Think Ironton doesn’t have a global business presence? Think again.

DropBox, Inc., is now partnering with SSD Drives, a division of the multi-billion dollar international corporation Parker Hannifin, to design and produce power conditioning systems (PCSs) and energy modules (EMs). DropBox is owned by Ironton natives, Robert and David Slagel.

Energy modules contain huge lithium-ion battery arrays capable of storing large amounts of energy; power conditioning systems contain SSD Drives’ gear, which connects to a power grid and tells the energy modules when to store power and when to release power.

“If we can establish these units at grids, they’ll help reduce power surges, and we won’t have blackouts,” DropBox general manager Matthew Vonderheide said. “Our coal plants will be able to load power slowly and not ramp up fast by using stored power from these units. And obviously this will promote renewable energy sources, as it can quite easily be made to store wind or solar energy. (It’s) like storing sunshine in a can.”

If outfitting a discarded 40-foot shipping container to hold intricate machinery was an engineering challenge, it was the kind of challenge that Parker executives said they knew DropBox could meet.

Lou Lambruschi, marketing services manager for Parker’s, said, “In addition to meeting Parker’s rigorous standards for the supply chain, another Parker division had a favorable experience with DropBox on a similar application. DropBox was also able to offer a cost effective solution while meeting a tight delivery schedule, and DropBox provided flexibility of design with their CAD and 3D modeling capabilities for our specific application.”

The DropBox team, under the guidance of Vonderheide and Robert Slagel, worked closely with the Parker team to design the unit. The end result is an extremely complex machine, but all contained inside what Vonderheide calls “a perfect structure.”

The shipping container not only holds large net loads, its standard size makes it easy to ship anywhere around world — and of course its reducing the carbon footprint by recycling several tons of steel that would otherwise sit unused for decades.

DropBox and Parker may seem as though their joint project is ahead of the curve, but officials with both companies contend the energy storage market is about to experience rapid growth and the work DropBox and Parker are doing has the potential to modernize infrastructure, increase conservation, protect the environment and not only increase energy supply, but entirely change the way energy was used.

“There are a huge array of different applications that you can put this in front of,” Robert said. “It’s good business, but it’s also good for our country, our planet and our future.”

Drop Box Inc. is located at 1805 N. Second St., Ironton.