Modernizing Energy Supply With Predictive Transformer Monitoring: Inside Joseph Kao's Journey Building Magnefy

You might not think of transformers every day, but they play a critical role in our power infrastructure, helping run everything from neighborhood power grids to airports and hospitals. 

But many transformers across the world are expiring past their “best by” date. They’ve been in action for decades, and are becoming the “ticking time bombs” on the utility grid. We saw the consequences of this recently—transformer failure at London Heathrow shut down the airport for an entire day, resulting in a loss of tens of millions of pounds. 

Having become immersed in energy supply and power infrastructure while working at Apple and studying at Stanford Business School, material engineer Joseph Kao knew that better monitoring and efficiency would be critical to managing energy in the long run. So he set out to build Magnefy and bring AI-powered predictive monitoring to critical electrical infrastructure.

Introducing Magnefy: Predictive Monitoring for Critical Grid Infrastructure

Magnefy uses AI and electromagnetic sensing technology to detect early anomalies in transformers. This helps organizations monitor the health of their systems and prevent costly outages. 

Traditionally, organizations have used Dissolved Gas Analysis (DGA) to assess transformer health, which consists of collecting oil samples and performing chemical analysis. But this approach is costly, indirect, and can’t be performed continuously, leading to incomplete monitoring. “Dissolved gas analysis requires engineers to go into the building and manually collect an oil sample from inside the transformer tank,” Joseph explains. “There are some challenges here. It's not continuous, to begin with, and it can be costly. And it's not insightful because it's indirect—it's using a chemical way to understand the electrical equipment's health.”

Magnefy, on the other hand, uses high-frequency electromagnetic sensors to assess transformer health in real time. Data is then aggregated into a sensor-agnostic, AI-powered analytics platform that allows organizations to monitor risk ranking, maintenance insights, and more. 

The team is currently partnering with mission-critical facilities such as hospitals, data centers, and independent power producers, helping them analyze transformer health and prevent costly outages. Having only launched one year ago, Magnefy just raised $1.8 million in pre-seed funding and already has 3-4 paid pilots in progress.

Joseph’s Journey to Magnefy

Although Joseph came to Magnefy by way of Apple and Stanford, he grew up a world away from Silicon Valley, in Taiwan. Raised by grandparents who had escaped China during the civil war, Joseph was brought up to believe that every resource is valuable. From volunteering at neighborhood recycling plants, Joseph developed an interest in materials science, and moved to the US to study the practice at UC Berkeley, earning a PhD in Material Science with a focus on plastics. 

After studying, Joseph moved into tech, first at unicorn startup Carbon and later at Facebook and Apple. During his time at Apple, Joseph was the lead engineer for the Apple Vision Pro lens module and advisor on Apple’s Zero Waste Initiative. These responsibilities led him to explore material sourcing and identify opportunities for efficiency in the organization’s supply chain. He soon recognized an insight—focusing on improving resource utilization allowed him to marry his innate belief in resourcefulness with his expertise in materials science. 

Joseph decided to leave his full-time role and attend Stanford Business School with the aim of building a company related to energy and supply management. He began with a focus on battery recycling and repurposing, setting out to build a solution that would help people use retired EV/solar batteries for other storage purposes. But after experiencing go-to-market challenges, a customer discovery call led to a vital pivot—renewable energy and utilities kept experiencing transformer failures, but had no tools for predictive monitoring.

So Joseph transitioned to build what is now Magnefy, aiming to maximize resource utilization through optimizing transformer lifetimes. In the long run, Joseph aspires for Magnefy to become the single source of truth for critical electrical equipment health, expanding beyond transformers to switchgear, UPS systems, batteries, generators, with the ultimate goals of minimizing power outages, maximizing renewable energy delivery, and promoting energy equity in the developing world.

Joseph’s Advice for Fellow Founders

As a solo founder, Joseph has had to navigate the ups-and-downs of his founder journey on his own. He emphasizes that it’s important for solo founders to believe in themselves—”As solo founders, we’re more powerful than we think,” he explains. “Believing that your vision and mission really matter really gives you strength."

At the same time, he encourages founders to ask for help when they need it, especially if they’re solo. “Finding the right advisor early on can really help. In addition to your own belief, having an advisor that believes in you, who knows the industry and can be your sounding board, is so helpful."

To learn more about Joseph’s journey, you can follow him on LinkedIn and visit magnefy.com/