publive-image

APR Technologies develops groundbreaking technology for thermal management on spacecraft and was founded in 2011. Simplified, the company’s technology enables extremely good thermal conductivity between various components. The technology has many applications such as thermal management in satellites and electric vehicle (EV) battery charging. For EV charging, the technology allows faster charging, safer handling, higher energy density and increased lifetime of electric vehicle batteries. APR Technologies believes this is a cornerstone to be able to reduce CO2 emissions, as well as other emissions from fossil-fueled transportations. The company has grown organically and has heavily invested in state-of-art in-house equipment, including 4 own cleanrooms for advanced R&D as well as pilot production. Currently, it has its main customers in the space industry with clients such as NASA, ESA and Airbus DS. APR Technologies is finishing a qualification right now according to Airbus supplier regulations, and it wants to bring its technology to the automotive industry.

An Industry Frontrunner

Peter Nilsson is the CEO and Co-founder of APR Technologies. He was the initiative taker behind the company. Prior to building up APR Technologies, he studied physics at Uppsala University, worked at a large chemistry company, worked as pioneer with developing advanced nanosatellites, as well as R&D engineer at NASA/JPL with miniaturization of an instrument for detecting water on Mars, and developed and started commercializing small satellite technology and organization as R&D manager at ÅAC Microtec in Sweden.

Delivering Industry-Specific Solutions

On contributing to the industry, Peter says,

For Space, APR Technologies can make satellites performing better in measurements of computing capacity and communication capacity thanks to better thermal management.

For EV, by faster charging it is often possible with smaller batteries and that will save battery-materials needed for replacing millions of fossil-fueled transportation vehicles with electric.

For various electronics, APR Technologies simply lowers noise or improves energy efficiency by keeping components at the proper temperature, with a noiseless, vibration-free and long life-time system for better cooling or other thermal control.

Leadership Traits That Lead to Success 

Peter believes to be nice, friendly, supportive and have patience to be a successful leader. He strongly believes that leaders should create a cooperative environment and give tasks with reasonable planning and enough prerequisites, be honest with good things as well as bad things, also share problems and issues so that people feel belonging. Leaders should make people feel that they can have an influence on decisions or at least have them firmly established. “Do your best to make people around you sense a positive feeling at work, and no employee should never be afraid of you, also try to make it fun. A very valuable quality in leadership is the ability to quickly and sharp feel and listen by reading the surroundings and understand the situation and the prerequisites, and then be able to adopt that. Do not overreact, someone has to bring stability and calmness to most frightening situations. Even very difficult things can be solved by honest and true listening and understanding of the situations and its important parameters, prepare things structured, and don´t be afraid,” he added.

Having built up trust and good faith is a kind of lubricant for everything, from customer relations to relations with employees and so on.

Challenges – The Balancing Act   

Peter feels it is always difficult being a pioneer with new technology. One dilemma is the balance between focusing on specific markets, technology, etc, and the need for a strong and broader organization with expertise from different disciplines, to enable system-level enhancements. Another is that the customer and infrastructure may not be ready yet, so you must have endurance.

Going the Extra Mile 

Peter foresees APR Technologies increasing cautiously every year, perhaps up to some EUR 10 million. But for new markets, electric vehicles, electronics, and other industries, it seems Billion-dollar growth. The company eyes improving efficiency in even more things, for example, heat pumps and air conditions.

“We can accelerate heavily next year, or in two or three years. The important thing now is that we stepwise prepare us and that we build a solid company,” says Peter.

Words of Wisdom

Peter advises emerging leaders to identify and decide what is their core business and niche. He asserts: think positive about others and build trust, companies usually want to make money by helping their clients and protect their core business. Keep that in mind when doing business as it will help you understand and predict your partner's behavior. Listen to other people’s experiences and knowledge but always filter the information, evaluate if it is relevant for you and your situation or not and if it is, is it relevant today, tomorrow or later, or was it relevant one year ago. Remember to adopt “good advice” to your needs and specific situation.

And remember what drives you and what drivdes the employees. For example, scientitsts or reseachers is often most motivated by the task and proper freedom, to solve the tast, while some other people is motivated by economic short term key indicators. When I was at NASA long ago i learned valuable motivation factors, like being proud, from their way to work.

Work smart rather than hard, and do not forget to sleep and relax sometimes, get the overall picture, have time with family and you learn a lot from spending time with your kids, they give you a balance in life and can be really good teachers.

Many people can advise you how and what you should do, sometimes ask yourself if that person believes so well in what he/she is telling you would take the risk and quit her/his job to actually do it, probably not. But many entrepreneurs actually take that step, it gives a baseline of how much many entrepreneurs believe in their emerging business idea, and are willing to risk.

Another comment I want to take the chance to include here is that my years in space related organizations has also given me a perspective almost like the astronaut's perspective; looking at our planet from a distance, surrounded by emptiness and dead planets. From a distance it is really obvious that we must take good care of our planet.