How Validika Built a $100M Battery Analytics Business by Being ‘Second Line’: A Case Study in Strategic Positioning

Most startup playbooks recommend owning the customer relationship at all costs. But what if the fastest path to scale is deliberately choosing not to? In a recent episode of Category Visionaries, Validika Diagnostics founder Claudius Jehle revealed how this counterintuitive choice helped his battery analytics platform monitor over a gigawatt hour of batteries across multiple continents.

The Strategic Choice to Be Invisible

Early in Validika’s journey, they made a decision that would shape their entire go-to-market strategy: rather than building a standalone platform, they would integrate their technology into existing systems. “We early on decided the software that we’re developing must be integratable into existing fleet management systems, into existing processes in the utility company,” Claudius explains.

This wasn’t just a technical decision – it was a fundamental strategic choice about their position in the market. As Claudius puts it, “We think that the battery itself will become a commodity, and thus information around the battery must become a commodity.” This insight led them to focus on making their technology both affordable and easily accessible through existing channels.

The Technical Foundation

This “second line” strategy required a specific technical approach. “Early on we decided tech wise to focus on APIs, well documented API and guidelines for partners to integrate our insights that we deliver into their product,” Claudius notes. By building their platform to be easily embeddable, they could reach users through the interfaces they were already using.

The Trade-offs of Being Second Line

This approach comes with clear challenges. “Very bluntly speaking, you’re at the mercy of your reseller. If they are big, you have to embed yourself into them,” Claudius acknowledges. “You’re not on the front line speaking to the beneficiary or the user. They are always in between you.”

But these trade-offs are balanced against powerful benefits. As Claudius explains, partnering with established players can be “a great multiplier.” By integrating with existing fleet management systems and utility company processes, Validika can reach more users faster than they could through direct sales.

Building Trust Through Technical Excellence

For this strategy to work, technical credibility becomes crucial. “We are dealing with a very complex technological component. So the market and early adopters and everyone needs to trust you. So you need to come up with a trustable story and not just marketing alone,” Claudius emphasizes.

Rather than relying on traditional marketing, they focused on building technical trust through industry presence. “For me, early adopters and finding interested people, my recipe would be to speak at as many events and exhibitions as possible,” Claudius shares.

The Scale Benefits of Being Second Line

This positioning has enabled Validika to scale across multiple sectors and geographies. Today, they monitor batteries in “containers in the desert of Texas, south of Dallas, in Arizona, and in Mexico City. We are monitoring buses in Mexico City and in the Netherlands, and in Germany, and in Sweden and Norway and in Canada.”

Their vision extends even further. “We want to be global. We don’t necessarily want to be in the front line, but we want that most battery information, battery health information, particularly for heavily used batteries, will be provided by us in the background,” Claudius explains.

When to Consider Being Second Line

Validika’s experience suggests that being “second line” can be particularly powerful when:

1. Your technology addresses a specific, complex problem within a broader workflow
2. Integration with existing systems would make adoption significantly easier
3. Channel partners can provide faster access to your target market
4. Your solution would be more valuable as part of existing platforms
5. Technical trust is more important than brand recognition

For B2B founders, Validika’s journey offers an important strategic lesson: sometimes, the fastest path to scale isn’t through owning the customer relationship, but through becoming an essential, invisible layer in the industry’s infrastructure. As Claudius puts it, “This can easily grow our company and the product… to dozens, if not plus $100 million business SaaS business easily.” Sometimes, the key to building a category-leading company is choosing not to be seen.