Episode 8 - "Charging Forward": Inside Averest with Gabe Sampson

Matthew Weitzel: 0:16

This episode of the GSE podcast is brought to you by exceed ground support equipment leasing your trusted partner for GSE solutions. We specialize in tailored operating leases for ground handlers and airlines, offering top notch equipment and flexible terms to suit your needs partner but they industry leaders, we're committed to bringing you the equipment offerings that keep your operations running smoothly and efficiently. Choose Xcēd for competitive rates and exceptional customer service. Visit xcedgse.com today, and soar to new heights with exceed ground support equipment leasing. This is Brad Compton. This is Luke brown. This is Jeff Barrett. This is Tessa Vaasen, and you're listening to the GSE podcasts. Now, right welcome to the GSE Podcast. I'm here with Gabe Sampson from Averest. How's it going, buddy

Gabe Sampson: 1:12

is going great. Good morning, Matt. Good afternoon, Matt. Sorry, this afternoon. Yeah, I'm looking looking forward to this conversation. Yeah, thanks, man.

Matthew Weitzel: 1:19

So we are actually at JBT headquarters. They were nice enough to allow us to use their facility in Orlando, Florida to record this podcast. So big thanks to JBT for supporting us. Do you work with JBT?

Gabe Sampson: 1:32

We do. We're a supplier to JBT, which is the reason I'm here. They were they were hosting a lot of their suppliers in house first supplier conference, you know, learn more about their processes learn more about the recent acquisition of JB T. And, you know, kind of kind of celebrate our successes together and discuss some, some short fallings that all suppliers need to work on to help JBT out

Matthew Weitzel: 1:54

the suppliers I mean, it's been rough. Right. Getting getting everything to the vendors and are being a vendor I guess and being a supplier to, to the manufacturers. Yeah, it is.

Gabe Sampson: 2:06

And obviously, you know, through the COVID years, as we all know, everything was hard to get that put pressure on us as suppliers pressure on the manufacturers. But but but I feel like now we're pretty much past that. It's you know, it's a it's a thing of the past it's history and move forward. And I think JBT is ready to move forward and young Vaughn Yeah. So

Matthew Weitzel: 2:28

so how did you how'd you? How'd you get in the industry? Anyway? I don't feel like I know the entire story.

Gabe Sampson: 2:33

Yeah, it's kind of an interesting story. So I went to school at a little engineering college in Georgia, just north of Atlanta called Southern Polytechnic State University. And soon as I graduated, a family friend reached out to me guy named Joe Fuqua, who's pretty well known in the industry, he's not retired. But he reached out through my parents and, you know, was looking to hire engineers actually interviewed with him an interesting little fact, he actually interviewed my brother in law as well, at the same time. But ultimately, I landed the job and went to work for Delta Airlines as a young engineer in the ground support equipment department. So got no see you're part of Delta GSE engineering, and that's correct. Yes, I worked underneath Joe, if you clay and was, you know, responsible for all sorts of engineering tasks at the airline, testing equipment, specifying equipment, you know, selecting new vendors, fixing problems, you know, working on the shop floor, some with the mechanics. But yeah, yeah, started the career that

Matthew Weitzel: 3:28

well, how many years were you at Delta?

Gabe Sampson: 3:30

I was at Delta for about four years. So started there in 1998, I believe, and worked in the ground equipment Engineering Department at first and then worked in the facilities department where I was doing more with fixed equipment, things like passenger loading bridges, preconditioned air equipment, ground power equipment, and right right at the end of my career at Delta, a little issue called September 11, came along, we're all very familiar with delta at that point, as well as the rest of the industry was struggling and needed to get rid of headcount. And delta approached the situation in a very generous manner and made basically severance packages available to every employee. And so I opted to take a severance package, left delta, which, you know, gave me a little bit of money and some great benefits and just kind of started pursuing a different career.

Matthew Weitzel: 4:22

Yeah, man. So um, alright, let's, let's take a pause here and talk about a story that you have, do we have a GSE story, because I think everybody that's been in the industry for any amount of time has a great GSE story.

Gabe Sampson: 4:35

I have got a lot of GSE stories. A lot of them involve drink too many beers and having too much fun, but I won't tell any of those today and won't name any names. But yeah, kind of interesting story for me, you know, when I was when I started at Delta, I was you know, just a young engineer, full of bravado and energy and, and maybe a little bit of talent, but not too much talent at that point. And I clearly remember getting assigned a project to do a modification You're not at baggage tractor. So it's down, worked on the shop floor with a mechanic and this mechanic looked at me, you know, he was experienced and had had way more skill set to me in terms of being a mechanic and working on equipment. And he looked right at me and he said, Boy, you never built a hot rod, have you? And I was like, I looked at him. And I didn't know what he meant by that. And he said, he said, you just don't like, you know, what you're doing with a tool. And, you know, I really didn't write a little bit experienced the hand tools and fun things, but it really defined GSE to me, because, you know, GSE is comprised of a lot of really talented, technical individuals that, you know, work on equipment day in, day out, you know, specify equipment, buy equipment, whatever they're doing, but a lot of them have hobbies on the side that tie right into that, right. They're working on hot rods or race cars, or, or old cars or motorcycles. You know, it's just, it's a really hands on fun industry. And, yeah, I knew it was the place for me, basically. So when I when I heard that, and I digested it and understood it. I knew man, this is a cool industry. Like I like the fact that I can get my hands dirty, still work on engineering task. And you know, never looked back. I'd been in the industry ever since. Yeah, I

