The Vergecast - Anker CEO Steven Yang is all in on USB-C

Episode Date: November 6, 2018

Nilay interviews Steven Yang, Founder and CEO of Anker. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

This episode of Virchcast is brought to you by ZipRecruiter. Have you ever uploaded all of your photos to ICloud by accident? That's not smart. But you know what is smart? Hiring with ZipRecruiter. ZipRecruiter's powerful technology finds people the right experience for your job and actively invites them to apply. So you get qualified candidates fast. That's why ZipRecurter is rated number one by employers in the United States based on

trust pilot rating of hiring sites with over 1,000 reviews. Now, Vergecass listeners can try it for free. It's ZipRecruiter.com.com slash verge. That's ZipRecruiter.com slash verge. ZipRecruiter, Smartest for the hire. On this week's interview episode, I talked to Stephen Yang, who is the CEO of Anchor Anchor is a company that kind of came out of nowhere. We profiled them a little bit earlier this year. They started out making replaceable batteries for phones. And now they're just the default brand of

USB battery packs, accessories, they make headphones, they make robot vacuum cleaners. And they built this business entirely on Amazon, which is wild. And so we talked to Stephen Yang about that. That was really fun. But really, we talked about USBC and how Stephen Yang and Anchor are all in on USBC. In particular, there's a material shift happening in this world from silicon to something called GAN, Galleon nitrite, which enables USBC power delivery bricks that can do like full-on power delivery to a laptop from a charger the size of the iPhone charger. And that's what they released. It's called the Anchor Adam. I mean, it's a USBC brick, but trust me, it's super cool. It's really small. So we talked about all of that, and I will tell you, I've never met anyone in my life who's more

excited about USBC and Stephen Yang and I know Dieterbone. So check it out. This is really fun. Here we go. Okay, we're here with Stephen Yang, the CEO of Anchor. It is Anchor, not Anker. I feel like it's a word people see on the internet, and they don't often hear. This is your first big event in New York. We're actually, for our chat listeners, we're not in the studio. We're backstage at the event.

You're about to have a rehearsal. Congratulations on your first event. Well, thank you. Thank you really, you know, for taking the time and speaking with us. Yeah. Anchors are a remarkable company. We covered you guys. We wrote a feature about Anchor.

several months ago. It came out of nowhere. You kind of dominate this accessory business for phones with batteries and chargers. I don't know we necessarily dominate, but I think we do, you know, try to play important rowing in this field. Yeah. And now you're having an event, which is, you don't think about the battery pack company having an event, which is so cool. Tell me the story. How did you guys start? Where'd you come from? So this was back into 2011. So I was actually working as a software engineer at Google. Well, I was looking actually for laptop battery to actually replace the one. I mean, that's being in my laptop for a long time, right? And then I went online, and I realized that I was actually into a dilemma. So there was,

I mean, the batteries from the manufacturer, which would cost me a small fortune. Then there was also, you know, the batteries from third parties, which are not having good review ratings by previous buyers. I realized it's a common issue. And so I thought, hey, it seems like opportunity and let's try to work on it. Well, in 2011, I moved back to China and started Anchor with a few colleagues at Google and also my fiance, Diane. With a team of engineers, we tested and actually found, you know, the best laptop charging accessories. And we, you know, sold them directly to U.S. consumers online at Amazon.com. Yeah. So this turned out to be a success. So we actually sold half a million products in our first year. And, you know, we sold, you know,

and got a review rating that's 4.3 stars out of five, which is way above the average of the industry, and then we're profitable. In one year? In one year. That's great. Right. So we realized that we seem to have found the success formula. So now it's actually to take it and apply it to a bigger problem.

We're looking at mobile. With the increasing popularity of gadgets, with smartphones, smart, you know, tablets, and so on and so forth, it was clear that charging has become a problem. It was slow charging speed, short battery life, easily broken cables, and so on and so forth. And there's no great solutions to this. So we felt that we could really make a difference, not only through, you know, price point and through just quality, but through our own innovative technology. So that's why we actually set up our first R&D center in Shenzhen. That's, I think, May 2012.

