evs yeah, they were starting to become more mainstream but still, there’s a lot of doubt even at the time if you remember where Tesla was at remember even some of the things they were facing ah, people were even on evs are like ah okay, yeah let’s see so you can imagine when you say oh yeah, we we’re going to do recycling. Let my batteries. Like what are you talking about like isn’t that 30 years away or something and so you know at the same time we knew these things take time and we knew that the whole supply chain is going to scgrrrrrtrale and also what people were missing is as you make batteries. It’s not perfect. It has a level of scrap so that took a lot of education but I remember vividly many meetings.

Ajay Kochhar: People say oh you just working on a science project or what do you What are you doing? How’s this going to make money and I get it because on the other side. The early stages you’re trying to prove the concept. You’re trying to bring the customers along show that there’s real demand pull for what you’re doing and show that the solution that we’re trying to validate works. So yeah, for sure early days. There’s a lot of lot more unknowns. Um, and definitely a lot of doubt. But how you get through it look I think at a very base level. You have to be an optimist. You have to be a realist in terms of what what works? What doesn’t you can’t be deluding yourself. Ah, you know the not being clear and honest about what the challenges are but at the same time you have to have a positive outlook and I think that’s something which both Tim and I have optimism for the future and that gives you a base to say okay well we’ll make it through this. We’ll figure it out. And to have a solutions oriented mindset to say okay well that’s the problem of what are we going to do now and then you need the persistence to see it through but it’s very emotionally wearing and that is the life at the beginning of being an entrepreneur.

Alejandro Cremades: Absolutely So I guess for you guys at what point do you realize you’re turning a corner and you guys are gonna be all right.

Ajay Kochhar: I remember in 2020 and it was a really odd time mostly given covid but many different things happening in the world and I don’t know if covid just reminded us in a quicker accelerated way that how so how fragile our supply chains are maybe it was. You know, not having people driving around in the pristine air. All of a sudden saying oh that’s that’s quite amazing. Ah, all of a sudden this amount of focus on Environmental Technologies Climate change you know all of a sudden accelerated very quickly because I remember 2019 was not like that. And we were definitely out there. You know trying to pitch what we were doing and where we’re going and overnight all of a sudden things catch obviously at the same time you had from a macro perspective liquidity being you know pumped into the market. All of a sudden. Um, but just certainly from a tone perspective it changed and I think. Always I come back to? yeah, raising money is ah a big part of it. But what do the customers saying what do the customers want and I think the thing that changed all of a sudden was we were going from having dialogue at a vehicle Oem or battery maker perspective that were kind of 1 ne-offs or you know regional or with a regional office. All of a sudden now you were starting to have like a pretty strategic conversation to say hey if we do this right? You can give us your batteries and you can get back your materials and vice versa. They were starting to say our customers and have been saying. That’s what we want. You know we want to give you batteries want the materials back because this is how we’re going to get domestic sustainable.

Ajay Kochhar: Lower cost more resilient supply chain in the long term so that was a big changing moment because in the day if the demands not there then you can do all everything you want, but the business is not gonna is not gonna thrive. So so that was a big aspect. And lastly. Around that time too was this whole onsoring theme so out of nowhere from 2 years before that like basically no one talking about domestic battery manufacturing all of a sudden having this very rapid growth of these giga factories started with Tesla but now. Many different companies North America europe so from a very asia -centric supply chain purely to one that has a lot of domestic manufacturing why that’s important for recycling is that comes with scrap. So now you actually have a base to say okay, this is a roadmap for us to build out and scale so that was a clear. Catalytic moment and 2020.

Alejandro Cremades: And and also for capitalizing the business. How was the journey of of racing money prior to the company going public. How much capital Do you guys? raise prior to taking public.

Ajay Kochhar: Yes, so in total we’ve raised now you know, almost one point three billion that’s to date that includes the commitment I’m including there from the department of energy that’s due to close shortly. So so that’s overall to the point that we were public I’d say it was a minority. Never I think fishly better a number but it was a minority if that number significant minority that we had raised so you know what we were doing up until that point it was mainly the piloting validation and we run this two phases model where we shred the batteries. This is what we call our spokes is spoken how model reverse logistics. And then the hub where we refine and so as we iterated one of the things we figured out is hey we have to be in the market. We have to be doing something commercial but many clean tech companies climate tech companies. They have this issue right? You you have to do validation and then you have to build a commercial facility and then also need a bunch of money right.

Alejandro Cremades: Now.