Matthew Weitzel: 6:08

think our mutual friend Brian Yoder, he, he, I think he went to Southern poly tech is well, and then he was racing dirt. I don't know, like dirt racing with cars. And so it kind of the same, same thing. So he had gotten his hands dirty. It's what I'm trying to say where you had not

Gabe Sampson: 6:26

correct Yeah. And I you know, I've never been a big race fan or anything. But obviously, yeah, especially back in those days, you know, NASCAR was a big, big deal. Most GSE people would follow NASCAR. And I think we probably went to a NASCAR race together, back in back in those days with some fun event. So

Matthew Weitzel: 6:43

yeah, so I think I met you probably around 2007, or 2008. At least, I used to work for tog, and which is now texture on GSE and used to come in as a supplier to talk to us about batteries. And I was in I was in sales. And you know, inevitably somebody, you know, a customer would say, Hey, I'd like an electric tractor. And then I'd have to spec out, you know, the kind of battery that they would need and the kind of charger they would need to go with that battery. And so my call was always to you, because you kind of hold my hand through that process. And that's how I got to know you. Because you're always giving me such great information. And so I could look good in front of my customer. I've leaned on game,

Gabe Sampson: 7:25

right. So yeah, that's exactly right. So so so you know, fast forward a couple years after I left delta I left alto went to work for AeroVironment was helping them with their posicharge product line, kind of promote it to the industry to the GSE industry. And then shortly shortly after that decided I wanted to start my own company, and a form de risked and, you know, one of one of our goals, when we when I started a virus was to promote electric vehicle technology. I just, I just really had a genuine interest for it. I thought it had a really good really, really good fit in the industry. It wasn't very well accepted then. So it was it was a fight right a battle all the time of trying to convince people that hey, you should consider this as a as a valid power source. But that's exactly how we approached the industry. So we worked with with the text John's and the GB T's and the Charlotte's and kind of acted more like a consultant, then, you know, let's say a sales guy. And we had we partnered with some really, really good manufacturers. At that time, East pin manufacturing, which is DECA batteries is what was building all the batteries for us. I was still working with posi charge. So we were able to provide the chargers and the batteries for these vehicles, which solves a lot of problems right so so if there was an issue with that system, which is provide the power of the vehicle, then we were we were there to step in and try to solve it. So that's how we approached the business then and it's really still how we approach it today. Just a lot more interest today than there's ever been an electric technology

Matthew Weitzel: 8:50

and that's for sure. So yeah, I think what I heard there was you were like Elon Musk before Elon Musk.

Gabe Sampson: 8:55

Yeah, he like calls me every once in a while for some advice. I don't often have time to take his calls the

Matthew Weitzel: 9:01

so how did you get involved with Charlotte? So I know there are large you know, electric manufacturer equipment manufacturer that provides electric to our industry. I'm pretty sure you have a great relationship with Rob lamb. So were they building electric tractors when you started that business?

Gabe Sampson: 9:18

Absolutely. So do you have a great relationship with my brother Rob lamb shout out to you Mr. Lamb Yeah, we we approached the market kind of in an interesting way we didn't really go try to sell to the airline or the sorry the OEMs directly we worked more directly with the airlines and tried to help them understand you know, battery technologies charging technologies, how to properly size a battery for a vehicle and through that, you know, just those relationships at the airlines just naturally was put in front of you know, Charlotte and the other OEMs that were making electric baggage tractors and electric Butler's back then, and you know, the end result was In have supplied Charlotte, a lot of batteries for for various airlines over the years for lots of different vehicle types. And still do that today. They're a good partner of ours. We've we've had a lot of fun together, we do a lot of business together and look forward to that for future years.

Matthew Weitzel: 10:15

So you you work with the airlines, the ground handlers and the OEMs. You touch all three?

Gabe Sampson: 10:21

That's correct. Yeah, we also work with airports. So Oh, yeah, well, that. Yeah. To get to that. Yeah. So airlines, airlines sometimes like to buy batteries directly. Sometimes they want to buy them through the OEMs. Ground handlers are the same way. Right. So sometimes they might want to source their batteries directly. So they have direct control over it. Or sometimes they might want to leave it up to the vehicle OEM. So yeah, we work through all channels don't don't really have a preference, we can conduct business any way that the customer chooses, you know, we're relatively small company. So we're nimble, obviously, obviously, enjoy any any business we get through any of those partners. Yeah.

