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After four years as CEO, Remco is handing over day-to-day leadership to Christiaan van der Waal. He stays closely involved as Smart Grids Director, a strategic growth area where he can put his entrepreneurial drive and technical knowledge to full use.
“This isn’t about me,” Remco explains. “It’s about the company. You have to look at what the company needs right now.” That conviction is the basis for the leadership transition at Tibo Energy.
Shifting demands
When Tibo Energy was founded in 2022, the focus was mainly on building a product and finding a place in an energy market that changes fast. In four years the company grew into a full Energy Management System (EMS) that around 150 businesses use every day to control batteries, solar panels and charging infrastructure intelligently. Lidl, Intratuin, DHL and Thermofisher are among the companies running on Tibo EMS.
That changed what the business was being asked for, Remco says. “The first years were about pioneering, experimenting and opening up new markets. Now the attention is shifting to scaling up.” That calls for different choices, and so for different leadership. “As an entrepreneur I know by now where my strengths lie. I love building something from scratch. But at a certain point the CEO role changes. Suddenly it is much more about structure, processes and scale. In truth, I knew from the day we founded the company that this moment would come. The question was never whether I would hand over, but when.”
Open from the first conversation
That moment has now arrived. Together with its investors, Tibo Energy went looking for a new CEO who could build out the course already set. That search brought Christiaan van der Waal to Tibo. His career has been spent entirely in tech.
At FedEx he built the product and tech team behind the global online shipping operations of TNT and FedEx, a platform that serves hundreds of thousands of businesses worldwide and accounts for billions in online revenue. He then succeeded a founder at B2B SaaS company Relay42, where he prepared the business for its next growth phase and an exit. That experience stood out, and Christiaan was invited in for a conversation.
The enthusiasm and the interest turned out to be entirely mutual. “What struck me from the first conversation was how open Remco was,” Christiaan says. “He had known for some time that a moment would come when someone else should take the company further. When you meet that kind of self-reflection and openness, you know straight away that a good working relationship is possible.”
He saw the same openness on the shop floor. In his first conversations with employees, it struck him that colleagues are willing to hold each other to account and to look critically at their own work. “You don’t find that everywhere. People here say honestly what is going well, and also what could be better. That is a culture you want to keep as the company grows.”
Which is why the collaboration between the two does not end with the handover of the CEO title. Quite the opposite. Remco stays closely involved in strategy and turns his full attention to smart grids and energy hubs: complex energy systems in which several businesses make intelligent joint use of the capacity available to them.
That combination is exactly what makes the role so unusual, and so interesting, for Christiaan. “In my previous role the founder could be far less involved after the handover. Here I can keep building on the knowledge and experience of someone who has built the company up from day one. That is worth a great deal.”
The Netherlands as a springboard
Christiaan: “The Netherlands is one of the countries where grid congestion is most urgent. That forces businesses to make more intelligent use of their existing electricity connection. Out of that necessity comes real innovation, which means what is developed here runs ahead of many other European markets.”
So the ambition reaches well beyond the Dutch market. “What we develop in the Netherlands will become relevant in other countries over the next few years. That gives us a rare starting position. The goal is to grow into the trusted name in energy management in Europe. Not by simply growing faster, but by making sharper choices and maturing as a business.”
The courage to choose
For Remco, maturing as a company also means setting clear goals and no longer chasing everything at once. “You have to dare to choose. In the early phase you try a lot: you want to serve different markets and explore opportunities. But a moment comes when you have to show your colours. You then have to make it very clear what customers should come to Tibo Energy for.”
That is also where he sees the difference between himself and his successor. “Where I, as an entrepreneur, naturally see opportunities everywhere, Christiaan brings them back to a short set of strategic priorities. I think it is impressive that he can do that. My own list is always much longer. Which is precisely why he is the right person for this phase.”
Christiaan sees two large tasks ahead of him. “The first is to develop the product into the platform of choice for businesses that want to standardise their energy management across multiple sites. The second is international expansion. The product has proved itself. Now we have to build the organisation and the commercial engine around it.”
Ambitions stay high
The management team is currently working on the course towards 2030. The point on the horizon is clear: Tibo Energy should grow into the trusted name in energy management in Europe. Not only with a strong product, but with an organisation that can carry the growth.
Remco looks a little further ahead still. “The European market is still fragmented, with a lot of small players each solving part of the puzzle. I expect a wave of acquisitions over the coming years. My ambition is for Tibo to play a leading role in it.”
That ambition is a high one, Christiaan acknowledges too. In his view, though, it does not start with acquisitions or market share, but with building the right organisation. “We’re holding gold,” he says. “The product is proven, we have picked up an enormous amount of knowledge, and the team is hugely driven. My job is to make sure all that knowledge and experience comes into its own at scale.”
The new division of roles shows that Tibo Energy is entering a next phase. One of them helped build the company over its first four years; the other now has to help it grow into a European player. Not as each other’s replacements, but as two leaders working towards precisely the same goal, each from their own strengths.
Words Paul Geraedts | Photography Loraine Bodewes
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