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20 Years, CEO, Lessons Learned | Anza, Mike Hall

EO08:43Added Aug 31, 2026

Anza provides comprehensive data on solar panel pricing, enabling businesses to build long-term strategies that incorporate both pricing and risk management. In this video, we meet Mike Hall, CEO of Anza—a company that has partnered with an impressive 95% of the U.S. market—and delve into his entrepreneurial journey.

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Contributed by 刘嘉琪

Transcript

Transcript format

  1. Intro

  2. 00:00don't start a bakery if you love to bake
  3. 00:02if you love to code don't necessarily
  4. 00:03start a tech company if your passion is
  5. 00:06specific technology you might have a
  6. 00:08great idea you might not be happy in the
  7. 00:10long term being CEO yeah I'm Mike Hall
  8. 00:13I'm the CEO of Anza Anza is a data
  9. 00:17technology and services company focused
  10. 00:19on helping large-scale buyers of solar
  11. 00:22modules or solar panels we've actually
  12. 00:24got 95% of the US market partnering with
  13. 00:26us on the platform because I've been in
  14. 00:28this industry for over 20 years we
  15. 00:31really haven't evolved it's pretty
  16. 00:33complex Market the price of Solar
  17. 00:34modules the price of batteries can move
  18. 00:36up and down significantly month to month
  19. 00:38and sometimes even week to week there
  20. 00:40are tens and tens of different providers
  21. 00:42and they each have multiple products
  22. 00:43these sellers need to know hey today
  23. 00:46where does my product stand why don't we
  24. 00:48create databases instead of driving
  25. 00:50information out of PDFs and emails hey
  26. 00:52you log into our platform and you can
  27. 00:54see all the options right there in a few
  28. 00:56clicks on these large projects it's
  29. 00:58millions of dollars of value that's
  30. 01:00can't find unless you have this St and
  31. 01:01Technology what's taking right now weeks
  32. 01:03and months and we can do it in
  33. 01:12[Music]