Matthew Weitzel: 10:58

So talk to me a little bit about airport infrastructure and how you've seen that change throughout the years and kind of what you see, you know, moving forward in the future,

Gabe Sampson: 11:07

yeah, sure. So there's a couple of big changes in airport infrastructure. One, when we first started business, the airports were not at all interested in buying charging systems. And considering that, you know, an airport owned product, right, they were they were already buying things like loading bridges and ground power units and precondition there, that it that it sort of transitioned over to airport owned. So at that point, the airlines were really our primary customer for the charging system. So, you know, let's say, you know, a Delta Airlines, who's heavily invested in electric vehicles now, back then may, you know, may make a decision to buy a handful to put in, let's say, Los Angeles Airport, where there might have been some, you know, some political reasons, or even regulation that they had to meet. And they would, so they would buy, you know, the electric vehicles, and they'd also buy the chargers, and then they would hire electrical contractors to install them at airports. So, you know, fast forward to today, almost 20 years later, the airports have really, really got involved, and it started providing that infrastructure for the airlines and for the ground handlers. So that, you know, that cost isn't coming out of the airlines capital budget, it's coming out of the airport budget, somehow, someway. And I'm sure the airlines eventually pay for that, because they're the tenants at the airport and pay the bills, but it really helps the airlines move forward with their electrification initiatives. Because because now they don't have to get the capital money approved for the chargers, they can just simply focus on the ground equipment itself and, you know, select the equipment, select the battery technology they want, and work with the airport for the Chargers

Matthew Weitzel: 12:37

do you have to help out with like grants and things like that,

Gabe Sampson: 12:41

we don't get directly involved in grants, we try to educate customers about what grants are available. We were doing more of that, you know, 1015 years ago than today, the airline's typically now have people that study and look in research, you know, and one of the things we're always looking for are grant opportunities, right. So any, any free money they can get, but particularly just educate as much as as much as get involved with the grant process.

Matthew Weitzel: 13:06

So now now you're seeing more of the airports buying the chargers, then then the airlines.

Gabe Sampson: 13:12

Yeah, we are. It's shift, it's, it's shifted that direction over about the last five years. I mean, some airlines are still buying charges directly themselves. United Airlines is a big customer of ours for chargers. So as delta, we've done a little bit of business to Southwest, we've done some with JetBlue. In recent years, pretty much every airline, even cargo carriers, but you know, since the airports are willing to buy those, you know that that's definitely the preferred method. The only problem with that is, is the airport's obviously, are very bureaucratic and move very slow. So, you know, sometimes they can't get out of their own way. And even though they may want to, and may even have the budget to buy chargers, it takes him so long that, you know, the airlines move it at, you know, 550 miles an hour, 30,000 feet, right, so they can get things done quicker. And sometimes they choose to do that just for just for timing reasons.

Matthew Weitzel: 14:02

So what about like, so when we switch from lead acid to lithium ion, most of the industry has changed. Now, I would imagine.

Gabe Sampson: 14:10

I would say most of it's changed, I would say most of its going in that direction. Okay, so I got a really interesting story about lithium battery. So we, we've been selling lead acid batteries to the industry for a long, long time, right? It's a very stable product, everybody understands that everybody knows its end of life. Everyone knows what to expect out of it for performance. But it can cause some problems in particular on an airport, right? Because it requires, you know, routine maintenance, you have to, you have to add water to the battery. You have to make sure it's getting charged properly, you have to make sure it's getting equalized, or you know that very expensive battery could could be a boat anchor, all of a sudden right and you have to start over. So we we decided a few years back maybe six years ago to look for different battery technologies to introduce into the market and we stumbled across live CLM as a potential alternative, and you know, kind of on the back of a napkin, sitting in a bar one day, scratched out how much we thought it would cost to put together a lithium battery and decided, hey, this is probably justifiable, very expensive at that point, it was, it was about three times the cost of lead acid, but we'd have at least twice the life and presumably zero maintenance along the way, right? Or routine maintenance to say, so. So we went to market found a couple of suppliers and put together our own lithium batteries, we took one to a trade show, as kind of like a gut check to see if we're the only people in the world that think this is a good idea, or does the industry think this is a good idea, we had overwhelmingly positive feedback from the customers. And then we, you know, we put that battery in the field for test, we build a few more, but back then partnered with Delta Airlines to test a few prototypes, you know, really just proof of concept batteries. And it went really, really, really well. Um, so well, that, you know, it's at that point had many customers coming to us saying, hey, we want hundreds of these things, we didn't have the in house manufacturing capability to build hundreds of these things. So we went back to the market and tried to find some manufacturers who were building lithium battery packs. And after interviewing several companies, you know, a meeting with several companies ended up partnering with Flux power, who is also building lithium battery packs for forklifts. And they let us basically control the design of a battery pack that was going to specifically be used to power bag instructors and belt loaders. So you know, we took our we took our knowledge of the industry, applied it on top of you know, the knowledge they had for building and constructing industrial lithium batteries. And out of that came a really, really good product and had a lot a lot of successful that product lately, and are on generation three of that battery pack now. And as I mentioned a minute ago, the industry is, you know, because of what we did, and because what other battery companies have done, because what some of the OEMs have done, the industry is rapidly heading down that path of lithium or, or let's just say advanced technology batteries, because there's definitely some other chemistries that are going to be in play in coming years as well.

Matthew Weitzel: 17:12

So if I had a lead acid charger that I had purchased from you, and it was at the airport, but now I've decided to switch to lithium, do you all have like converters? Or like what does that look like? Yes, that's

Gabe Sampson: 17:24

a really good question. Luckily, or, or maybe, maybe strategically, the posi church systems that we've supplied to the industry for so many years, we're already ready to charge lithium batteries. So out of the box, the design features they had built into him with a with a very simple software upgrade, we're able to charge lithium batteries. So when we took this to a customer, we didn't tell them, hey, we've got this shiny new sexy battery. And it costs you know, X amount of dollars more than your lead acid batteries. Oh, and by the way, you also have to buy a new charger, right, we didn't have to do that we were able to introduce the batteries into the marketplace. And by working really closely with posi charge, you know, come up with a solution where the charges customers already had with a simple software update, were able to to safely and successfully charge the lithium batteries. Since then, there have been some improvements in some of the communication platforms used by these batteries. And so there are some upgrades available today that make that even better, but it's not required. We can we can charge dilithium batteries we provide to the market on any of the older posi chargers and we can do it a little bit better with a small upgrade.

