Chris Black has founded and/or grown numerous software companies over the past 25 years. Chris currently serves as CEO of GridX. GridX partners with utilities and energy suppliers to transform their businesses and accelerate the clean energy transition. The company’s Enterprise Rate Platform helps these organizations to develop new products and business models to achieve their clean energy goals; quickly operationalize new offerings in their billing and settlement processes; and better engage with their customers for broader program adoption. GridX’s platform is used by leading utilities, retail energy suppliers and energy ecosystem OEMs to serve more than 19 million homes and businesses.Prior to GridX, Chris was a Principal Partner at Huck Capital, where he was responsible for sourcing new clean energy investments, leading technical and operational diligence to support transactions, and enhancing portfolio company value through the application of technology and operational best practices to deliver outsized returns. Previously, Chris was CTO and COO of Tendril, a distinguished energy management company providing solutions to nearly 100 of the largest regulated utilities in North America. The Tendril solutions allow energy companies to change their relationship with their consumers, create energy efficiency improvements, and actively manage energy in the consumers’ homes, as a way of balancing individual comfort with grid stability. Over the 8 years that Chris was COO at Tendril, he led the transformation of the enterprise from a struggling hardware technology company to a successful software-as-a-service business, known for its innovative solutions that empower and inform consumers and change the way that people consume energy. During his last years at Tendril, Chris led an aggressive strategy to acquire five of the leading companies in the space, that together with Tendril, form a new entity. That company – Uplight – is now the industry’s leading technology partner for providers transitioning to the clean energy ecosystem and was recently valued at over $1.5b.Chris is passionate about team culture, technology, impact, and sustainability and how these elements can work together to accomplish something truly grand. Chris chose to join GridX to be a part of a like-minded team to help accelerate the scale of positive impact that can be affected through the application of innovative technology by passionate people, and by doing so, hopefully leave a better world a little bit better for his daughter.