Thank you to the amazing climate founders, investors, and industry leaders who joined us at the second annual San Francisco Climate Week for 'From Seed to Scale - Insights from Planeteer, Nexus, S2G, and Generate Capital'. Talisman hosted a climate investment-focused panel with Hannah Friedman of Planeteer Capital, Joshua Kaufman of Nexus Development Capital, Andrea Woodside of S2G Ventures, Christian Okoye of Generate Capital, moderated by Tom Perkin of talisman. We heard insights from these climate investors operating at Seed, A, B, C and further along the lifecycle. Read our key climate finance insights from the panel below.
Key Takeaways from the Panel:
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Investor Criteria for Founders: Investors look for founders who demonstrate hunger, deep industry knowledge, humility (adaptability and resilience), and empathetic listening skills (understanding customer needs). They also value a track record of developing projects and scaled technology, clear market advantage, and well-developed projects or pathways.
- Talent and Investment Decision Making: Talent is a critical factor in investment decision-making, especially at the early stages. Founders with industry veterans and strategic finance professionals on their team are more highly valued. As companies scale, there's a need to augment the management team to be more well-rounded.
- Risk Appetite and Mitigation: While investors are open to execution risks, they generally avoid technical and policy risks, apart from one panelist willing to take regulatory risks. Effective strategies include focusing on distributed assets and structuring financing facilities well.
- Growth Challenges in Climate-Tech: Hannah from Planeteer Capital is encouraged by the collaboration & participation of strategic corporations in the funding rounds - Highlighting the tailwinds and the demand for purchasing power of some of the largest corporations. We need to get institutional capital, philanthropic capital, corporate and strategic capital coordinated in a way so that 'first-of-a-kind' stage can flourish.
Thank you to the expert panel for sharing their knowledge:
Hannah Friedman of Planeteer Capital
Joshua Kaufman of Nexus Development Capital
Andrea Woodside of S2G Ventures
Christian Okoye of Generate
Thank you to Epic Cleantec for providing the brews for this event - Made from greywater recycled from showers, laundry, and bathroom sinks in a 40-story San Francisco apartment building, where Epic has onsite equipment to capture, treat, and reuse water for non-drinking purposes. Who knew being eco-friendly could taste so good? Thank you to all of the volunteers and organizations who made the 2nd annual San Francisco Climate Week possible. We look forward to supporting organizations in scaling innovative solutions in the clean energy, sustainability, & climate sectors.