🛫 Last week, meeting one of our portfolio company in San Francisco! 🇺🇸
For Climate Tech Day (08/05), we got the first-ever 52 degrees recorded heatwave in SEA. So we decided to get the f. out to some cooler climates... What better than a nice spring time in the U.S. ?
Climate Tech Day: We are receiving incredible feedbacks 😘
Alongside 170+ investors interested to fund a new era in South East Asia, we wrote history with a conference gathering nearly $1b in the room, from corporate venture capitals, family offices, and angel investors money around the theme of « Decarbonizing Megacities 🌏 ».
We are now gathering feedbacks and ideas from the conglomerates and investors we got the chance to have speaking at the event to define what is next for the Climate Tech Coalition.
Discover Atlas Capital’s portfolio company: Posh Robotics
US portfolio roadshow - field notes:
After spending 2 weeks in the US this time, here are some of my field notes:
🤵🏾♂️ So, after everything that happened (Black Lives Matters, Trump fans taking over the capitol, the Woke thingy…) since my last trip in the US pre-pandemic I was pretty anxious of geeting back to the US. Would I get shot as a black guy? Would I see an apocalyptic San Francisco full of homeless? I have th admit at the contrary, SF was pretty clean… At least on the streets I walked…
👾 Otherwise there is something invisible in the streets that I learned about SF, that I need to share with you here as a sideline, this is how AI is really taking over most of the tech folks conversations in the US — Mainly because of this new — be careful this will change your perception of tech on many levels.
💸 So yeah, aside of the hype about Generative AI, lots of discussions around Carbon Capture... I just learned from my friend, the share of global emissions covered by carbon taxes and emissions trading systems (ETSs) has grown from 7% to around 23%.
🚂 Several other VCs I had the chance to discuss with (DCVC for example), strongly believe that AI is reaching its inflection point next 2 years, and this could be as impactful as the introduction of steam engines in the XIXs.
🤖 While most people think AI will just take jobs, AI experts and the most sophisticated AI users talk instead of AI “Co-Piloting” workers in their tasks, enabling them to do in 10 minutes what could have been done in a few hours (check out how sneaky developers have been using Github Co-pilot for a while now without getting fired to understand what we mean here). The complete replacement of humans by robots is worrisome of course but still a decade away (Pfiou!).
🌳 In the US, the Inflation Reduction Act (IRA) passed last year, allocating more than 370 billion in funding to mitigate climate change— the largest investment for climate ever made in US history — while in Europe, the EU Green Deal could potentially dedicate more than 1 trillion in public and private funds to the race towards decarbonization and climate adaptation.
🌱 In fact, due to the Russian war, nations have been accelerating their deployment of infrastructures resilient to the fluctuations of oil and gas prices. The case of renewable becomes a stake of national strategic independence. Mckinsey estimates that the new race towards decarbonization and climate adaptation could be reaching a market size of 9 to 12 trillion in annual investments by 2030.
📈 If we separate the ESG investments and decide to zoom in specifically on climate-oriented equity investments, here is the breakdown of the evolution of the areas of interest since 2017. Within, we can note the explosion of Hydrogen and Green Scale Energy Storage is probably the next hypes asset classes. We (AtlasCap analysts) explain this by observing the near maturity of PVs & Offshore Wind, which used to be the main areas of investments.
🌊 There is a flood of funding for late-stage climate tech but the bottleneck is early-stage funding. Too many funds keep their dry powder awaiting the megadeal instead of seeding the next possible megadeal. However new alternative investors are joining the party (big time!) such as real estate developers & asset owners, looking to invest in innovations facilitating the sustainability transition of their existing and future buildings.
😎 Sophisticated investors and the most innovative conglomerates looking for their next S-Curves now understood that jumping into the space now, before others do, is extremely strategic to guarantee a future for their revenue lines.
🤑 While inflation and other macro factors are still keeping investors cold feet, some US investors believe this is the best time to build companies before the next cycle. The world largest comglomerates are now setting up massive climate tech decarbonization funds… Completely out of the blue, last month one of the world’s largest cargo container fleet announced a $1.5B fund!
🎯 There is a real difference between the speed of business that can be achieved between a startup based in the US and a startup based anywhere else really: The access to capital defines that speed. Hence an opportunity might exist to enable South East Asian startups to have a foothold in the US and access those investors… Food for thought.
Join the rebellion
The Climate Tech Coalition is now strong 400 members strong!
Now, our goal is 1000 qualified, curated members, all investing in the climate tech space.
Corporate Venture Capital executives are joining to access talking directly to a global dealflow of climate tech founders
Family Offices are joining to learn about the Do’s and Nono’s of climate tech due diligences
Founders are joining to connect with investors and get exposure to climate sensible investors and experts
Scientists and experts are joining to have fun and give feedbakc on whats good out there
Medias are joining to find out what to write about this new climate tech category
You should be joining to check out the incredible global community we are building.
