About the Author: Nolan Gray is a Silicon Valley SaaS exec turned ClimateTech entrepreneur and investor. American-born and based in London, Gray was selected in 2020 for Forbes 30 Under 30 in Europe. He is co-founder of Svea Solar, a pan-European digital energy innovator that has eliminated millions of tons of CO2. The company has generated $130 million in revenue, while raising $31 million, with more than 500 employees. Previously, Nolan served as CMO at Jobscience, a San Francisco-based SaaS company sold to Bullhorn, owned by Vista Equity Partners, for $50 million. He has helped raise over $80 million for multiple SaaS and ClimateTech startups in the U.S. and Europe, and has made a series of impact investments.
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Why ClimateTech is Bound to Blow Away Cleantech
[1600 words]
Cleantech was a rebrand of greentech, which failed out of the gate at the turn of the millennium. In two decades of cleantech, there have been ups and downs. The new kid on the block is called ClimateTech. Is it a rebrand, a sub-sector, or something new and dramatic? We’ll scan the space from an investor’s perspective. We’ll evaluate the distinctions as well as the common ground of cleantech and ClimateTech, their risks and potential rewards.
How Big can the Perfect Storm of ClimateTech Grow?
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How big is the ClimateTech market? Reviewing the literature, we come across the data that by 2023, total investment in the ClimateTech and cleantech sectors is expected to reach $6.4 trillion. Dig a little deeper into this number and you find that it is taken from a 2014 study by the World Bank focused on developing countries. Bearing in mind that in 2014 the industry was still a wreck from a VC perspective, what is the true potential of the coming ClimateTech storm?
Eight Factors that can Birth the Next ClimateTech Unicorn
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The transnational push to net-zero, sealed in the Paris Accords and boosted by COP26 in Glasgow, is a long-term global commitment pulling the weight of the world’s most powerful nations. That three-decade agenda provides a sustained tail-wind for ventures which contribute toward the consensus goal, pressuring countries and companies to deliver on their promises or be left behind — and heavily fined. Here are some make-or-break factors likely to separate ClimateTech winners from the also-rans.
Five Red Flags to Watch for When Investing in ClimateTech
[1200 words]
VCs are more pressured than ever before to make impact investments. With 19 billion invested in startups in the first three quarters of 2021, ClimateTech is an attractive sector, not just in terms of ESG reports but in terms of pure profit potential. But due diligence is especially essential in this young fast growing sector. Here are some warning signs which would-be investors in this space will want to watch out for.
Three Customer Camps ClimateTech Companies Must Corral
[1400 words]
There are three camps of customers for ClimateTech startups, similar but not identical to those of CleanTech. Startup and growth company executives, and those who invest in them, would be wise to avoid the trap of focusing on one at the expense of the others. To do so would not only neglect key slices of the total addressable market: it would cripple the ecosystem synergies and network effects essential to scaling up a unicorn.