BrightSource Energy Inc. designs solar thermal energy plants for electric utilities and companies. Founded in 2006, the Oakland-based company developed proprietary technology to convert solar energy into high-temperature steam to produce renewable electricity. Its major customers include Pacific Gas and Electric Co. and Southern California Edison, two of California’s largest electric utilities. It also has operations in Israel and South Africa. The company had planned to go public this spring but canceled its IPO in April.
THE QUICK BIO
Daniel Judge became general counsel and corporate secretary of BrightSource in 2008. From a family of lawyers and a 1985 Stanford University graduate, he took a year off after college to tour Africa and Asia, sparking a lifetime passion for travel. He graduated from UC-Berkeley School of Law in 1989 and went straight to Orrick, Herrington & Sutcliffe, where he specialized in corporate securities, project finance and commercial finance law. In 1994 he was seconded to one of Orrick’s Japanese clients for a year, which sparked his interest in going in house. “Putting transactions and deals together felt like a more productive use of my skills,” said Judge. In 1998 he became vice president and senior counsel at San Francisco-based Bechtel Enterprises, the infrastructure project development and investment division of Bechtel Corp. and focused his attention on the development and financing of airports, bridges, water systems and power projects, an area he had first explored during his year in Tokyo.
