On this episode of BILLIONS, I'm sitting down with Alan Chang, Co-Founder and CEO of Fuse Energy—a tech-driven energy company that has completely shattered the UK market.
Alan was employee #3 and Chief Revenue Officer at Revolut. Instead of coasting on fintech success, he and his co-founder Charles took that hyper-growth playbook and weaponized it against traditional utility giants like British Gas and Octopus.
In just three years, Fuse has exploded from £2M to £400M in annual revenue, achieving a £5 billion valuation.
If you want to know how a lean tech team can buy a wind turbine, acquire a grid operator, and out-execute legacy multi-billion dollar incumbents, this is your blueprint. In this masterclass, we break down:
- The Revolut Exit: Why Alan walked away from fintech because the problem was "largely solved".
- The £1M MVP: How they bought an energy license for £50K and a single wind turbine for £750K, using a mix of their own capital and an early round.
- Anti-Democracy Culture: Why running a startup by committee fails, and why top performers should be paid 10x more than bottom performers.
- Full-Stack Infrastructure Control: Why Fuse is currently buying a grid operator to dominate supply.
- Internal AI Weaponization: How Fuse is building internal AI agents (PR reviews and error-tracking) to keep their team incredibly small and efficient.
TIMELINE
00:00 – Leaving Revolut: Moving from a "solved" fintech industry to an unsolved energy crisis.
04:20 – The £1M Full-Stack MVP: Door-knocking for a wind turbine and securing an energy license.
09:33 – The Efficiency War: Why European energy costs are 3x higher than China's.
13:31 – Controlling the Grid: Why Fuse is actively acquiring a grid operator.
17:05 – The Execution Layer: Rejecting complex designs and demanding simplicity.
22:36 – High-Performance Compensation: Why top engineers make 10x more than the bottom tier.
28:50 – VC Term Sheets: Setting absolute founder-control red lines with investors.
36:50 – The Main Job: Why recruiting absolute elite talent takes up the majority of a CEO's day.
43:52 – Product Design: Building beautiful micro-solar and balcony battery products for consumers.
46:05 – Weaponizing AI Internally: Building PR review and error-tracking agents to optimize code.
REFERENCES
