ClimateTech Talks: Exploring the pathways to net zero
By David Contreras
ClimateTech Talks: Exploring the pathways to net zero May 05, 2021
20 - Daniel Arraiz and David Contreras - Cofounders of ClimateTech Talks and Explorationists
This was a fun one to record. Finally our two cohost and cofounders, Daniel and David have a chat to discuss the year in review, aspirations, learnings and personal and corporate climate landscape for the new year
Hope you enjoy it
Art by: Maria Alexandra Monteverde / Instagram: @mariale.ilustra.asi
Editing, mixing and mastering by: Daniel Arraiz
Disclaimer: This podcast was prepared by myself in my personal capacity and the views and opinions expressed in the podcast are my own.
They do not necessarily reflect the opinion or views of TGS and TGS does not guarantee the accuracy or reliability of the information provided herein.
19 - Madhusudhan Rao - Founder of Oorja
Our guest this week is Madhusudhan Rao, who is the founder of Oorja, a company that provides energy efficiency, renewable cooling and heating solutions, mostly in the Indian market. He’s also a mechanical engineer by training and an entrepreneur for most of his working life.
Our Substack - Explorationists: https://explorationists.substack.com/
Art by: Maria Alexandra Monteverde / Instagram: @mariale.ilustra.asi
Editing, mixing and mastering by: Julio Cesar Fernandez.
Disclaimer: This podcast was prepared by myself in my personal capacity and the views and opinions expressed in the podcast are my own.
They do not necessarily reflect the opinion or views of TGS and TGS does not guarantee the accuracy or reliability of the information provided herein.
18 - Anish Malpani - CEO of Ashaya
Our guest this week is Anish Malpani. About 81% of waste in India is left untreated and half of it ends up in landfills. However some entrepreneurs have realised that those landfills actually represent a mountain of opportunities and potential multi-billion dollar business. Anish Malpani from Ashaya is pushing to develop a social impact startup that can improve both the quality of life of waste pickers while tackling heads on the recycling issue.
Our Substack - Explorationists: https://explorationists.substack.com/
Art by: Maria Alexandra Monteverde / Instagram: @mariale.ilustra.asi
Editing, mixing and mastering by: Julio Cesar Fernandez.
Disclaimer: This podcast was prepared by myself in my personal capacity and the views and opinions expressed in the podcast are my own.
They do not necessarily reflect the opinion or views of TGS and TGS does not guarantee the accuracy or reliability of the information provided herein.
17 - Anirudh Gupta - Founder of the Sustainability Mafia
Our guest this week is Anirudh, and he defines himself as an idealist, a dreamer who wants to build a better, safer, wealthier planet for all of us. Anirudh was born in South India, moved to New Delhi, lived in a boarding school at the foothills of the Himalayas, moved to the US to study economics and political science at Berkeley, moved to Spain to work with Airbus and then went back to India.
It was when he returned to India that, led by curiosity, he tried to adopt sustainable practices like zero waste, water efficiency and solar systems at home. He managed to install solar panels at his place and he realized the power of sustainable solutions. Anirudh transformed his house into an off-grid solar powered place and that triggered a domino effect among his neighbors. Anirudh’s own sustainable curiosity allowed him to build a database of sustainable solutions providers across India.
“A map of sustainable solutions across India”
Our Substack - Explorationists: https://explorationists.substack.com/
Art by: Maria Alexandra Monteverde / Instagram: @mariale.ilustra.asi
Editing, mixing and mastering by: Julio Cesar Fernandez.
Disclaimer: This podcast was prepared by myself in my personal capacity and the views and opinions expressed in the podcast are my own.
They do not necessarily reflect the opinion or views of TGS and TGS does not guarantee the accuracy or reliability of the information provided herein.
16 - Nils Söderström - Co-founder and CEO of Renbloc - Radical transparency to the energy market
Our guest this week is going to tell us a lot about what his company does in the Energy transparency sector. Based in Sweden, Nils Söderström is the CEO of Renbloc, a company bringing radical transparency to the energy market. We also discussed his motivations, background and how he got into the Climate Tech space. Enjoy!
Nils's LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/nilssoderstrom/
Renbloc's website: http://www.renbloc.com/
David's LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/davidcontrerasdiaz/
Our Substack - Explorationists: https://explorationists.substack.com/
Art by: Maria Alexandra Monteverde / Instagram: @mariale.ilustra.asi
Editing, mixing and mastering by: Julio Cesar Fernandez.