So it was, well, a hell of a journey. Yeah. And so now you're here and you have some new products you're announcing today. Yep. The listeners will hear this a couple weeks from today. But today you're announcing a new USBC power delivery brick that's very small, 27 watts. And this is something you developed in your research and development center. Well, partnered with manufacturers of the silicon of the GAN.

What is the GAN? GAN is actually a new material. It's a new semiconductor material. that we think is going to replace silicon as the best, you know, material to make chargers for the next, you know, decades and hundreds of years. Wow. Why is that? We've been using silicon to make chargers for the past 40, 50 years. And, well, they're helpful, but they operate at a lower frequency, so charges could not be made smaller.

Again, actually, this new material basically operates at a much higher frequency. So it basically adapts like five to ten or even more times every second than silicon does. The result of that is actually a much smaller, you know, charger foam factor, much less heat being produced, and ultimately, you know, lower bomb too, lower bomb cost. That's a bill of materials. Yes, so a lower cost for you and a lower cost for the consumers. Yes. So, but I think, you know, initially what you're only going to see is the small foam factor.

That lower cost will come like several years later. data when that mass scale actually is reached. So your new product, the atom charger, that's the first GAN product on the market? Yes. I think that will be the first, you know, GAN products on the market, you know, for portable devices. And GAN, that's a chemical symbol that you're pronouncing, right? GAN. Yes.

It's actually gallium nitrite. Galium nitrite. Yeah. And so gallium nitride is going to replace silicon. Yes. And that's going to be the future of charging. Yes. And you guys want to be, obviously, the leaders of that.

Yes. we want to continue our leadership, hopefully. So let's get really nerdy about USBC. Sure. I want to talk for the other products you're announcing too, but I want to be nerdy about USBC because that is in my heart. We should.

So USBC has been on the market for several years now. It's been the standard in phones. Yes. Apple put it on the MacBook. They put it on MacBook Pro. And the USBC ecosystem, the PD ecosystem, is still pretty immature

and still kind of messy. Why is that? Well, I think it's getting better. It's getting better by a lot, actually, very fast. So I'll just give you

a quick example. So last year, we're actually crowdfunding our first true wireless headsets, which was the Liberty Plus. So our online survey,

I mean, we always listen to customer advices, customer inputs. Our online survey said that about 30% of people like USBC on this battery box

versus actually 40% of something like USB MicroB. And that's time, while certain people like USBC, but still USB MicroB was a majority, and the same test, in the same survey, I mean, was run this year. Guess what the, you know, percentages are? I'm guessing it flipped. It flipped and actually not only flipped, but also USBC was like 70%. Wow. So people are getting used to it. And their expectations are going to use one plug for everything.

Yes, yes. So my argument would be the one plug is kind of confusing because you plug a laptop into a phone charger and nothing happens, Apple has thunderbolt inside of that port. Do you think that confusion is people are figuring it out, or do you think this is basically a charging standard and everything else is sit by the wayside? So I think you're right on the problem. So USBC is so powerful that it contains so many protocols in it

that I think we sort of released a monster. That could bite back, because people could be confused. by that cable, that port. And some will do charging, and some will do display, and some will do network, right, and some will even do audio. But they have to match specifically which is doing which. It's not that, you know, they're all, like, functioning at the same time.

That's going to definitely cause a challenge. So I think there are actually discussions upon, you know, taking some of the protocols out. Really? Yes. I mean, that's in the standard consortium, right? But I think eventually still for charging USB C is the way to go. Yeah.

I think that's pretty much the, you know, conscientious. I mean, I have always found it remarkable that the USB A plug is the most standardized power socket in the history of the world. And it is not, it was. It was. And now, hopefully, it's going to be C. Yep. But before that, I mean, the USBA plug is everywhere. Yes.

Traveling internationally now is like far easier than it ever was before. Yes. The standardized thing. So you can see how making USBC more powerful and more able to do laptops and that sort of thing would work. But again, that ecosystem is only just beginning. Do you think gallium nitrate, GAN, is going to help that go faster? Do you think that making the thing smaller is? How do you see that playing out?