Matthew Weitzel: 18:33

Okay, the small upgrade is like some kind of converter type of thing they can purchase from you directly.

Gabe Sampson: 18:37

Exactly, yeah, there's it basically adds it's a it's a board a circuit board that installs inside the charger and adds Canvas communication capability to the charger. So that then the battery and the charger are directly coupled together via CAN bus. And essentially at that point the battery is controlling the charger. These lithium batteries are very smart, they have their own battery management systems on board, which is basically a computer it knows what's best for the battery. And so when you get that Canvas upgrade the battery can now control the charger instead of the charger deciding what to do. So it's a very effective way of you know, more efficiently charging led acid or the I'm sorry, the lithium batteries.

Matthew Weitzel: 19:19

Nice. Okay, so and then another topic I wanted to cover off with Eon is I've seen a lot of these walls of the you know that the GSE Expo I saw you there. And there's a lot of different companies kind of doing these mobile power units. And I know you know we're at JB T today and they kind of launched their product at the show is well, what can you tell me about those? Are you involved in those and all that kind of stuff?

Gabe Sampson: 19:44

Yeah. So, interestingly enough, about 10 years ago, that idea came up we were actually working with Swissport who was struggling with charging infrastructure at certain airports and they needed but they needed and wanted to buy To vehicles. And so we kind of came up with the idea of a diesel generator power charging cart, which on the surface sounds ridiculous, right? You know, you're going to run a diesel generator to recharge electric vehicles but but in all reality, if you can run one diesel engine at a very high efficiency, that's a big, big benefit. In terms of emissions reduction, when compared to running, let's say 10 smaller diesel engines at low efficiency. So the you can make the environmental argument that it is better for the environment, you're not putting out as much harmful emissions. So that idea was just batted around and never got off the ground. But fast forward to today. Yes, we partnered with JB T, by supplying them a full policy charge system that's mounted on a trailer. And they coupled that with, I believe, a Cummins generator to do just that. So this concept that we talked about Swissport years and years ago, you know, kind of finally came around, and JB T's had a lot of interest in that product line. It's not only powered by the diesel generator, though, they have the ability to to power that cart using a 480 volt cord, essentially, or you know, a big, large extension cord. I know DHL is gonna be launching some of those carts very soon in coming months. And their intention is to power it with a chord, but at least it's a mobile system that they can move from spot to spot plug in, in different places, bring their electric ground equipment to it. And then in the case of emergency, or if they really need to get really remote with it, they can still fire up the generator to power the charging cart. So I think it's a, it's a very good solution. And there's been other versions coming out, we we actually developed one in house ourself, that's a bit different, it's going to be powered by foreign at hertz gate power. So, you know, envision this being the size of a bag cart, parked at a vacant gate, maybe overnight, the GPU unit on the loading bridge can be plugged into this cart powers up all the chargers, and then you can charge five vehicles or five batteries around that cart, you know, within a couple hour period. So so there's a lot of those kinds of mobile charging solutions that are being introduced. And the reason is, is because the airlines are now deploying electric vehicles much faster than fixed charging infrastructure can be put in. And so they're having to come up with all sorts of creative solutions to get energy into these batteries, right? A battery is nothing more than a fuel tank, stores electricity, and they need to be refilled right every every day sometimes. So if there's not enough charges to do that, they've got to get creative and find other solutions. And that's what they're doing. And in some of these things may be temporary, you know, some of these carts might just be temporary solutions until permanent infrastructure gets installed. But it at least bridges the gap and lets them get closer to, you know, to their goals of, you know, zero emissions. GSE.

Matthew Weitzel: 22:48

So, are you just working with airports all the time now? I mean, it's it's just yeah, we demand has to be crazy.

Gabe Sampson: 22:54

Yeah, demand is crazy. We are working with airports all the time. You know, the New York is not not a secret that the New York port authority wants every airline and cargo carrier and ground handling company to have 100% Electric GSE by a certain date. So there, we have constant conversations with them about how to get there, because you know, they, they will need to install a lot of charging infrastructure to do that, right, it's going to take some very creative solutions for them to do that as well, because there's not really enough power at the airport to do what they want to do. So I can envision them, you know, employing some of these new smart power sharing circuits in so we've got an ability to hook up our policy church systems to an existing circuit for a loading bridge, for instance, and use the power that's there for the loading bridge. When the loading bridge is just parked doing nothing, we can use that power to power a charging system. I know ITW has introduced a new product in the industry that helps with that JBT as a product they've introduced in the industry that that helps with that as well. All about using that existing infrastructure, let's say in a smarter way, so that you don't have to install new infrastructure and in some cases, they're not even a possibility to install new infrastructure. I can see these airports in recent years installing battery systems that store energy at it within a facility and then that energy is able to be distributed back out through a charging system to a different matter. So there's gonna be all sorts of creative systems put in place to help manage this big infrastructure demand but there's there's a lot of really smart people working on it and the problem will be solved right there's no doubt my mind companies like us are always coming up with with new ideas and new ways to get energy into the batteries so that you know the vehicles can go do their job.