  34. Leaving What I Loved, Finding What I Needed

  35. 01:20seconds when I started I used to go
  36. 01:22around the local community organizations
  37. 01:24and I would do a presentation on the US
  38. 01:27power supply maybe 45% came from coal
  39. 01:30you were to look at the slice that was
  40. 01:31renewable energy you couldn't even see
  41. 01:32it it was so so thin yeah the industry
  42. 01:35has grown 35,000 times literally 35,000
  43. 01:38times since we started basically all new
  44. 01:40generation in the US is renewable the
  45. 01:43cheapest source of new energy
  46. 01:44electrification of transportation and
  47. 01:46electric vehicles is really exciting it
  48. 01:48was fun to be very early in an industry
  49. 01:50there was a lot of energy and enthusiasm
  50. 01:52about it it was also hard though because
  51. 01:55nothing worked so like the first power
  52. 01:58converters we bought for example they
  53. 02:00had 100% failure rates everything that
  54. 02:02is easy now was much harder in the
  55. 02:05beginning but it was also small I'm
  56. 02:07being real our very first customers are
  57. 02:09family so I think my father was the
  58. 02:12first system my uncle was a second and
  59. 02:14we were basically going into people's
  60. 02:16homes and trying to sell them on you
  61. 02:18know 25 $50,000 rooftop systems i'
  62. 02:21probably pitch four or five homeowners a
  63. 02:23day actually go into people's houses and
  64. 02:25sit at their kitchen tables and none of
  65. 02:27them even knew people who had solar
  66. 02:29panels so they were all very early
  67. 02:30adopter so you had to explain everything
  68. 02:32you had to convince them that it was
  69. 02:33going to work Grew From just a few of us
  70. 02:36doing this to actually like an
  71. 02:37Enterprise with employees the good times
  72. 02:39and the wins are a little bit like a
  73. 02:41drug you know you're just like searching
  74. 02:42for the next one if you ask customers
  75. 02:44about their problems they might not
  76. 02:45always be able to name them dayto day
  77. 02:47they're just like oh it's not a problem
  78. 02:49because that's how I do it but they
  79. 02:50might not realize how much opportunity
  80. 02:52they're missing focus on the industry
  81. 02:54you know best go out and talk to
  82. 02:56customers and validate that you really
  83. 02:57do have something how do you do this
  84. 02:59thing a really great question is how
  85. 03:01long does it take simple question but
  86. 03:03there's there's actually two different
  87. 03:04questions there is how many hours does
  88. 03:06it take you process time and then how
  89. 03:08long does it take on the calendar how
  90. 03:09long does the clock both of those are
  91. 03:11potential sources of waste somebody too
  92. 03:13long to actually like do the task a task
  93. 03:15can take too long to get done because
  94. 03:17collaboration is slow weight times are
  95. 03:19long how much does something cost how
  96. 03:20many times you have to do something over
  97. 03:22and over again and whenever you find
  98. 03:23waste you've got a problem to solve the
  99. 03:25thing that you started with and might be
  100. 03:26successful in the beginning might not be
  101. 03:28successful forever and you may have to
  102. 03:30make some hard decisions to just move on
  103. 03:32thing that you might have loved that's
  104. 03:34what happened for us residential market
  105. 03:36like installing solar on people's homes
  106. 03:37that become so competitive our margins
  107. 03:40started to compress took like a year
  108. 03:42year and a half trying to do everything
  109. 03:44we could to turn it around we kind of
  110. 03:46had two choices we could just continue
  111. 03:48to chase the competition down or we
  112. 03:51could look for another Market these
  113. 03:53bigger projects were higher leverage
  114. 03:55with fewer people per dollar whereas the
  115. 03:57other one is so human capital intensive
  116. 03:59and so we had the glimpses of a new
  117. 04:01exciting Niche within the project and
  118. 04:03customer base we already had we just
  119. 04:05needed to put all our Focus there and
  120. 04:07ultimately we made the hard decision to
  121. 04:09get out of the business entirely we
  122. 04:11actually sold that whole business unit
  123. 04:12off we were 165 people then about 120 of
  124. 04:16them worked in that business we
  125. 04:18overnight went from 165 person company
  126. 04:20to a 45 person company as those problems
  127. 04:23changed our projects types changed but
  128. 04:25also our business changed we negotiate
  129. 04:28with the utility and the local
  130. 04:29authorities to do a large project here
  131. 04:31it's really hard to go from something
  132. 04:33you know really well to something you
  133. 04:35don't know at all we hadn't done that
  134. 04:36I'm not sure the company would have