Well, if you look at the history of USBA, right? So first introduced back in 1996, the charging Oling started to really take place, I think, almost 10 years after. Initially, it was like 2.5 or 5 watt. Slowly it increased up to 15 watt. So that took almost 20 years to basically get USBA to where we are today. But I think USBC is going to be much faster. Yeah.

First of all, it delivers much more power through the same port, right? It's up to 100 watt versus actually USBA is like 15. That protocol, again, as we talk about, is powerful enough to actually also host other protocols. There's one actually hope that we really have, not only at Anchor, but I think also shared by others in the industry, that's really to turn the chargers from majority being shipped inbox to actually majority being like bring your own charger. Really? Yeah.

Why is that? So a quick number actually. How many chargers are being shipped every year? I mean, Apple ships like 100 million iPhones. So it's like 100 million right there. Two actually. I think it's 200 million. So it's 200 just from Apple.

Yeah, it's 200 million. And they're still doing five-watt chargers. So hardly of these chargers do you have at home? Yeah. So, wait, I'm just going to guess. So it's just 200 million Apple alone. Yeah. 500 million chargers.

No, actually. So if you look at every smartphones has a charger that ships with it, right? So we had about 1.5 billion smartphones last year. 1.5 billion chargers shipped last year. That's only for phones. That's crazy. And then you're counting the, you know, tablets, the laptops, your power drills, right? and your, like, you know, other gadgets, which could come with adapters to.

Yeah. So we estimated a total of, like, 4 billion charges. Wow, my guess was super wrong. It was much lower than I anticipated. Actually, there's one thing I think you'll definitely be right of. So do you have a box or is you're at home that have old, save all this old charges? Yeah, of course. My wife hates this box.

Right. So I think that box will go away. You think so. With USBC, with power delivery. and we scan. Because everything will be standardized. Yes. I mean, the same set of charges will be able to use repeatedly

to charge all the devices that come into your household. Okay, so that's a beautiful vision. Right now today, one of my favorite products you make that I have three of them in my house is the USB power brick. Yes. So plug in the wall, I get 10 USBA ports. Yes. It sits on the nightstand.

Yes. It's like everything in at night. Yes. Why can't I get one of those with 10 USB-CPD ports? That's again because You make one that has five USBA and one PD Yes That's because of the power density

That silicon is able to make Does not really meet the need of the USBC and PD Okay Right so that power big actually that you have Packs about 60 watt of power That's okay with USBA Because each port only takes like 15 watt Yeah maximum

But if you look at USBC Each port itself could take up to 100 watt Wow right If you put 10 parts force over there. So what's the maximum power this adapter should have on its own? At least like 200, right? Today, if you're making it with silicon, that will be like a huge break. But actually, that's the merits, the benefits of GAN is that with GAN, this could be made much smaller. Right. So I think in the future, like we'll see charges like you just mentioned, which have

multiple USB C ports. That's ubiquitous. So you don't need to, you know, like actually read which port does the fast-charging, which port does not. Just plug any device into any of this, and it will just fast-charge your device. So I saw it on the table outside, I definitely spied on your new product before he came in. I saw on the table outside,

you have the atom, the little one, which is not much bigger than, say, for the listener, not much bigger than, say, the pack-in Apple charger. The 5 watt. And that can do 27 watts. It can run a switch.

It can power a MacBook. Yes. And lots of things. Yeah. But 27 watts. So it's like just to give a frame of right. reference. You now have a charger that's the size of Apple's five-watt, five-watt, ubiquitous iPhone charger. Yes. That can charge a MacBook. So that's remarkable.

Yes. And then next to it, I saw the thing I want, which is the brick that has two USBAs and two USBCs. Is that also running, is that a GAN product? Yes, that's actually my favorite, too. So that actually, a charger, which is still smaller than Apple's 60-watt charger, packs two USBC port. and 60 watt of power, that can be dynamically allocated between the two ports. Which means if you're plugging one device, it could take up to 60. And if you're plugging two, it will smartly allocate power between the two. So this really like, again, if you're traveling or if you're, for example, taking your phone and your MacBook, you can plug both of them at the same time, and it'll just true power.

