‘Across the globe, brilliant people are turning their minds to ‘what’s next to solve the climate crisis.’
Twitter
LinkedIn
Chris Coleridge and five Climate Tech founders share their predictions for 2023.
At the end of 2022, we shared how we’d found hope from working with so many passionate and determined founders, a hope that humanity may indeed be able to come together and combat the climate crisis. Now, we’re looking ahead to 2023.
6 climate tech experts and founders have taken a moment to share their predictions for this sector in the year ahead: Dr. Chris Coleridge, a professor of entrepreneurship at Cambridge; Dr. Nicky Dee, considered a leading voice in carbon ventures; Pr. Francesco Pomponi, professor chair of sustainability science at Edinburgh Napier and co-founder of PreOptima; successful entrepreneurs, Jonathan Cumming who directed the $10bn trade sale of a telecommunications company; and Michael Langguth, founder of Poq a startup which powers the apps of some of the largest retailers in the world; as well as accomplished climate tech Co-founder Lewis Jenkins. Though there are challenges ahead for entrepreneurs, all agreed that 2023 is going to be a year of great opportunity.
What opportunities do you see in climate tech for the year 2023?
All the founders agreed on one thing: founders building climate tech right now will find themselves in good positions to catch the growth wave in subsequent quarters.
From changing mindsets:
Chris Coleridge, Founder and CEO at Carbon13:
“Across the globe, brilliant people are turning their minds to what’s next to solve the climate crisis? While some solutions have been developed, many bold climate tech answers to the climate crisis have yet to be found”. Even if this innovation doesn’t make the headlines the world is in the process of coming up with better ways of supporting both the ‘fixers’ and the ‘pioneers’” of climate tech.
Jonathan Cumming, CFO and Co-founder of Carbon13:
“The war in Europe, extreme weather patterns and the continuing fall-out from the pandemic has helped to change the dynamic. Today the reality of climate change is recognised by nearly all and the conversation is increasingly about the solution(s)”.
Which will lead to developments in the climate tech sector, especially for hardtech startups:
Francesco Pomponi, Founder of PreOptima:
“A lot more focus on the fact that we cannot AI our way out of the climate crisis.” which he sees as an opportunity to “understand what this might mean in terms of shifting economic opportunities” and “collaboration between the VC world and academic researchers which might already have solutions to Technical Readiness Levels”
Nicky Dee, Chief of Sustainability and Innovation at Carbon13:
“Changing mindsets and growing support for climate tech solutions to saving the planet will bring forward advances in specific sectors. Even more investment, ideas, and support for a genuinely smart energy system” can be expected in 2023 in order to “decouple from grid constraints and centralised stabilisation services while understanding location specific options in renewables, storage, heat and demand”.
Lewis Jenkins, CEO of Nium:
“We’ll see more investments in hardtech. There’ll be big opportunities in sectors that people might not think of as green. Like the chemical sector or built environment sector. People who can disrupt these industries are the most promising.”
Political pressure was also identified as a growing opportunity:
Michael Langguth, Chief Strategy Officer at Carbon13:
“People will demand action from their governments as they are falling further behind against their committed climate goals.” Despite setbacks, “governments will increase their investment for supporting innovation in the climate tech space meaning more grant opportunities for climate tech startups.”
Changing mindsets around the climate crisis will be auspicious for climate tech in 2023 and if the last few years are anything to go by, among our cohorts alone, we can expect these to be potentially life-changing again in 2023.
What challenges do you see for climate tech this year?
Jonathan Cumming explained the economic and political tensions:
“Rising inflation and the war in Ukraine which have strained markets might lead companies to fail or at least falter through lack of liquidity”. He suggests this will “put a lot of talent back into the market accompanying those laid off by big tec. This will be a positive driver in terms of people looking to launch new businesses and work for start-ups. More specifically looking at climate tech.” Therefore, “climate tech ventures should be opportunistic in their approach to locking in sufficient liquidity to give them runway.”
Lewis Jenkins focused on systemic issues which might slow change:
“We don’t have some of the benefits that existing infrastructure or investment projects do. There’s lots of subsidies out there that are supporting the old way of doing things but less of that in the spaces we’re growing into but luckily, I’m starting to see that change.”
Climate tech ventures needed more than ever
All in all, despite challenges, the need for urgent action is highlighted by all 6 founders to solve the climate crisis. The parallel opportunities for innovation and investment in this sector, make us at Carbon13 optimistic that climate tech solutions will develop faster than ever this coming year. Through our Venture Builder, we’ve accompanied 32 startups and over 300 founders to building ventures with the potential to reduce emissions by 10 million tonnes CO2e yearly in sectors ranging from energy to retrofitting. We urge anyone passionate about climate, no matter their background, to consider committing their careers to saving the planet by signing up to be part of our next cohort in Europe or in the UK.