Matthew Weitzel: 24:39

So is there a I think you said that there was a maybe even alternatives even lithium or you're working on batteries that are even like is there different technology out there that kind of hasn't been introduced yet?

Gabe Sampson: 24:52

Yeah, there's there's a significant number of cell technologies that are being tested and developed and introduced into different into Trees, I would say most of them are coming out of the automotive industry. But there's one in particular we think might be really, really good for ground equipment. And it's called sodium ion. It's, we've got cells in house battery cells in house now that some of our engineers are going to be cycled testing, to try to learn more about their capabilities, but they have a lot of promise, because even though the risk of a lithium battery fire or thermal runaway event is very low, it's still there. And there's certain vehicles that might be too close to an airplane to even even live with that risk. Right? So I don't know that, you know, lithium batteries is right for every application. So and we don't we as a company, are very Engineering and Technology, heavy. We're constantly researching the market looking for different solutions. I mean, at the end of the day, that's what we are, we're a solutions provider to the customer, not a product provider. So I think in a in a 12 month period or so we're going to have developed a another battery technology, like we did earlier on with the lithium batteries that we could test and try and learn about. And you know, maybe that's the next best thing we don't know yet a lot of work to do. But yeah, absolutely. Always looking at different battery technologies, and, and even at times different charging technologies. Again, just trying to solve the problem of getting all this electrical equipment charged up that that the airlines are buying.

Matthew Weitzel: 26:21

So talk to me about high voltage. Yeah, so

Gabe Sampson: 26:26

high voltage has made its way into ground equipment, no doubt about it. Our first exposure to it was with gold hofers, electric high speed towbarless tractor, which by the way, I mean, you know, I'm a guy that really believes in electric technology, I've been doing this for nearly 20 years, and I rec June, next year will be our 20th anniversary of being in business, which is gonna be a wild thing to celebrate, I never, ever, ever thought that I would see high speed towbarless electric tractor, low speed towbarless electric tractors or just low speed push back tractors, this is a really, really easy problem to solve the guys that gold offer, you know, and girls, I'm sure to whatever their engineering team, you know, did some phenomenal work and have put out a very, very impressive machine. So I believe that unit is roughly 800 volts. So that's at the higher end of high voltage, seven or 800 volts somewhere in that range. And our first exposure to that has been to supply some charging systems for that particular vehicle. And we've had a lot of success with that, we've learned a lot about that technology through this process. It is essentially, well, it's not essentially, it is the same charging technology that's used for electric cars, I have two electric cars in my family. And, you know, we recharge those at night in our garage, but which works fine for daily driving. But if you're gonna get these things on the highway driving across the country, you need some, you know, high speed, high voltage, high capacity charging systems. And that's exactly what we're introducing on airports now to recharge that Goldhofer tractor. There's also there are also other vehicles, I know Textron has introduced a high high voltage baggage tractor and we're really just let's say battery system into the marketplace. So there's, there's going to be more and more that find its way onto the ramp. alongside of you know, the low voltage, high voltage is not necessarily the solution for everything, but it's definitely gonna be mixed in with the you know, say that what's what's more common as the low voltage or the 80 volt platform that's so popular today. And all that GSE is gonna be operated right next to Ford lightning pickup trucks, you know, maybe a Tesla or two, you know, for transit vans, Silverado, Evie, pickup trucks, you know, all those vehicles are going to make their way onto the ramp to because you know, as we know, it's not just purpose built ground equipment at an airport, there's all kinds of vehicles running around to, to move people or do different jobs. And those are going to have to be charged as well. So that that's kind of interesting, cuz that same charging infrastructure could do both at that point.

Matthew Weitzel: 28:47

Yeah. So again, the same kind of question I asked you before, which is like, so will your chargers will they be capable? Like the chargers that you've currently, you know, got into the marketplace? Will those charges be able to be capable of doing like a high, high voltage charge?

Gabe Sampson: 29:01

Great, great question. So not today. But there is a project well underway to develop a high voltage posicharge Power Station, the design intent behind that product is that, let's say you have a eight port charging system. Now, you could pull one power station out, put this new high voltage power station in its place without adding any additional infrastructure to the airport. And now you've just you just gained the capability of charging, you know, one of these higher voltage batteries off the same existing infrastructure. So, so kind of a hardware, change out a system, upgrade, whatever you wanna call it. It's been developed. And I think it's a brilliant idea. And we're hoping to introduce that sometime before the end of 2024, probably probably q 620 24. We'll have it at the marketplace.

