We're joined by Jeff and Cornelius. Jeff, tell us about B
Capital and the work you're doing.
- Absolutely. So, B Capital is a
venture investment firm that's global in nature. We have
offices across the US and Asia. Our focus ranges from early seed
stage up and through growth. We have three main verticals we
focus on, which is enterprise, technology, health care and
climate. And my focus is really on the climate side, which I
have recently joined to lead, and our focus in climate is
really on growth investments. So series of, stages B and beyond
And what is sentiment like in the climate investment market at
the moment, are people optimistic or cautious?
- Cautiously optimistic?
- That's a good get out clause. - I
mean, look, the sector today, there's many, many positive
things. We're seeing a lot of momentum behind great companies
and great entrepreneurs. You know, companies are growing,
they're deploying facilities, they've got customers that are
buying. You know, capital is more challenging than it's been
in the past. And you know, these are just really hard industries
to innovate in. So as you move along, the challenges become
greater. So there's a lot of, again, opportunity and reason to
be excited, but there's a very long road ahead for these
companies to succeed.
And Cornelius, which bits of the market are doing really well at
the moment?
So, I mean we've seen tremendous development on the whole in
renewable generation, wind, solar, batteries, et cetera,
coming on the scale curve, et cetera, et cetera. Costs
plummeted, especially in solar PV. That is obviously a strong
foundation and now, you know, that's
going to the next cycle, so to say. Where I'm particularly
interested and excited about right now is, is heavy industry
starting to get serious about decarbonization with new
technologies, with, you know, flexible innovative solutions. A
lot of this, you know, you can see in in the portfolio here at
the Breakthrough Energy Summit and that is, you know, still
small scale. You talked about, you know, how long it takes to
to really, you know, come up the scale curve
on those more complex solutions. And at the same time, I think
the pace and, and the innovative power is quite breathtaking and
amazing.
And are there climate investments that you think are
being overlooked at the moment?
So I wouldn't say overlooked, but I think one of, one topic
that is I think on the cusp of becoming, you know, a real game
changer, especially in industrial decarbonization is,
is thermal or heat storage. And that is in a way the missing
link between
volatile flexible fluctuating electricity and industry
requiring continuous process heat and using that fluctuating
electricity to generate the heat and then to kind of stabilize it
on a 24-7, in a way, time scale with heat storage. That's pretty
exciting. Some of the companies here are, are driving this. I
think that's that's a big
step forward for making progress on decarbonizing the heavy
emitting sectors.
- And Jeff? -
Yeah, yeah. I mean, I agree with everything you said. I think
there's a lot of exciting areas in all of these dimensions that
are being worked on. I'd say one of the overlooked areas is more
focused on growth capital. So there's a lot of money at the
earlier stage. There's a lot of money for proven technologies to
roll out as infrastructure. But to really support companies at
this growth stage is something where there's a documented
quantitative and qualitative view that there's not enough
money flowing,
which is what we're really trying to lean in and and work
on. And so we're excited about that. In terms of sectors, you
know, I'd say the one that has really been,
you know, capital has flowed out of as the food and ag sector.
And, you know, there's such a tremendous amount of, of
innovation and opportunity in that, that I feel like that's
poised for a comeback, but it's certainly still, some time to
work through it.
- Jeff, Chris, thanks very much for joining us.
- Thank you. - Glad to be here.