  135. To Know the Right Price, Ask the Right Questions

  136. 04:41survived best way to figure out what the
  137. 04:43price is to have those awkward
  138. 04:45conversation with customers and
  139. 04:47potential customers about their
  140. 04:48willingness to pay and that's the right
  141. 04:50way to do it anything else is just
  142. 04:52guessing I think people do it backwards
  143. 04:54a lot where they arrive at their pricing
  144. 04:56because that's what they need to have in
  145. 04:58their business model to hit their
  146. 04:59forecast or they could price based on
  147. 05:01cost but that can be completely
  148. 05:03disconnected from what the market is
  149. 05:04willing to pay the first thing you have
  150. 05:06to establish is how is your Market
  151. 05:08segmented are they even interested in
  152. 05:10the product you want to sell one of the
  153. 05:12most important questions that I don't
  154. 05:14think people talk about enough we're
  155. 05:16going through this right now with a
  156. 05:17product launch we're doing in September
  157. 05:19okay if we were to charge
  158. 05:21$30,000 what number would you give that
  159. 05:23price and there's actually macro data on
  160. 05:26if they give you a five they're like 80%
  161. 05:28chance they'll actually buy if they give
  162. 05:30you a four it might be a 50% chance
  163. 05:32they'll buy it if you're getting all
  164. 05:33ones and twos you're probably
  165. 05:35overpricing it and then from there once
  166. 05:37they've said hey I am willing to pay
  167. 05:38that's binary so then you can ask them
  168. 05:40the next question about how much if you
  169. 05:42get a lot of data you might be able to
  170. 05:44start to find price Cliffs where a
  171. 05:47psychological thing that happens at that
  172. 05:49price point humans don't actually
  173. 05:50respond rationally to pricing but you
  174. 05:52also are going to have to move forwarder
  175. 05:53than perfect data at some point almost
  176. 05:55no one has the money to get perfect data
  177. 05:58I'd also be careful about just saying
  178. 06:00what are you willing to pay because
  179. 06:01customers tend to give you a small
  180. 06:03number because they think they're in a
  181. 06:05price negotiation even though they're
  182. 06:06not you may want to Anchor them and then
  183. 06:08have them respond to your anchor margins
  184. 06:10are a different question and it really
  185. 06:12speaks to your strategy if you really
  186. 06:14have a genuine case that high amount of
  187. 06:17market share High penetration is going
  188. 06:19to in and of itself create a competitive
  189. 06:22Advantage you probably just need to
  190. 06:23price at whatever it takes to get that
  191. 06:26market share if that's not the case you
  192. 06:28need to price so that your unit
  193. 06:30economics are profitable I mean you may
  194. 06:33spend more than your gross margin on R&D
  195. 06:35and sales and that's fine you know if
  196. 06:37it's taking you two years to recover
  197. 06:39your cost of sales you've got problem I
  198. 06:41see a lot of companies that price to
  199. 06:44gain market share but don't necessarily
  200. 06:46have a great story for how that market
  201. 06:48share is going to deliver a long-term
  202. 06:50competitive

  203. Why Star Players Don't Always Make Great CEOs

  204. 06:54Advantage I mean I love my job I think
  205. 06:57it's a lot of fun it's also tiring not
  206. 06:59all the work is yours to do but all the
  207. 07:01responsibility is yours so you wake up
  208. 07:03with it you go to bed with it you think
  209. 07:05about it in the shower as a CEO your job
  210. 07:08is to make those tough calls it's not a
  211. 07:10democracy if you ask everybody to vote
  212. 07:13they will probably vote to maintain the
  213. 07:15status quo because the unknown is so
  214. 07:17scary but if you don't make a decision
  215. 07:19to change then you're making the
  216. 07:21decision to stay hey you have a lot of
  217. 07:23employees who you're loyal to and you
  218. 07:25have shareholders who may have wanted
  219. 07:27you to hit some number sometimes there's
  220. 07:29going to be tension between that's
  221. 07:31what's tough and I don't have a great
  222. 07:32formula for that how do you separate
  223. 07:35your own attachment and other people's
  224. 07:37attachment of the status quo from what
  225. 07:39you believe to be right to sometimes
  226. 07:41persist stand on that Hill whether to
  227. 07:43keep going or to make a big change of
  228. 07:46course and you're the only one who can
  229. 07:47make that decision well I'd say the
  230. 07:49hardest part if you were the Superstar
  231. 07:52individual contributor and now you're
  232. 07:54trying to be a leader you're just trying
  233. 07:56to set up the infrastructure and the
  234. 07:57culture so that someone else can close a
  235. 07:59big deal or deliver the product on time
  236. 08:01that can be a difficult transition many
  237. 08:03people who used to work with me have
  238. 08:04gone and started their own companies and
  239. 08:06I think this is one of the most
  240. 08:07fundamental challenges they have just
  241. 08:09kind of emotionally they were all star
  242. 08:11performers individually and now all the
  243. 08:14credit should be going to someone else
  244. 08:15your job is to create the environment so
  245. 08:17that they can be successful not that you
  246. 08:18can be successful don't start a bakery
  247. 08:20if you love to bake if you love to code
  248. 08:22don't necessarily start a tech company
  249. 08:24if your passion is a specific technology
  250. 08:27you might have a great idea you might
  251. 08:29not be happy in the longterm being CEO