Disclaimer: This podcast was prepared by myself in my personal capacity and the views and opinions expressed in the podcast are my own.
They do not necessarily reflect the opinion or views of TGS and TGS does not guarantee the accuracy or reliability of the information provided herein.
15 - Katerina Garyfalou - Commercial and business development director at Clean Planet Energy - Mastering Oil and Gas transferable skills to land clean jobs with impact
Our guest this week is going to tell us a lot about what her company, Clean Planet Energy is doing, but perhaps most importantly, she will share insights on her career pivot from the O&G industry into a role that has given her the opportunity to align her values of protecting the environment and maximizing impact. Katerina Garyfalou, is the commercial and business development director at Clean Planet Energy.
We are very excited about this conversation because, for full disclosure, Katerina’s own energy transition from O&G to a clean energy role is quite an inspiration for the program we are building with our partners at Terra.do. We want to help fellow upstream O&G workers to trace their own road map to pivot their careers to clean energy jobs. And to do so, we can’t stress enough the importance of roles models like Katerina. We are delighted that she has kindly agreed to be one of our guest lecturers in the program and as you will read next, we can all learn a lot from her journey
Katerina's LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/dr-katerina-garyfalou-mba-42893612/
David's LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/davidcontrerasdiaz/
Our Substack - Explorationists: https://explorationists.substack.com/
Art by: Maria Alexandra Monteverde / Instagram: @mariale.ilustra.asi
Editing, mixing and mastering by: Julio Cesar Fernandez.
Disclaimer: This podcast was prepared by myself in my personal capacity and the views and opinions expressed in the podcast are my own.
They do not necessarily reflect the opinion or views of TGS and TGS does not guarantee the accuracy or reliability of the information provided herein.
14 - Eric Chaves - Founder of Terrament - Bringing Gravity to the Storage Game
Although people often think of energy storage as a battery that uses a chemical reaction to release energy in the form of electricity. Chemical storage is just one class of a bigger spectrum. There are many other ways to store energy for later use, fossil fuel is a form of long term energy storage, hydroelectric dams and pumped-hydro are also forms of storing potential energy in water reservoirs and releasing it by dropping it and passing it through turbines.
Over the last decade, chemical energy storage has had great improvements in efficiency and capacity, lithium-ion batteries are currently in the spotlight of energy storage technology, accounting for 80% of energy storage VC funding, but the energy storage landscape is bigger than the teslas and the NIOs. Chemical batteries are a form of short-term storage and so far they are applicable at the household level. We need a form of longer term and larger scale energy storage that can leverage the surplus of renewable energy created at peak times.
There are a lot of startups working in the energy storage space, this map from our friends at Contrarian Ventures shows a comprehensive market map of it.
The spectrum in gravity energy storage is small. Some notable examples are:
- Energy Vault that is storing energy by using an automated group of cranes that lift and drop heavy blocks;
- Gravitricity is building a system with cables that lift weights from mine shafts and;
- New Energy Let’s Go, who acquired the patent of Heindl Energy GmbH (recently bankrupted) that uses hydraulic power to lift masses of rock.
However a new crop of players is coming to the scene. Terrament is a startup that is tweaking existing technologies to develop an innovative approach using potential energy stored at height, taking advantage of gravity, wind turbines and mining tech. We had the pleasure to interview Eric Chaves, Terrament’s CEO in our ClimateTech Talks podcast to discuss his upcoming techno-commercial plans, and the future of energy storage. Enjoy the conversation.
Terrament website: https://www.terramenthq.com/
Eric's LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/erchaves/
Daniel's LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/danielarraiz/
Our Substack - Explorationists: https://explorationists.substack.com/
Art by: Maria Alexandra Monteverde / Instagram: @mariale.ilustra.asi
Editing, mixing and mastering by: Julio Cesar Fernandez
Disclaimer: This podcast was prepared by myself in my personal capacity and the views and opinions expressed in the podcast are my own.
They do not necessarily reflect the opinion or views of TGS and TGS does not guarantee the accuracy or reliability of the information provided herein.