Matthew Weitzel: 29:49

Awesome, man. So I'm gonna go a little bit outside of your realm of knowledge here, maybe I'm not sure. So, talk to me a little bit about hydrogen. I think, you know, I've heard some rumble Things in the GSE community about hydrogen and possibly being an alternative fuel that people are going to look at. Do you know anything about that technology? And like, what are your kind of your thoughts? I mean, just dealing with airports and the infrastructure concerns that you've been dealing with for 20 years? What do you think about that,

Gabe Sampson: 30:16

right. So we don't deal with any hydrogen technologies directly. But, you know, being a, like I mentioned, a very high, high tech kind of company, we are with a lot of engineers that geek out over fun, new power, power products, we follow it closely. We have conversations with hydrogen fuel cell companies, or maybe even companies that are interested in you know, internal combustion engines that run off hydrogen, I think hydrogen will have a place on the airport, or at various airports, let's say if I understand it correctly, the Cincinnati airport is kind of made big investments in some hydrogen infrastructure. But that's the key, right. So when I say there's limited infrastructure at an airport to recharge a battery, there's at least electricity there, right, that we can tap into. And we can do things, there's not tanks of hydrogen, there's not pipelines of hydrogen that are set in place to refuel these vehicles or to refuel a fuel cell even. So that is the biggest obstacle to, to what I think is an a really big problem to get hydrogen onto an airport, there's a large barrier to entry, it seems like a very large barrier to entry. And then couple that with the fact that, you know, let's talk about hydrogen fuel cells for a second. So a hydrogen fuel cell, you know, takes that hydrogen and generates electricity, it has to have a battery typically, or a super capacitors, something of those effects to store some of that energy to act like a buffer between itself and the vehicle. And they're very complicated, they require a lot of maintenance. So they sound great on the surface until you start digging into the details. And they become very, very complicated very quickly. And then now let's compare that to an electric vehicle with a battery, you know, maybe a lithium battery or a solid state battery technology that requires almost zero maintenance. All you have to charge it just a much simpler system. Right. And, and our industry needs to think simply sometimes and not overcomplicate things, so I'm not I'm not anti hydrogen at all, I think it's cool. I think the environmental impacts of you know, burning hydrogen are great, right? You just get water out of the tailpipe. Fuel cells are cool, sexy technology. But that that infrastructure issues going to go really slow it down, if not just just completely stop it from making its way on the some airports.

Matthew Weitzel: 32:20

Yeah. So Well, thanks for covering that with me. I really appreciate it. So is there anything else that Avis is working on that I need to be aware of?

Gabe Sampson: 32:27

Yeah, so we we've I mentioned our charging cart that can charge or can be powered from a 400 hertz, ground power unit that's at a gate right? That that product kind of came about, because over the last couple of years, we've been developing and supplying onboard chargers that go on primarily on push back tractors at this point, but but they they have a really good, a really good use case for pushback tractors, container loaders, maybe even belt loaders, you know, any of that equipment that stays parked at the gate area. And the reason it's a strong use cases, these onboard chargers are also powered from 400 hertz. So envision this, try to push back tractor pushes a plane back takes a few minutes, maybe the battery capacity goes from 100% to 80%. During that push back, push back deck here now drives back to the gate in parks. You've got 290 kV, a ground power unit, or sometimes even 100 KV ground power unit hanging where the cord hanging right there next to where the push back tractor parks, the operators can now take that cord, plug it right into the side of the push back tractor. And before the next plane gets there, now that battery is fully charged again. So that's been our latest innovation. It's been really, really well received by a few airlines. And we're seeing a lot of demand. We're constantly spinning out new designs now for different vehicle types, because it's not a one size fits all, you know, we've got to find places to mount these chargers on the vehicles. But that's kind of the latest and greatest and something we're very, very excited about. It's not gonna solve all the problems, like none of the solutions, we have solve all the problems, but it definitely definitely helps, you know, get another vehicle deployed. That's electric without having to go add extra infrastructure. Right? That's that's the key.

Matthew Weitzel: 34:08

Yeah, for sure. Yeah. So. So how was your Expo? How was your GSE Expo experience?

Gabe Sampson: 34:13

Oh, man, mind blowing, exhausting. I was talking to somebody today about that here. JBT that, that is probably the first Expo that I've been to where we've exhibited, that I never left our booth other than to go back to the hotel at night, you know, go hit a bar, get some dinner, go to bed and then rinse and repeat, as I say, which means I missed out on a lot of stuff, right? I didn't get to see a lot, a lot of friends, a lot of business partners that were also exhibiting, but that's okay. I mean, that's just a sign of our times. I mean, it's validation that the decision I made, you know, nearly 20 years ago to help airlines with electric ground equipment has paid off. I mean, we are Yeah, we are as a company, you know, almost almost 20 employees. Now today we're pretty small, which is just mind blowing. I never thought we did more than about five employees or revenues are obviously much higher than ever And you know, we're reinvesting all that one of the ways we're reinvest in some of that revenue, by the way back in our employees. So another little, another little nugget for the industry that some people know about some dance because I know a guy to brag a lot about what we do. But at the end of 2022, I turned our business into a 100% employee owned through what's known as a ESOP. So I was the founder, the owner, the shareholder, right, so I've, I've now sold my ownership back to the business, and that ownership is now gifted or given to employees on an annual basis. So they can, you know, reap some of the rewards and enjoy some of the successes we're having as well. Really, really exciting thing. It's incredible. Yeah, very, very exciting. I'm not going anywhere, right? Don't don't think that mean, game is going to disappear in a couple years. I've got plenty of years left in me, but it does give me peace of mind knowing that there's at least eventually a way out of the business, and makes me super happy to know that I can now that the profitability of the company directly affects every employee individually, as they as they gain ownership over years. They're gonna, they're gonna do pretty well.

Matthew Weitzel: 36:05

And that's awesome. You got some lucky employees there. Yeah, yeah.