Ajay Kochhar: And from an investor perspective. It’s it’s hard because you’re saying well how am I going to know that that’s going to work unless you’re already doing something that I can see. Okay, you have some traction so one of our it was actually 1 of our board members 2018 or 19 we had these 2 technologies and we were trying to do both at once. He actually suggested hey like. Why don’t we parse a set of bit do the spokes you know in lockstep with customers their lower capital requirement gets you in the business. Get some flow in the business and also builds that feed at advance of the hub and that’s what we did and that then color is the capital needs. We didn’t need a lot of capital before 2020 thing that was a catalyst and for us to need more capital was the hup which is a centralized facility much larger scale um, scaled larger because you want to have those economies of scale and also get all the feed from all the all the spokes and that then colors the capital needs so is basically at that moment where we said. Okay, we now need. This much larger slugger capital you know hundreds of millions of dollars to fund that and see that through and that was what led us to this process of assessing different options which ultimately ended up with us going public.

Alejandro Cremades: What was that process like what was that experience of going public.

Ajay Kochhar: Yeah, so we back in late Twenty twenty in early twenty one we so made this decision to move forward with the hub. That’s what we we knew we needed to do why did we do that again that’s really how you scale the business us we make the better grid materials that’s also how we best serve our customers. They want you know so spokes we make this intermediate product that goes to the hub we transform it the customers ultimately want back the battery grain materials. They want it domestically so scale purpose timing all line up. So I thing that then colors what we need so we went through a process we looked in the private markets at the time. Um, and and many options in the private markets. We also looked at this option around going public we could and it wasn’t you know I’d say now as mainstream relatively. Ah, you know, clean tech climate tech has been It wasn’t at that point yet. Um, but there was still interest. And we definitely had the ability to raise the money privately the thing that struck us at the time and we compared both options alongside each other it did come down to a cost of capital aspect. It also came down to a time perspective. You know I’ve spent a lot of big time. This is the benefit of having 2 people. Um a lot of my time at the end of the day even pre-goin public was focused on raising money I mean just to make sure that we had what we needed to keep going so so having having been through all that time you kind of take a step back and say well hey do I have enough time to focus on the business. Yeah.

Ajay Kochhar: And are we getting enough capital at once to be efficient and so all these things kind of played in and you know we have experience internally with you know folks that have been public before so we were not blind to the pros and cons obviously being public for staying private and so in the end, all those things. Together. We started to go the public route alongside raised a large summit capital was five hundred and eighty million dollars at the time went through a process of course to get public and eventually list in August of 21? Um I can talk about what’s happened since then but that in itself was quite the process. Ah, going through all the filing iterations with the scc and it can take a while so that was ah that was a journey in 2021.

Alejandro Cremades: Wow, That’s incredible and obviously you know to all those investors you had to um convey a compelling vision so in that regard imagine you were to go to sleep tonight a J and you wake up in a world. Where the vision of lifecycle is fully realized what does that world look like okay.

Ajay Kochhar: Yeah, we ah it was actually interesting that we ah 1 of the awards we won recently was this bloomberg new energy of finance pioneerss work. It was interesting. 1 of the articles you wrote about it. They actually think paned it pretty well it said imagine it’s 20 just Tuesdays year twenty thirty 2040 and you’re driving an ev and it’s made for majority recycled batteries recycle battery materials I think that’s a pretty compelling vision of the future. Ah, what do we want? We want to be basically enabling more e these to get on the road. We want to be enabling cleaner these. With a lower carbon footprint and we want to be enabling eventually more affordable electric vehicles and so we can do all that through incorporating recycled materials that can stay domestic. Don’t have to take round trips around the world but eventually get back into the end product on mass at scale and so I think for me. And doesn’t just seem to be evs. It could be energy storage could be any application both my betters. That’s really the definition of success at scale to the company.

Alejandro Cremades: That’s ah, that’s exciting for sure hey now for the people that are listening to understand you know a little bit on the scope and size of lifecycle I mean what? what? What do you feel comfortable sharing in terms of number of employees or anything else.

Ajay Kochhar: Oh yeah, we’re 450 people plus today we have presence in North America europe a packet pack is primarily a commercial you know office. But our main assetses are in North America Europe we as I mentioned run this two Phasese model. Ah, spoken hub the spokes shred the batteries. The hub is the refining aspect so we have in North America four operational spokes commercially, we have one in Ontario Canada ah Rochester new york gilbertb azonna and Duslos Alabama so very good coverage around the United States and Canada the whole point is you want to be close to where the batteries are so minimize that logistics cost from the customer. We don’t typically bear that cost but make it easier for them to make that decision to go to us and then we’re building this large hub in Rochester New York so that just for a sense of scale is circa. 60 football fields in size just to help relate for people so quite a large facility in terms of the land mass that it occupies will be the largest ah new lithium source in the United States whether from recycling or mining and we’re doing that in a short period of time because it’s recycling it doesn’t need. Long permitting associated with mining also our recycling type is much easier to permit. We have our permits for that. So so yes, that’s North America and then in Europe we have 3 spokes that have been announced or are underway Germany which will be our flagship facility. Our largest in Europe we. France.