13 - Rokas Peciulaitis - Managing Partner at Contrarian Ventures - Power of Giving, Community and Venture Firm Building
Welcome back! Today we have a very special guest, Rokas Peciulaitis, managing partner at Contrarian Ventures, an innovative venture capital firm set up to disrupt the energy landscape. We explored the inspiration, the meandering pathways, the role models that Rokas has followed to start the firm with a core climate focused component before it became hype. We explored questions like: How and why he created the energy Tech Summit or the Climate 50 VC benchmark ? It was a fascinating discussion on innovation, on excelling at being a David surrounded by Goliaths coming from the VC world and represented by the multiple incumbents in the energy space. At the end, we geeked out on hydrogen, the expected decline in production technology costs and it will open up multiple industrial applications; i.e. cement, steel manufacturing, among others. Enjoy!
Contrarian Ventures website
Rokas' LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/rpeciulaitis/
David's LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/davidcontrerasdiaz/
Our Substack - Explorationists: https://explorationists.substack.com/
Art by: Maria Alexandra Monteverde / Instagram: @mariale.ilustra.asi
Editing, mixing and mastering by: Daniel Arráiz.
Disclaimer: This podcast was prepared by myself in my personal capacity and the views and opinions expressed in the podcast are my own.
They do not necessarily reflect the opinion or views of TGS and TGS does not guarantee the accuracy or reliability of the information provided herein.
12 - Joey Moreau - Head of Account and Investor Relations at Startupbootcamp
In today’s episode we explore with Joey Moreau how Startupbootcamp is playing a key role as an accelerator in the ClimateTech ecosystem in Europe and globally. We discussed what value the company is bringing to corporates and to the founders themselves.
Joy told us about the recent IPO of the sustainability program that they're putting together this year. Sustainability being a core tenet for the near mid-term future of the company. And for the investors themselves that are looking for an ESG and climate focused companies to diversify their portfolios. It was a great conversation and we hope you enjoy it.
Joey's LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/joeymoreau/
Startupbootcamp website: https://www.startupbootcamp.org/
Our Substack - Explorationists: https://explorationists.substack.com/
Art by: Maria Alexandra Monteverde / Instagram: @mariale.ilustra.asi
Editing, mixing and mastering by: Julio Cesar Fernandez.
Disclaimer: This podcast was prepared by myself in my personal capacity and the views and opinions expressed in the podcast are my own.
They do not necessarily reflect the opinion or views of TGS and TGS does not guarantee the accuracy or reliability of the information provided herein.
11 - Madison Rifkin - CEO and Founder of Mount - Unlocking the micromobility revolution
In today’s episode we explore how Madison Rifkin and Mount as a cool micromobility startup is rapidly expanding, in the crowded and competitive space of e-scooters and bikes. But ...
Micromobility can play a significant role in decarbonising the passenger road transport emissions in big cities and even in smaller towns across the globe. But,Why is decarbonising the road transportation sector (so) important? Well, because it is one of the major CO2 contributors. In fact road transport (passengers and freight combined) alone makes up to 15% of CO2 emissions. The electrification of that space is accelerating in every single transport category, and in our view even long-haul freight is very likely to be part of the “electrification-of-everything” revolution (vs other potential contenders like hydrogen-based alternatives).
Zooming in at the city level, one of the best ways to decarbonize the transport sector is to provide the end-consumer (let’s say you, the driver) with options to NOT take your ICE (or even electric) car at all when you’re exploring a city. We as society must prevent, abate and mitigate C02 emissions as much and as fast as we can. Having access to e-bikes or in this case an e-scooter in strategic places (maybe your next Airbnb as we’ll find out with Madison) can help in this endeavour. And besides, it is a LOT of fun as well.
Madison's LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/madison-rifkin-23037712a/
Mount's website: https://mountlocks.com/
Daniel's LinkedIn: linkedin.com/in/danielarraiz
Our Substack - Explorationists: https://explorationists.substack.com/
Art by: Maria Alexandra Monteverde / Instagram: @mariale.ilustra.asi
Editing, mixing and mastering by: Daniel Arráiz.
Disclaimer: This podcast was prepared by myself in my personal capacity and the views and opinions expressed in the podcast are my own.
They do not necessarily reflect the opinion or views of TGS and TGS does not guarantee the accuracy or reliability of the information provided herein.
