- 9
- July
2020
Ecosummit Zoom 4 August 2020
The 4th Ecosummit Zoom takes place on 4 August 2020, 10:00-12:00 Berlin time, and is co-hosted by Gerard Reid, Alexa Capital, and Jan Michael Hess, Ecosummit, to educate and entertain you during the summer holidays. We bring together Europe’s leading smart green startups, investors and corporates in energy, mobility and cities. The agenda presents 10 speakers. A highlight will be the update of Martin Kröner and Yann Lagalaye on their Green European Tech Fund. Our third online event presented a lot of hot startups currently fundraising as well as corporate VCs actively looking at new dealflow and supporting their portfolio in good and bad times. Please get in touch if you want to pitch at Ecosummit Zoom and get your tickets to join us.
Read more- 6
- September
2019
Smart green VCs you should know
There are many smart green VCs in Europe and the US that back startups in energy, mobility, buildings, cities, materials, food and circular economy to create impact as well as environmental, financial and strategic returns for their fund investors (LPs). In the VC food chain, early stage investors prefer to invest, at lower valuations and higher risk, in the Seed, Series A and Series B financing rounds of young startups working on product market fit and traction (users, customers, revenues). On the other hand, late stage VCs like shorter holding periods and time-to-exit and, consequently, advanced startups with more than €5M revenues, experienced management teams and fast growth. The existence of KPIs, ideally going up over time, makes the life of every investor easier. Facing climate change, technology revolution and global competition, the majority of corporates have adopted corporate venturing and open innovation strategies in order to invest in and do business with startups. The result are different investment strategies and sometimes competing portfolios that startups should know before pitching. Let’s co-invest and meet at Ecosummit Berlin.
Read more- 9
- April
2016
Late stage startup panel featuring Grundgrün, Ludgate, Alexa Capital and Munich Venture Partners
Ecosummit TV: At ECO15 London, we did a very informative and lively panel about growing and fundraising for late stage startups. The experts on stage include Felix Grolman (Grundgrün), William Weil (Ludgate), Gerard Reid (Alexa Capital) and Martin Kröner (Munich Venture Partners). In the meantime, a lot has happened: Gerard raised $50M for Younicos from First Solar, Panasonic and Grupo ECOS. Bill left Ludgate and joined Greencoat Capital, the CVC of the Irish utility ESB. Felix sold the direct marketing business of Grundgrün to EnBW and Martin invested in Cobi while Kebony raised €19M from PMV, Investinor and existing shareholders. It turns out that fundraising for late stage startups takes a lot of time and needs to be done globally to attract the best strategic investors for the growth strategy of the startup. At the same time, late stage startups need to hire the best management team to manage their growth. In Europe, family offices and corporates increasingly play a leading role in late stage investing and helping European startups become global market leaders.
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