It's just so convenient. Yeah. So let me zoom out a little bit. So this is very cool. It's very nerdy for us. And I know the Verchcast audience is just as nerdy as we are, so I'm sure they're excited to. But just zoom out a little bit. Yep.

A normal person goes into an Apple store or they go into the Microsoft store, Best Buy or something. They buy a new USBC laptop. How do they know what will charge it and what will not? Because the cables do all look the same? How do you think about educating the consumer about what they need beyond saying this is 27 watts or this is 50 watts or this is 100 watts? Because that is obviously still pretty opaque. I think my ideal way would just be let users forget about it. They can plug in any port, and it would just fast charge.

It would just be enough power for the device. But I think we have to, again, go through various stages and finally reach that vision. So initially, I think you're still going to see like USBC plugs with different wattage ratings. And you pick the right one to fit your device. But later on, as you started actually to deploy the SMOTI USBC port, which share the same 100, 200 watt, then I think you no longer have to worry about am I plug into the right power or not.

How far away is that? Is that a year away? Is that five years away? I'd hope it to come within two to three years. Definitely for the nerdy customers. I mean, that's what we have here. Because today actually, so for the nerdy customers, we already have the 100 watt.

That's the PD4, the atom PD4, which packs 100 watt of power that can be distributed between two USBC port and two USBA port. Yeah. Right. Get that stuff at home and you don't worry about which port you're plugging. Yeah. So that's USBCPD, which I'm very interested in.

I'm very excited to get the new stuff. Thank you. I think you're doing a great thing, you know, again. So to push, I mean, there's, we estimate about 300,000 tons of eways just because of this inbox chargers. I think you're, you know, helping to get rid of them. Just by buying them, I mean, just getting them off the market. myself personally. So how do you, do you go to an Apple and you say, hey, take this junky 5-watt

charger, just stop putting it in the box. So our friend Joanna Stern at the Wall Street Journal, every year she reviews the iPhone and says, why do I have this garbage charger? I'd prefer you give me a fast charger. I'd prefer you just let me use an iPad charger. I don't need this anymore, but you still ship it in this box. Do you go to Apple and say, hey, just let us do it? Just, you know, sell the iPhone and then have a row of anchor 27-watt bricks over there if you need it. Well, I hope so. I mean, not only Apple, but also like all the major device manufacturers out there, right? We'd hope them to stop shipping all this, you know, low-wattage chargers and just divert consumers to actually desert parties, which could really, you know, work for a very long time.

Yeah. And so you'd buy the higher-power charger. You'd plug it in. It would automatically recognize your device and deliver the appropriate amount of time. It's worry-free. It's bring your own charger. And it's the same set of chargers like for 10 years and even longer. Yeah.

So that's the easy way, I think, to do it. Do you think we're ever going to come to a place where we get rid of these sort of like 110-volt AC terminals in our wall and just replace everything with USBC? That's a great question. I think I can see that actually maybe half of the house, the wall outlets, like being replaced by just USBC outlets, right? But I think still, like for bigger, like, you know, things like refrigerators and so on and so forth, we're probably still going to need an USB, sorry, AC outlet. Yeah. But this is probably AC for. for limited location in your house.

Can you run like a TV off of USBC? Yes, you can. You can. So let's see, USBC actually delivers up to 100 watt today, right? So I think that at least feeds most of the TVs on market today. But I think, again, USBC is, it's 100 watt because today we're still only, you know, tackling the phones and the tablets and the laptops market, right? As that's become sort of taken, as they move upstream, I don't see,

know, challenges for USBC to deliver, you know, up to 200, 300 watts. Really? So that's the time, I think, almost everything in the household could come into, you know, directly show power from this point. That's amazing. So you have become this large accessory brand on Amazon. Is that where your business is? Do you want to go elsewhere?

