Ines Bergmann pitches corporate venture capital provided by E.ON
Ecosummit TV: We just met Ines Bergmann at the Cleantech Forum in San Francisco where she is spending 6 months scouting new innovation that can be brought to Europe. At ECO14 Berlin, Ines pitches the benefits of corporate venture capital provided by E.ON. The German utility is one of the most active corporate co-investors in smart energy startups. E.ON’s added value is rolling out the products of their portfolio companies to their 35 million customers, increasing startup revenues one market after the other. This turns out to be a very useful market entry strategy especially for US startups planning to enter Europe. E.ON’s portfolio includes Orcan Energy (ECO14 Award Bronze), Thermondo, Autogrid, Firstfuel, Sungevity, Opower and Bloom Energy. While many utilities are also working on becoming technology companies, it remains to be seen when E.ON’s CVC activities will result in the first acquisitions.
Read moreJonathan Tyler presents Climate-KIC and its startup accelerator
Ecosummit TV: Jonathan Tyler presents Climate-KIC and its startup accelerator at ECO13 London. The public-private partnership is funded by the European Commission via the EIT (European Institute of Innovation and Technology) with a budget of €63M in 2014. Climate-KIC has got 6 national centres embedded in leading universities in UK, Denmark, Netherlands, France, Germany and Switzerland and fosters education, innovation and entrepreneurship with a particular focus on early stage cleantech startups. Among the many startups funded by Climate-KIC are Tado (Germany), Waste2chemical (Netherlands) and Aqdot (UK). Climate-KIC Germany partners again with Ecosummit Berlin 2014 and sends their best fundable startups to our smart green innovation conference.
Read moreWhat cleantech startups and VCs in Europe and USA can learn from each other
Ecosummit TV: Europeans don’t think big enough. Michael Linse (KPCB), Pascal Mauberger (McPhy Energy), Oliver Stahl (Entelios) and Bart Markus (Wellington) discuss the differences between the cleantech startup and VC business in USA and Europe. There are many things we can learn from each other. On average, US cleantech startups get 4 times more capital than European ones. This has to do with the different environment in terms of market size, capital availability and competition.
Read moreEcosummit 2012 celebrates Smart Green Business with new Award
Press Release: For the third time, Mobile Economy GmbH organises Ecosummit, the international smart green business conference. Ecosummit 2012 (ECO12) takes place on 22-23 March in Berlin and gathers 400 executives representing investors, startups, corporates and utilities. ECO12 focuses on cleantech, renewable energy, electric mobility, smart green city, startup financing and sustainability management. The new ECO12 Award rewards the best smart green companies in Europe.
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