Gabe Sampson: 36:09

I guess so. I mean, I look at it the other way around, I'm lucky to have them, right. I mean, for sure. We got some really, really good people that deserve this. So I want to see this business, you know, live on without me. And I think that's a it's a really effective way to do that. You know, we've got some young, very smart, talented individuals that you know, are going to be having these conversations with the next Mike, Matt Weitzel, episode number 154 of the GSE podcast is going to try it, you know, some of our young talent in a few years. So excited to see that happen.

Matthew Weitzel: 36:40

So are you going to the other conferences this year, or what are you looking at next year for conferences and expos?

Gabe Sampson: 36:47

Yeah, so I know we've got the Southwest Airlines event coming up. They do their own kind of mini trade show. I call it their own supplier.

Matthew Weitzel: 36:56

Yeah, they have the margarita cart there. Or they least used to do you remember the margarita cart? Yeah, tug? Yeah. My understanding that things still exist and and Southwest has it now I can. I can neither confirm nor deny that. But I don't know if you've seen that there before the blue, the blue juice. Yeah,

Gabe Sampson: 37:12

I know exactly what you're referring to. I had a few of those margaritas through my through my years. Like we all have. Yeah, I've not seen it at the event. But I'm sure it's still floating around. But anyways, televisions has this wonder Sydney picture? Yeah, sure. Yeah, yeah, they put on a wonderful event, invited some key suppliers in, like I said, do kind of a mini trade show, they take that opportunity to bring in their their GSE management team from all over the country, do some training, some meetings, some, even some high level executives come in and do presentations to the employees of Southwest plus to us suppliers. So we've got that coming up. That's always really exciting and really fun, very, very focused, always come away from that, you know, proud to participate. And just just happy to be there. And I think that'll probably wrap up the year for conventions or trade shows, things that I can think of. But we've definitely, definitely keep an eye on Portugal, right. So for sure, was Lisbon. So we'll definitely be there excited to exhibit that that actually would be our first time exhibiting at that particular event, I have attended it, I've walked it up in there with other companies, we've never exhibited, because we just haven't done or didn't see the need to market what we do in Europe as much, but we do now. So we've got a few opportunities in Europe already. And and we see that as maybe a good opportunity to get the word out about what we do and how we might be able to help. Yeah, that's a

Matthew Weitzel: 38:31

great question. So you all do stuff outside of the United States. Are you in Canada? Are you in Europe?

Gabe Sampson: 38:36

We do. We do quite a bit of business up in Canada. We've got a partner up there, GTA aviation, the Durso boys, which are good partners to have to help us out a bit in Canada. We do a little bit South America, we had to deal with Copa airlines over the last year, so that where we put some chargers in to recharge some ground equipment, and you know, always looking for the next opportunity to help, right, so we think we think the European marketplace is is somewhere we might go to next, right? We're gonna find out. We never we never want to go into a marketplace that we can't service. I mean, that's, that's one thing I probably didn't mention yet is how big we are on service. When I say we're, you know, we're a very high tech company. I mean, we've got we've got me and one sales guy, right that that's our sales team at the moment, Brian lash, and then we've got a plethora of technicians, engineers who do nothing but product support, or product testing or product development, you know, either in house or with our partner manufacturers. So we're really, really big believer in that. So before we ever dip our toe into, let's say, the European market, we're going to make sure we have a support staff of some sort, whether it be our own staff or we partner with a third party company. I want to make sure that any product we sell into that marketplace, we can fix if it breaks, right, we will for sure. There it is. That's key key in this industry. It's it's a core value of ours. It's quite frankly, how we built our reputation. And I think I've been so successful as a result After that, so see, I hope hoping to grow in Europe, but kind of put kind of put the right pieces in place first.

Matthew Weitzel: 40:04

Yeah. And as I said before, you know, the way that I met you is just through your support of of tug and me when I had trouble with my customers and you know, knowing what what charger to match with what battery and what technology was out there. And that's how we met and and I gotta tell you, you're you're fantastic at the support piece and your entire company is and so and I think that's the reason you're still in business today in the 20 years coming up. So what are you doing for 20 years? Are we going to have some big blowout that I'm going to get invited to like what's happening? Yeah, that'll be fine. I'm

Gabe Sampson: 40:37

not not got my head around that yet. But there will certainly be a celebration of sorts.

Matthew Weitzel: 40:41

We got to do something man.

Gabe Sampson: 40:42

I like, you know, I guess my initial thoughts was definitely all our employees, there's going to be a big, big party. But we'll bring in the kegs. And whatever we need to do, we're going to do bringing in partners to you, right, so why not invite some customers in? Yeah. Bison famous

Matthew Weitzel: 40:58

podcast host. You know what I mean? Just whatever you got to do, really?

Gabe Sampson: 41:01

To get everybody out there you and Mr. Brogan might come in town. Yeah, we'll do another pot. Yeah,

Matthew Weitzel: 41:05

let's call him out. Let

Gabe Sampson: 41:06

him know. Okay, cool. Yeah. Yeah, not really thought about it at all. Other than I know, it's coming. I know, it's a big milestone. I remember when we went through our 10th anniversary, which we were much smaller company than but it's still still a really good feeling to know that, hey, we survived, right? It's hasn't always been easy. But, but we survived and we've profited. And we solved a lot of problems, develop a lot of relationships, you know, this, as you know, this industry is, is built on relationships, this, this GSE thing gets in your blood. And, you know, people might change companies might move around a bit, but but they're, you know, put on a different shirt, but but they're always at the trade show.