Do you diversify that? Like, is Amazon a risk to you or do you still see as an asset? No, I mean, we see tremendous value, actually, for offering our products directly to consumers. But we also actually realize that there are customers who would like to buy from their local outlets. So that's why we partnered with Wormat and Best Buy. And for example, just to bring our products to their local outlets so they can just grab them when they want to. So I think as a brand, we hope to be Omni Channel. We'd hope to be anywhere you would like to get this stuff. But I've noticed that people's senior success, when other sellers on Amazon

see success. They come swarming in. This is a classic story. Amazon itself will be like, Amazon basics, here we go. Do you worry about that? Do you think that you've got some competitors that are making very similar products to you? Does that drive you crazy? Or you just like, screw it? Consumer electronics is never short of competition. Over the past several decades, like, it's probably the most competitive field in the world ever. So I think, again, just our value is really, really to listen to our customers and deliver value to them. Yeah. That's our principle.

We really pay very close attention to actually what customers, you know, feedbacks are. Right? They like about us. They don't like about us. And I think as long as they like about us, I think we're okay. Hey, everybody. We have a quick advertiser segment from ZipRecruiter and The Road to Hired. Learn more about how one groundbreaking business is attracting the best talent.

This is the Road to Hired, brought to you by ZipRecruiter. and their UFO crashes on this planet called Smeeborg. That's Gretchen Huebner, co-founder and head of product at Codable, a game that uses fuzzy aliens to teach kids programming skills. Codable was founded in 2013, and it's now been used in tens of thousands of U.S. elementary schools. It's a company with a mission. If programming is something that everyone learns to do when they're young,

it's not the boy thing or a girl thing or a nerd thing. It's just something everybody learns. As Codable grew, Gretchen was wearing a lot of hats. hats. All of our sales and marketing, all of our game design first curriculum. So to scale, she needed to find talented and passionate people fast. So she turned to ZipRecruiter and used their candidate screening feature. My favorite thing was the deal breaker questions because I was able to ask people, why do you think it's important for kids to learn to code? It's really important that I know their answer to that. And that's how ZipRecruiter helped Gretchen hire a skilled

game artist who was the perfect fit for Codable. Finding that person feels like finding a needle in a haystack. We were able to find somebody who matched our culture, who believes in what we're trying to accomplish, but who also had all the skills that we were looking for. Use ZipRecruiter to find candidates that have all of what you're looking for. ZipRecruiter, the smartest way to hire. Thanks to our sponsor, ZipRecruiter. Back to the show. Anchor has also diversified, right? So you have a line of speakers called Soundcore. Yes.

You have a line of home products. Yes, called Ufi. Ufi. I was going to say, it's another word I only read and ever say out loud. So, Ufi. Yes. Are those as big of bets as the sort of charging and battery packs? Are they just, it's pretty easy to make this stuff?

I think every different device type poses a unique challenge, and often and usually a different challenge. But do you think Soundcore can go defeat Sonos and Bose? With the USB-C stuff, it's obviously you have a vision. Yes. That you want to be a major player. you want to push the standard forward. You're the default vendor.

You have the biggest brand in that stuff. Yes. Is that what you're trying to do with Soundcore? Are you trying to beat Roomba with Ufi? So I think with charging, we would like to believe that we are actually pushing the envelope and leading the industry, right? But with other categories, we do realize actually there's a long way for us to catch up. Yeah.

I mean, they are doing great jobs. Sonos, JBL, out there. So I think we're still trying to catch our line and really just figure out essentially for the long term, how do we want to run this business? The case is that we have independent teams in the company, each working on a category. So they're sort of drawn from, you know, the major, you know, brands. And they're here to build a brand on their own. We are the same, you know, sort of processes via the same, you know, philosophy that anchors basically built on.

Yeah. Right. When you have a vision in your mind, when you want to build something on your own. So even it takes time, you're going to, you know, continue work on it. Yeah. So that's why you see, actually, actually, you know, you know, take audio, for example, we started four years ago with a Bluetooth speaker that's actually, I think it's unique in a way that it actually packs about 16 hours of battery life,

which is kind of anchors advantage. Yeah. But then over the years... The advantage is that you build a battery. I like it. That's pretty good. Yes. Over the years, we really morphed into, really developed into, you know, building great sound.

