From Hypothesis to High-Growth Startup: Building Resolv Rebates

In our latest CleanStart Perspective, I had the chance to sit down with Sam Ruderman, co-founder of Resolv Rebates, to dig into his entrepreneurial journey of how he validated his idea, built early traction, and leveraged relationships to launch one of the most interesting clean-energy startups I’ve seen in a while.

From the first minute of our conversation, Sam’s enthusiasm for the energy transition was obvious. As he put it, “We started Resolv to make it way easier, way more accessible to leverage clean energy incentives.” He’s not wrong; most people have no idea how many rebates are out there or how complicated they can be to access.

Understanding the Lived Pain Point

One thing I really appreciated about Sam’s story is that Resolv didn’t come from a whiteboard brainstorming session. It came from years of lived experience. Early in his career, he was the guy contractors called when they were buried in paperwork.

As he told me, “My first job out of college… a lot of my job was just walking contractors through the process of finding the programs and understanding them… and then I’d actually do the rebate paperwork for them.” Pen on paper, PDFs, missing documents, you know, the classic mess.

That experience turned into the hypothesis behind Resolv: if you can automate all the frustrating parts, you unlock more clean energy projects, faster.

The Power of Network and Relationships

For entrepreneurs, your network isn’t just nice to have, it’s part of your traction and where you can build a team. Resolv is a perfect example.

Sam spent six years building relationships across utilities, local governments, agencies, and contractors. And when the moment came to test his idea, those same people opened doors: A year or so before Resolv, Sam met Shane Smith, who would become his Co-founder, and connected over how much money was getting left on the table by contractors.

One day, Sam got a call from Shane saying he had given his employer notice and they were going to start a company.

“I was like, holy smokes, I want to make sure that this is real for him and real for me.So, the plan became… my plan became, start calling contractors, right? Like, I gotta really do the validation.”

He set out to conduct customer interviews and validate their hypotheses. It wasn’t easy. Some days he would reach out to 20 contractors and get no response. Eventually it paid off with one contractor practically demanding a solution and saying they would pay.

These early conversations also revealed unexpected opportunities, like adapting Resolv’s contractor platform for utilities and public agencies. That came directly from someone in his network sharing a California Decarbonization email listserv discussion of industry professionals where a large utilities director of programs fantasized about “a solution that would find all the rebates, qualify them, do the paperwork for the contractor, send the homeowner whatever they need”… which is what Resolv does.

Validating → Selling

When I talk with founders, I often remind them that building a company starts with validating your assumptions. Sam did exactly that. Before Resolv had paying customers, it had partners—contractors who helped test, break, and improve the earliest prototypes.

“You can never get enough customer or partner feedback,” he told me. “Once we started actually selling… that’s when you really learn.”

Their early builds were shaped by five core contractors, then by beta testers across California. Today, most contractors can submit multiple rebates in just minutes rather than hours. That’s real validation.

Today, Resolv works with 85–90 contractors, has a growing team, and is preparing to expand nationally. As Sam shared, “It’s really cool right now to be able to say [revenue] is going well…”

That kind of momentum doesn’t come from luck—it comes from deep problem understanding, a validated solution, and a strong network.

🎥 If you missed the conversation, watch the full discussion on CleanStart’s YouTube channel.
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