Gibss

Green India Building Systems and Services Pvt Ltd (GIBSS) is a Mumbai-headquartered clean technology company that designs and installs geothermal (geo-exchange) air conditioning systems for industrial, institutional and commercial buildings in India. Its systems use the ground as a heat source or heat sink, exploiting stable subsurface temperatures to improve the thermal gradient for heat transfer and thereby cut air conditioning energy consumption. Because heat is rejected by conduction and convection rather than by evaporation in cooling towers, the company states the approach also eliminates the water losses associated with conventional systems.

Beyond geothermal cooling, GIBSS markets a broader suite of energy-efficiency products including hot water co-generation and LED/induction lighting, positioning these as demand-side measures that can be combined with supply-side solutions such as solar to move buildings toward net zero energy. The company reports four patent filings covering geothermal strategies, design and a geothermal vault, copyrighted ground thermal and hydrological data for 29 Indian cities, in-house geothermal vault manufacturing that it says reduces project execution cycle time by about 30 percent, and a team including 11 IGSHPA-accredited geothermal specialists. It describes itself as a participant in national geothermal policy discussions with India's Ministry of New and Renewable Energy and Ministry of Water Resources.

Founding story

Co-founders Arun Shenoy and Mandar Kaprekar met at TRANE's India operations. Shenoy holds a master's degree in mechanical engineering from Oklahoma State University with a specialisation in geothermal systems and had worked at US geothermal heat pump manufacturer ClimateMaster and at TRANE in the US and India, moving to India in 2008. Kaprekar, an alumnus of Mumbai University and IIM Bangalore, had spent more than 15 years in building systems, geo-exchange and district heating and cooling across India, the UAE and the United States before returning from the Middle East to start a venture. The two decided to pursue the GIBSS concept in February 2009, drawing on a combined two decades of exposure to geothermal technology; the company began operations in April 2010 from an apartment living room. Reports variously date the founding to 2009 and 2010.

Business model

GIBSS delivers turnkey design and installation of geothermal air conditioning and related energy-efficiency systems. To lower adoption barriers it offers a zero-initial-investment "pay from savings" model in which customers pay out of realised energy savings rather than upfront, backed by performance bank guarantees. It also offers buy-back of customers' existing equipment routed into an e-waste management ecosystem, and stocks spares locally to minimise downtime in smaller towns.

Revenue derives from turnkey geothermal air conditioning projects and complementary efficiency products, including arrangements in which customers pay from guaranteed operating-cost savings rather than an upfront capital outlay.

Traction

As of 2015-2016 the company reported deployments in more than 400 buildings across India, more than 75 large customers, annual savings of over eight million electrical units, reduction of over 150 million litres of water consumption, roughly 90 employees and 40X growth from its bootstrapped beginnings.

Latest developments

In August 2015 GIBSS announced a Series A round from Zurich-based social investor responsAbility with participation from existing investor Infuse Ventures, following an April 2015 investment by Infuse Ventures under which Infuse CEO Kunal Upadhyay joined the GIBSS board. Proceeds were earmarked for faster scaling of its geothermal cooling business.