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How Bulb’s blowout left taxpayers with a £2bn energy bill

The inside story of how two City traders created a trendy power company feted by the PM — until the lights went out

The Sunday Times

Wednesday afternoons were rowdy at the Bulb offices on Bishopsgate in the City. Staff in the glass-fronted building lined up in two groups for a frenzied reminder of the company mission. “Lower bills, lower CO2,” they shouted, getting louder each time.

It was a scene more typical of a trendy tech company than a power supplier, but Bulb’s young founders were keen to distinguish it from the old-fashioned energy giants, which had a reputation for ripping-off customers.

Its offices were filled with expensive plants, staffed by excited young graduates hired on the promise of disrupting a cumbersome industry, and led by a pair of entrepreneurs who had raised hundreds of millions from investors won over by their mission to provide greener energy at cheaper prices.