Mm-hmm. Not only just, you know, great battery life, right? So that's a slow process, but we're trying to get there. Yeah. You're announced a projector, or you will be announcing a projector here. Yes. What's really interesting to me is you're putting that on Kickstarter. Is there a reason that you take some products and you say, let's do crowdfunding?

Is it just to build hype? Do you actually need the capital? Like, why go to Kickstarter or some products? I think for one thing is that we want to continue the way of our product development, which is listening to customer feedbacks. So putting on crowdfunding really enable us to listen to feedbacks earlier instead of having everything ready and just, you know, unveil it. And second thing is really, I think,

having the first, you know, group of customers at the word of mouse really help us to bootstrap a category. Because we, at Anchor, we don't usually, you know, spend a big, you know, money on, you know, marketing and bootstrapping a brand, right? Yeah. Would rather pass that actually through the crowdfunding to the initial customers. Yeah. So they get a much discounted, you know, products. And they help us to actually spread a word of mouse. That projector, we're very excited about it because the previous version, I think Ashley Carman,

one of our reporters had picked it as the one to get. So this is the new one. So do you still need, even if you already have one that's pretty successful, you still think you need to crowd fund the second one? We haven't succeeded in disrupt this category yet. Okay. Right. So our customers, I mean, they like the first version, but they still have regrets.

For example, like a resolution is still like not optimal. So the content in there is still not optimal. So we listen to their advice and then we work on a new version, which try to fix this. So this one's coming with actually HD in 720P. And then it's coming with Android TV, so it's native content. Oh, cool.

So speaking of new product categories, one of my reporters noticed that you have a LinkedIn job opening for a product manager for e-cigarettes. Is that something that you're aggressively going to pursue? You only have one opening for it. So that's not aggressively being pursued, right? So it's an area that we're trying to feel out.

Yeah, there's no, Big plan for it. Yeah. Do you think there's like an ethical problem with making, you know, Jewel exists and they're obviously huge. Yes. And they're like a $3 billion company, which is crazy. And now they're running into like regulatory issues.

Yes. Do you think that's a problem that you just don't want to deal with or is that something that you're chasing after? Well, so I don't smoke. Yeah. But I wish I didn't. I kind of got sort of like secondhand smoking like several times a week. Yeah.

Right. And it really bothers me. So I think what I like about a cigarette is that secondhand smoking is almost like none. Yeah. Right. It's basically reduced to minimum. So I think that's sort of helping me, whereas actually helping the smoker, you know, himself too. Yeah.

So I do see benefits in there. But again, I think we have to figure out what value can we bring to the table. We don't want to just be like yet another company, you know, doing this. And we definitely don't, you know, want to do it just, you know, for a profit or whatever. We think, again, adding to the public welfare, it's definitely, you know, the minimum that, you know, we have to start from. Yeah. Yeah. And then I have a third set of questions, which is really about what kind of, what places can you and can you not go?

Yeah. So you, I think something that's very notable is like you don't really make battery cases for phones, which was once a hot category and seems to have kind of died. And, you know, I spoke to Apple when I was reviewing the new iPhone. And I said, you know, we have just antenna performance concerns. Is that like you go to Apple and say, hey, we can just, we make batteries, like, we can just make this case and they say, no, we don't want you to do that? Or is it, we make one, you ship it, you check it out? Or is that you saying, actually, nobody wants these anymore. We're just going to make the bricks.

I think technical challenge is definitely a deal breaker there. So to actually have a good battery case as well as actually, you know, good antenna performance is just tough, right? But last year with, you know, the wireless charging, the problem is doubled. Really? So now you actually, so do you want to actually have? that battery case being able to be wireless charged or not? Because if it's not, then the phone sort of loses its wireless charging capability. Right.

But if you want to build in, then that's adding even more sort of shielding or, you know, basically interference to the phone's antenna performance. So I think it's just becoming like an impossible problem. I'm not saying impossible. I think the challenge is definitely, you know, sort of increased. Yeah, I mean, the trade-off there seems enormous, right? And also, I think the phone became a bit sicker too. Right.

