St. Anthony: Solar entrepreneur's business heats up

Engineer Mouli Vaidyanathan, who turned entrepreneur after he lost his corporate job during the 2008-09 recession, is getting national traction with his SolarPod modular solar panels. He has added Lowe's as a distributor, joining Menards, Northern Tool and Mysolarpod.com.

Vaidyanathan said he expects to sell 75 units this year and 200 in 2015. After investing five years and more than $500,000, he's thinking about paying himself a salary.

"Starting a business is risky," Vaidyanathan said. "But I'm encouraged because I'm starting to generate enough volume to be a profitable business."

He recently introduced the SolarPod Crown lightweight rooftop system. He installed the system atop his family's home in Eagan, where he also runs the business.

"I don't buy electricity from Dakota Electric," he said, referring to the local utility. "It's net zero for the year. On a cloudy day I'm a buyer. When it's sunny, I'm selling electricity to Dakota Electric."

He said a 5-kilowatt SolarPod Crown system costs about $15,000 installed, but that drops to about $10,500 if the homeowner takes the 30 percent federal tax credit. It pays off in 10 to 11 years in Minnesota, and six or seven years in Arizona or Southern California, he said.

The SolarPod Crown is a patented design with no roof penetrations and less weight. It promises no water leaks and has the ability to stand up to winds of 90 miles per hour. The original SolarPod, launched in 2011, is a ground-rack system and smaller than the rooftop version. Vaidyanathan, who uses a contract manufacturer, dropped the price to about $3,200 for a 1-kilowatt plug-and-play system with four solar panels and related parts. It can produce up to 50 percent of the electricity for a small house with one TV and a refrigerator.

Colin Hirdman and Josh Becerra have been partners for seven years in an online-marketing business called Monkey Island Inc., named for a St. Paul playground of their childhoods.

They have developed a way to use wireless technology and the Internet to transmit tenant water usage in real time.

It came out of Hirdman's experience as a rental property owner. Hirdman, a technologist and tinker, sought a way to avoid excessive water and sewer bills from leaky toilets or dripping shower heads.

The duo, who are trying to raise up to $300,000 to move Watermetersolutions.com into production, are among 18 Midwest businesses that have gone through the Midwest Cleantech Open business-accelerator program. They will present their ideas to investors and others Monday and Tuesday at the annual Midwest Innovation Summit in Minneapolis.

Justin Kaster, founder and CEO of the Midwest Cleantech Open, said a record 400 attendees are expected from around the country to hear what's driving efficiency and innovation at big and small companies in the region.

Minnesota Diversified Industries (MDI) celebrated its 50- year anniversary at a sold-out event last Thursday at the Crowne Plaza in St. Paul.

MDI, a nonprofit social enterprise, employs 311 workers, half of whom are people with disabilities, at four Minnesota locations.

CEO Peter McDermott, who has led a turnaround of the business in recent years, reports that MDI, which expanded to a larger, renovated facility in northeast Minneapolis in March, added 73 people this month thanks to demand from business customers. MDI makes corrugated plastic containers and offers a variety of product-assembly, recycling and other contract services.

Iric Nathanson, who assisted many small businesses in the tight-credit years that followed the Great Recession, has been named to the Twin Cities Community Development Hall of Fame for a half-century of work.

The award is sponsored by the Metropolitan Consortium of Community Developers (MCCD) and Twin Cities Local Initiatives Support Corp.

"The clients are engaging people and the job is never boring," Nathanson said. "I get satisfaction trying to help people who are making a real contribution to their communities through their businesses."

In recent years, Nathanson has helped cobble together financing for the expanded Butter Bakery Cafe on 37th Street and Nicollet Avenue S., a once-vacant corner that now boasts an apartment building and enterprises that employ more than 50 people. He assisted residential contractor Anderson Mitchell Construction in north Minneapolis with working capital loans; and secured the last piece of financing for Aggressive Hydraulics of East Bethel, enabling it to move from three dispersed locations to a new manufacturing plant. The company topped 50 employees and hit record revenue this year.

"Iric was critical to us getting into the new facility," said Aggressive Hydraulics CEO Paul Johnson. "We borrowed $300,000 from MCCD to bridge a financial gap because the appraisal was less than the building cost. And we're paying back that 5 percent loan faster than called for under the terms."