10 - Helen Bertelli - CEO of Benecomms and co-Founder of Women in Climate Tech (WiCT) - Talent everywhere
We had the pleasure to chat with Helen Bertelli, she has a compelling story of transitioning her career to a more impactful path. She purposefully redirected her (marketing) skills to align her values and find a way to help in the cause against climate change. She’s the CEO of Benecomms, a PR and marketing firm, and also the co-founder of Women in Climate Tech (WiCT), an organization that empower women’s voices in the climate space, offering them a safe place to speak, grow their network and advance their careers.
Benecomms website: https://www.benecomms.io/
Women in Climate Tech website: https://womeninclimatetech.org/
Helen's LinkedIn: linkedin.com/in/helenbertelli
Daniel's LinkedIn: linkedin.com/in/danielarraiz
Art by: Maria Alexandra Monteverde / Instagram: @mariale.ilustra.asi
Editing, mixing and mastering by: Daniel Arráiz.
Disclaimer: This podcast was prepared by myself in my personal capacity and the views and opinions expressed in the podcast are my own.
They do not necessarily reflect the opinion or views of TGS and TGS does not guarantee the accuracy or reliability of the information provided herein.
9 - Katie Mehnert - CEO of Ally Energy - The skills of the Energy Transition
We had the chance to catch up with Katie Mehnert, the CEO of Ally Energy. She's an impressive Diversity, Inclusion and Equity advocate in the energy world. We touched on how the O&G community is preparing for the energy transition. We discussed the role of corporates, governments and in particular, the role of the individual and how soft skills may be the key to ensure relevance in an uncertain environment. Finally, we discussed how Houston is going through a major rebranding exercise to become the energy transition capital of the world. Green Town Labs, the Climate Tech accelerator is trying to capitalize on that. I hope you enjoy our conversation.
Ally Energy website: https://allyenergy.com/
Katie's LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/katiemehnert/
David's LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/davidcontrerasdiaz/
Art by: Maria Alexandra Monteverde / Instagram: @mariale.ilustra.asi
Editing, mixing and mastering by: Daniel Arráiz.
Disclaimer: This podcast was prepared by myself in my personal capacity and the views and opinions expressed in the podcast are my own.
They do not necessarily reflect the opinion or views of TGS and TGS does not guarantee the accuracy or reliability of the information provided herein.
8.2 - David Mazaira - Especialista en el Impacto del Carbono en ResponsAbility - Liberando finanzas climática en Economias Emergentes
Daniel y David tuvieron la oportunidad de ponerse al día con David Mazaira. Nuestro invitado exitosamente migró del O&G, donde fue parte de Repsol en la parte de Refinación, Procesos y Sostenibilidad, para llegar a trabajar actualmente en responsAbility. La compañía basada en Suiza es un gestor de activos con $3millardos bajo su mando e invierte en 3 pilares: inclusión financiera, comida sostenible y finanza climática, el último el tópico de nuestra discusión.
También discutimos sobre #ESG y su diferencia con Inversion de Impacto. Aprendimos cuales son los criterios que responsAbility utiliza para monitorear y elegir en que proyectos invertir. Brevemente discutimos sobre los riesgos percibidos a la hora de invertir en economías emergentes y como navegarlos. Por ultimo, tocamos el tema del rol de la Tecnologia a la hora de optimizar y crear nuevas maneras para contabilizar y monitorear las emisiones de efecto invernadero. Entre ellas destaca el rol de #Satelites, #drones, #blockchain, CCUS, entre otras.
Espero disfruten de esta primera edicion del ClimateTech Talks en español.
Si prefieres puedes escuchar este episodio tambien en ingles, publicado justo antes.
responsAbility website: https://www.responsability.com/en
David's LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/davidcontrerasdiaz/
David Mazaira LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/david-mazaira-3548b925/
Daniel Arraiz LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/danielarraiz/
Art by: Maria Alexandra Monteverde / Instagram: @mariale.ilustra.asi
Editing, mixing and mastering by: Daniel Arráiz.
Disclaimer: This podcast was prepared by myself in my personal capacity and the views and opinions expressed in the podcast are my own.
They do not necessarily reflect the opinion or views of TGS and TGS does not guarantee the accuracy or reliability of the information provided herein.