So with the addition of the battery case, it's going to be just quite bucky. So is this a set of tradeoffs that you see? Okay, we can build a battery case, but we have to add another wireless charging coil to preserve that. And now we know we're degrading antenna performance. We're going to not do it. Or is it we're going to make this. Some people will choose the tradeoff, but Apple says, hey, you can't do it. No, it's more like we build a prototype, but we decided we don't really like it.

you're like no one will actually make it yeah so we that's actually so when we did you know build something and we you know show it to our customers and they don't really like it we just don't even ship it yeah right and then the other one I was just wondering about this is not your not sort of anchor's moment but case that adds a headphone jack back to these phones

yes it seems like a very natural sort of thing to do is there a reason you haven't done one of those well again that's back to us VCC right really so do you still like you're a 3.5 millimeter Jack to be there forever? Yes. I suppose you probably have some very expensive. I feel like you asking a question and a bunch of people in their cars listening to this

was like, yes, of course. I think it's a very valuable thing. But that's just me. Other people obviously disagree. Yeah, for people actually who have invested in some very expensive, you know, headsets with this 3.5 millimeter, they only want it to be there. Right. But I think for a lot of people, for probably like 99 or even 98% of the customers out there,

I think they'll probably just want to use something that works universally. That USB-C headset, I mean, it's able to plug into your phone and your laptop and your other places. So you think USB-C headphones are the thing? Do you make USB-C headphones right now? Not yet, but it's definitely on a roadmap. Okay. But again, so that headphone can be phone compatible, laptop compatible, and then hopefully in the future, like in cars and in airplanes, right? I mean, I hate nowadays when I'm traveling internationally, like to try to find a place to block my headsets thing.

Do you have a USBC? I just feel like I'm just asking about things I want you to build because you do a good job of them. Do you make a headphone dongle? USBC to 3.5. 3.5 headphone dangle. I don't recall we have one. But, okay, we're going to build one for you. Okay.

Well, I mean, that's a, I ask in all serious. I mean, first of all, I want one. So that would great. But I ask in all seriousness, until Google shipped the pixel three. There was actually not a great USBC headphone dongle on the market. I see. It was just like a missing product. And so that's why I keep in my eyes the idea.

You see the ecosystem changing. Yep. You see the standards changing. Yep. And the ecosystem has some like notable gaps in it. Yes. So USBC headphones is one notable gap. Yes.

USBC a dongle is sort of another notable gap. Yes. And so I'm wondering, how do you think about addressing these gaps in the market? And it sounds like you're saying, look, we're all just moving. on. Yep. So, like, these gaps are fine. No, no.

I mean, if we have enough engineers, so we'll attack this problems all. Yeah, yeah. But, you know, you don't, right? Right. So we have actually today about 700, you know, product managers and engineers today in house. We're still, you know, ramping it up.

Yeah. So it wouldn't actually from 400 something last year to have 700 this year. But again, as you said, there's still problems we haven't really, you know, addressed well. Right. Well, it just seems like you have. have the most considered opinion on how USBC should develop. And so the question is, do you try to make it solve all the old problems, or do you push into the future? At this point,

you can see it's primarily charging first, right? Because with charging, we haven't really released enough products to fill that spectrum yet. So going to audio, I think that's the next one, and that's someone we definitely will be there. Do you think Apple will switch from Lightning to USBC? Because everyone says that's the thing that'll do it. And I don't know if they ever will. You should ask them. You know, don't you? No, I honestly don't. I honestly don't.

I want to know, too. I mean, let me know the answers if you have. Yeah, there's an event coming up. We'll ask them for sure. It's remarkable that you've started a company. You started selling on Amazon. How do you think he went from where a direct consumer retailer of primarily Amazon to sort of this moment where you're having your first New York event?

Like, what was that path like? How did you build a brand to here? Is it all just word of mouth? Do you have to do marketing? When did you make the decision of I need to go stand on a stage and actually announce some new products? I think there's one perception that we felt that we had to change, which is Anchor's a power bank company. Yeah. Right?

Because still, like, you know, journalists were right, okay, so Anchor is this battery company out there. Well, we felt, I mean, this is no longer true for a few years, right? And so that's why we felt that, you know, with one event to showcase, you know, the different categories that Anchor is working on. I mean, Anchor Innovation is working on. We could better actually bring the general public an impression that how this company, what this company is about. And why do your own event and not go to like CES or something like that? We tried to actually CES.