Ajay Kochhar: On route as well as Norway So very similar Strategy. We’re falling where the batteries are starting with commercial contracting build the spokes to build up that baseload of feed make the black mass and eventually the strategy would be routed it with you know in general a scaled hup. That’s basically our. Region by region strategy and lots more to come.

Alejandro Cremades: So That’s amazing and they obviously you know as you’re suggesting you know and and you are talking through all these different regions. What comes to mind is is Culture. You know how do you go about culture when you have all these different you know, offices and different. You know, maybe like. Because at the end of the day you know the culture is the one that you establish in the in the in the in the Hq in the headquarters and those different you know other regions. You know they have their own different variations of whatever culture you have established in the Hq So How does that work and how do you guys go about making sure that that’s. Unified and aligned. You know as much as possible.

Ajay Kochhar: Absolutely and I think it’s you know customization with some key themes that are unwavering right? So that’s that’s the key here we know look it’s been interesting for Tim and me we obviously our roles have developed shifted but 1 of the things that we’ve understood. Well. Is at the end of the day us and our leadership team set the tone and visible leadership. You know, helping set that culture is really important. It’s starting it off right? You know we have a set of values. We have a set a vision a mission. We’ve continued to iterate that. Also as time has gone on to make sure it’s relevant but a lot of the same things have remained true whether it be safety being a top priority our ability to be agile right? That’s large amount of the ability that we have to to move efficiently also quite different for a hard tech. You know company. Um, so things like that that we ensure are instilled and grained. Part of the way that we act and hiring you know folks that we believe embody those values right? and are going to be great role models because we also can’t be everywhere all at once. So that’s one side of it. But at the other side of it. You know as I just mentioned we are in all 3 of those regions. The cultures are very diverse. The cultures are even diverse within say heat. The us. Different countries and then Europe different regions within those countries right? You have to know that and I think the the beginning there which will always serve you well is leading with empathy so understanding, you know where are those folks coming from what is their way of of leading themselves supporting themselves.

Ajay Kochhar: And you know being clear about the things that aren’t wavering like safety. You know we we can’t compromise on safety but then understanding how we can tailor our approach to be effective in communicating with those folks locally and I think that’s hopefully what drives a 1 team 1 lifecycle mindset.

Alejandro Cremades: So we were we were talking earlier about you know the future the future that you would envision for this and I want to shift gears here and talk about the past by being able to talk about the past with with a lens of reflection. So. Imagine I was to put you into a time machine. Aj and I bring you back in time you know, maybe like a seven years ago when you were still working at Hatch and you were able to grab that younger a j that younger Tim, you’re able to sit both of them down. And you are able to give them 1 piece of advice before launching the business. What would that be and why given what you know now.

Ajay Kochhar: Trust your gut that would be the advice. You know I think judgment comes with experience and I think judgment is you know what? Ah which you can ring at the table a lot and I think you know not to say that. Everybody makes mistakes everybody. That’s how you grow. That’s how you progress I think some of the moments when I reflect on different. You know we’ve obviously again, we’re scaling very well. We’re in a great place. Very excited about the future and I think about the moments we’ve had as we’ve moved on and ups and the downs and at times you can. It’s very easy as a human to second guessss and of course you have to do sound first principles analysis you know and do the work to get to a conclusion. But what I’ve learned is it sometimes is that blink feeling that you get. And don’t ignore it and and seek that out when you have it and listen to it as much as you can question it if needed. but but I think that would has and continues to service fall and I think the moments where I look back and I say oh I wish did something different there. It’s probably usually where I didn’t quite listen to my gut. And there were other things that were around it happening that drove a certain decision in a different way. All fine, no harm to foul but definitely something I’ve taken heart since.

Alejandro Cremades: I Love it So a J for the people that are listening that will love to reach out and say hi. What is the best way for them to do so.

Ajay Kochhar: People can reach out at info at Lifecycle.com that’s info at l I hyphen c y c lee dot com I think also on website there’s other ways to to get in touch with us. Ah, you know for folks that are out there wondering also hey. And offs is for entrepreneurs and others and they’re probably thinking you know what can I do spread recycling batteries we work with different partners as well. Main focus is b two b main focus is on auto batteries and like but we also do take consumer electronic batteries. There are partners we work with that run these you know collection boxes at different stores or areas you can take back. You can look it up. We work with groups like call to recycle and other partners like that sore wondering people often ask hey how can I do something you know as part of this if you do have devices sitting in your drawer at home. There’s valuable cobalt in that I can go to making new ev batteries. There’s a collection program usually in a way that eventually gets to us. But that’s a way that everybody you know can play a part in electrifying our future.

Alejandro Cremades: Amazing. So aj thank you? So so much for being on the deal maker show today. It has been an absolute honor to have you with us.

Ajay Kochhar: Thank you all Andre great pleasure to be on.

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