8 - David Mazaira - Carbon Impact Specialist at ResponsAbility - Unleashing climate finance in emerging economies
We had the chance to catch up with David Mazaira, a friend of mine (David) from childhood and that has successfully made the transition from a direct O&G job (he was a Process Engineer in Repsol) to a role as Carbon Impact Specialist in an asset management firm in Switzerland.
We discussed #ClimateFinance, #ESG, #ImpactInvesting and the main difference among those two. We learnt about responsAbility, its criteria to invest and three main thesis. We also discussed the main perceived risks in emerging countries and how to navigate them. Finally we touched on the role of technology and how it will be key in the accounting and monitoring of GHG emissions. #Satellites, #drones, #blockchain, all in the episode!
If you prefer, you could give it a listen in our first ever Spanish episode where Daniel and I dissected and deconstructed Impact Investment with the help of David
responsAbility website: https://www.responsability.com/en
David's LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/davidcontrerasdiaz/
David Mazaira LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/david-mazaira-3548b925/
Art by: Maria Alexandra Monteverde / Instagram: @mariale.ilustra.asi
Editing, mixing and mastering by: Daniel Arráiz.
Disclaimer: This podcast was prepared by myself in my personal capacity and the views and opinions expressed in the podcast are my own.
They do not necessarily reflect the opinion or views of TGS and TGS does not guarantee the accuracy or reliability of the information provided herein.
7 - Siobhan Clarke - Operating partner at Launchpad - Building a net zero Unicorn Factory
We had the chance to discuss with Siobhan Clarke one of the leading VCs in the #ClimateTech space and an Operating Partner at Launchpad. Working semi-independently from BP (Launchpad’s investor), this “Scale-up Factory” has the vision to generate sustainable change by building and scaling a progressive portfolio of digitally-led businesses which re-imagine energy.
We had a wide-ranging conversation on finding and building the next #ClimateTech unicorns, the traits of successful investors; we geeked out into how #geophysics (and as geophysicists ourselves we definitely enjoyed the insights) is an essential component on how Stryde (a portfolio company) and their nodes could further unlock the potential and applications of/in #geothermal, #CCUS, civil engineering, archeology, among other industries. Finally, we touched on how important #Diversity is, both from the founders and investor perspective. Launchpad is not only chasing but creating the next unicorns, so watch this space.
Launchpad's website: https://www.itslaunchpad.com/
Check Siobhan's new book: The Founder's Handbook
David's LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/davidcontrerasdiaz/
Art by: Maria Alexandra Monteverde / Instagram: @mariale.ilustra.asi
Editing, mixing and mastering by: Daniel Arráiz.
Disclaimer: This podcast was prepared by myself in my personal capacity and the views and opinions expressed in the podcast are my own.
They do not necessarily reflect the opinion or views of TGS and TGS does not guarantee the accuracy or reliability of the information provided herein.
6 - Lubomila Jordanova - Co-Founder & CEO of Plan A - Enabling businesses to go carbon neutral & Improving their ESG performance
Lubomila is an exceptional leader. You can gather it from her huge list of awards:
Atos Partner Startup, as part of Scaler, 2021
Top 100 Women in Germany for 2020, FOCUS Magazin, Dec 2020
80 Top Founders shaping the post-pandemic world, Sifted.eu, July 2020
Marshall Memorial Fellow 2021/2022
Forbes 30 under 30 2020
DT50 Sustainability Award 2019 from McKinsey, Google and ROCKET INTERNET
BCG Social Impact Award 2020
Winner of TECHBBQ Pitch Competition 2019
Winner of PIRATE SUMMIT Pitch Competition 2019
Winner of Women Startup Competition 2019
Top 100 Meaningful Business 2019
Slush Top 15 2019
But despite all the great recognition, she is incredibly affable, personable, down to earth and clear in her mission to fight Climate Change. She and her team are doing so by creating a SaaS platform to help businesses calculate, monitor and reduce their carbon footprint monthly, while automatically building each month a tailored sustainability action plan and offsetting schemes, according to the footprint of the company. The technology behind the software uses insights from the Plan A algorithm which analyses over 300,000 data points to predict and prioritise the most critical environmental issues and the way industries and companies impact these environmental changes.