You know, this year we had a booster. We're basically showcasing all the brands, but it's just too crowded, right? It's so hard to get the voice out there. I agree. Yeah, but this year, you know, we're trying to really just have our own stage and people here only for Anchor. So hopefully that will, you know, we'll bring, get the voice out. about how Anchor Innovation has now, you know, five brands working on charging, audio,

smart home, smart driving, smart projectors. Yeah. Smart driving. What's smart driving? That's the Rolf. Remember the Rolf Viva? That's actually the Alexa. Yeah, with Alexa.

How's that one going? Do you have one in your car? Yeah. Well, actually, so. Well, don't bring the question up, but, you know, I wish to if I were in the States. Okay. Oh, right, because Alexa doesn't work everywhere. I got it.

Okay. Fair answer. Fair out. And so the reason I ask for that is, do you think the path for anchor is to always sort of be leading in these accessories? Or is it to become a major consumer electronics brand? Would you make a phone? Would you make a television? Would you do all these things that the Sony's and Apple's and Googles of the world do?

That's a great question, actually. I would say it's quite a few times we're sort of about a problem. So we be making phones or even TVs. But if we do so, we definitely have to convince ourselves that we're bringing unique value to the table. If we're not, then we shouldn't be doing it. So with accessories, we do see a bunch of low-hanging opportunities out there. We actually, you know, companies are not doing good enough. But with phones, with TVs, I think, again, we yet have to figure out what additional value,

what uniqueness can we bring. because we just don't want to do MeToo products. So here's my last question. What don't people know about Anchor that they should know? Because it's still, we wrote a whole feature. Here's this company that you know about, but you don't know anything. We try to explore where you came from. But it still seems like you're the default option for power banks, honestly.

I mean, people, assuming you saw a lot of them. What don't they know about that business? Well, this is one thing, you know, I'd like people. I'm not sure if they know or not, but we actually do pay attention to every review that they live online. It's that we actually have product managers and quality engineers reads through every of them. So is that something you know?

No. I mean, I knew that you guys pay a lot of attention to those Amazon reviews. And I know that Amazon score for every product is life or death for the product. So I assume you paid attention. I don't know you read every single one. Yes. Just tens of thousands on some of these products. That's actually 350,000 last year.

Wow. More than that. That's crazy. Yeah. So you have to. Actually, we not only read the negative ones, but we also read the positive ones. Yeah. Because when people are happy about something, we also actually log it down.

So we have a system basically to lock down what each individual feature that people like in each review. Yeah. Right. So we can actually not only do qualitative studies, but also do quantitative studies on what people like. Yeah. So for example, we change the packaging. Like, let's say like 50% more people are talking. about it and they like about it, then we know it's right.

That's really cool. I mean, we also do focus groups. That's sort of way in the beginning of the product development cycle. But I mean, one thing we do is that before we enter in category, we'll just gather around all the reviews for the existing products. We'll try to quantize them and see, hey, how many people like this, how many like that, and so on and so forth. So that's kind of like a focus group and even more accurate. That's very cool. Well, it's been really interesting in chat with you today.

with you today. Thank you for taking so much time. Well, it's a pleasure, really. I think you know, you know so much about this world. And I think you are, again, generally interested in helping, I think, the world to be a better place. So I really hope there are more people like you out there. Wow, that's a lot to live on too. All right, I'm going to do my best. But first, I need that power brick with four USBs and a USBC headphone dongle. You'll get fun.

I'll help the world out for you, but I want that headphone dongle. All right. Thank you so much, Stephen. I really, really appreciate it. Same you. Thank you. Thank you. Stephen Yang from Anchor. It was really fun to talk to him, and hopefully we'll have him back on the show again soon. I want to know what you think of these interview episodes. Tweet at me. I'm at Reckless on Twitter. I want to know how you think they're going, and I would love to know who you want me to interview next. We'll see you later this week for the full-on verge cast, and we'll see you next week again with the interview episode.