Matthew Weitzel: 41:40

Yeah, they never leave GSE now that I tried it one time, and I came right back.

Gabe Sampson: 41:44

That's great. Yeah, I mean, they're always sitting next to shoulder to shoulder at the bar after a long day at the trade show right? Sipping down some cold ones, because, you know, we all need that. That r&r time, just as much as we need our work life.

Matthew Weitzel: 41:55

Yeah, so I know you got one child to do. Yeah, I

Gabe Sampson: 41:59

got one child. I tell everybody that we got it right the first time so we didn't need to have any more.

Matthew Weitzel: 42:04

Do that's what I tell people. Yeah, I've only got one this one as well. I patented that man. Oh, man. Do I heard I heard the genius somewhere. I didn't know it was from you. Yeah. So

Gabe Sampson: 42:13

yeah, I got one daughter super proud of her. She's 17 learning to fly wants to be a commercial airline pilot. So if for any airlines, you're listening, get your next best employee.

Matthew Weitzel: 42:25

There we go van Josie 17. And she's already a pilot. Yeah, well, learning

Gabe Sampson: 42:29

to be a pilot. So she's about halfway through her private pilot's license really loves it. And which is kinda interesting, because I learned to fly a few years ago myself just for the challenge. And the fun, kind of gave up on it because I just got busy with other stuff and, and I tell everybody, that if you're going to be a pilot, you have to be that has to be your passion, right you need you need to be flying all the time to keep yourself safe, keep the plane maintained. And I have a lot of other interests, interests in life, a lot of hobbies. And so after I learned to fly I got my instrument rating criss crossed the country a few times had all kinds of great experiences, you know, almost crashed several times. You know, fun stories come out of that stuff. But I kind of got too busy and, and opted to just kind of put flying aside and do other stuff. But, you know, fast forward a few years after that, and my daughter, just out of the blue one day expressed interest in math. I think I want to go fly an airplane. Ah, okay. We can do that. So you know, found a little local flight school arranged a you know, introductory lesson with her I had the opportunity to fly with her that day. Super fun. She immediately was hooked. And you know, off to the races. She went off to the sail to the sky. She Exactly. So she's, she's little more than halfway down. We're getting a private pilot's license. laser focused on it as she finishes her last year in high school and looking to continue that in college. So that is so cool, man. And it's awesome. We've not made a not made a college decision yet but going down tour Auburn next week. Oh, Mr. Lamb Mr. Mr.

Matthew Weitzel: 43:59

Lane must be really excited.

Gabe Sampson: 44:00

I'm making phone calls for you. Yeah, he's gonna say he's gonna call in and I told him not to because if he calls in I might not get a spot

Matthew Weitzel: 44:07

there for the daughter. But that's what I was gonna say. It was like a Be careful about those phone calls. I

Gabe Sampson: 44:10

absolutely. Miss Mr. Reeves as well. I know. He's an Auburn grad. So yeah, we're gonna go toward that campus next week. They have a really, really good aviation program partner with Delta Airlines. And so it's one she's interested in. She's also looked at a couple of schools, Montana states and other one that she's really interested in, up in Bozeman that has a really good flight school and an a path to the airlines. Right. So she she wants to go get a degree you know, she she wants to college experience but yeah, wants to learn to fly at the same time. So we have Embry Riddle down here. Yeah, Embry Riddle is another good choice. She has not looked at that one yet. But, you know, I said, we have made a decision. I

Matthew Weitzel: 44:48

can't make any calls for you. I'm sorry. I don't have any connections over there.

Gabe Sampson: 44:51

So yeah, I'm excited to see her make that decision, right. We're trying to help her, help her guide her down that path and And you know wish her the best and

Matthew Weitzel: 45:02

for sure we all do the GSE industry it's behind her Yeah, I

Gabe Sampson: 45:05

can't wait to can't wait to board a plane one day coming home from a Vegas trade show and you know, there's my kid

Matthew Weitzel: 45:10

yeah maybe she'll maybe she'll make sure you get up here to class or something.

Gabe Sampson: 45:14

Yeah, that'd be nice. Yeah, or maybe maybe she'll let me ride the jump seat. Oh, there we go even better either to the left seat and put me in the jump seat.

Matthew Weitzel: 45:20

Well, thank you so much, man. I really appreciate you coming on the podcast and you know if anybody needs anything from a wrist you know go in line or connect with Brian leash or yourself on on LinkedIn and I'm sure you guys can help take care of them. Yeah, absolutely.

Gabe Sampson: 45:38

We're on LinkedIn web page. You know we got we all got cell phones in our pockets all day long. We we do answer the phone and we love love helping solve problems. Right. So that's, that's what I that's what I dig out about right at it. I don't geek out about all the business stuff and the numbers and the sales. I mean, none of that matters to me at the end of the day. I really get excited when we get to solve a problem to help a customer so yeah, anybody anybody should be able to find us these days and be glad to help. There you

Matthew Weitzel: 46:01

go, man. Well, thank you so much again for joining us and this has been Matt and gave for the GSE Podcast. I'm Raven hog sacre and you have been listening to the GSE podcast.