We had a great conversation around becoming a founder, leaving a comfortable FinTech and Investment background behind to dedicate fully to the Carbon accounting mission. In that sense Plan A is enabling companies of all sizes have a much better accounting and even offsetting of their carbon emissions and by doing so improving their ESG performance. We also discussed the recent news about Plan A recent $3m raise, their plans of growing in France, the US and elsewhere and what this milestone means to other Bulgarians and immigrant founders in the ClimateTech and wider ecosystem.
Plan A website: https://plana.earth/
Recent raise: https://techcrunch.com/2021/03/09/softbank-demeter-and-coparion-invest-3m-into-plan-as-b2b-carbon-monitoring-and-esg-platform/
David's LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/davidcontrerasdiaz/
Art by: Maria Alexandra Monteverde / Instagram: @mariale.ilustra.asi
Editing, mixing and mastering by: Julio César Fernández / Instagram: @juliocfdez
Disclaimer: This podcast was prepared by myself in my personal capacity and the views and opinions expressed in the podcast are my own.
They do not necessarily reflect the opinion or views of TGS and TGS does not guarantee the accuracy or reliability of the information provided herein.
5 - Chryssa Tsouraki and Stelios Papagrigoriou - Co-CEOs of IN-VR - Best marriage in Tech, Government, Finance and Energy Investment community
Chryssa and Stelios are a power couple in every sense of the phrase. They have married (pun intended) their hyper-human-connection and business development skills (Chryssa) with Stelios previous tech expertise in banking and in the Tech sector in London to create IN-VR. The company is fully remote since its inception, giving it an edge when COVID hit. They serve a wide range of clients from governments around the globe, private companies, Tech giants, renewables developers, super-major, financiers, etc. They use high-tech marketing campaigns to identify partnerships and enable unlocking investment opportunities in the energy sector.
Thus IN-VR is a leading global Energy investment platform, that will have a major role moving forward by connecting the different players in the space, and increasingly in the renewables space.
As explained succinctly by Chryssa, their mission is to democratise investment opportunities.
We had a nuanced conversation about the whole Energy Transition, the renewable uptake (that is seeing great inroads in places like Colombia, Chile and many parts of Africa). We discussed how the transition and even net-zero will have different shades and in many geographies will be a challenged because of the ever-changing political landscape. However, there is hope, and it will come via better, cheaper and more accesible energy products, including electricity.
They are proud promotion partners of ONHYM Morocco, ANP Brazil, Petroleum Authority of South Africa, ANPM Timor-Leste, ALNAFT Algeria, Perupetro Peru, Ministry of Energy Ghana, among others.
IN-VR have very exciting plans in the coming weeks, all around community and further unlocking the democratization of the energy world and investment. Stay tuned !
IN-VR website: https://www.in-vr.co/
David's LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/davidcontrerasdiaz/
Art by: Maria Alexandra Monteverde / Instagram: @mariale.ilustra.asi
Editing, mixing and mastering by: Julio César Fernández / Instagram: @juliocfdez
Disclaimer: This podcast was prepared by myself in my personal capacity and the views and opinions expressed in the podcast are my own.
They do not necessarily reflect the opinion or views of TGS and TGS does not guarantee the accuracy or reliability of the information provided herein.
4 - Jack Macfarlane, CEO of DeepStream Technologies
In this episode we learnt about Jack Macfarlane, CEO of DeepStream Technologies.
The company is completely modernizing communication and data exchange among parties within the RFX experience (any sort of procurement process). With a strong focus on reducing inefficiencies, and bringing auditability, transparency and flexibility to a bureaucratic tender process that was ripe for disruption and with an industry-agnostic SaaS solution.
Jack lived a very cosmopolitan life in his early years. He was born in Egypt and grew up in places like Peru, Tanzania, India and France before he went back to the UK at the tender age of 14.
With a strong investing banking and finance background, Jack invested early into DeepStream (just when they were just an idea), and wanting a new challenge, he approached the founding team and convinced them that he could take the company to its next level.
Jack also led the team into the Techstars journey. The energy program designed and managed by Equinor, Kongsberg and McKinsey brought many benefits, most importantly validation in “an incredibly risk-averse industry”, introductions and the “brand” that come with the industry partners managing the program.
Typical companies range from gigafactory battery providers, brokers like Braemar, O&G companies, and any other company that relies heavily on document-heavy-tender-processes.
2020 was a good year for DeepStream, catapulted by the digital-everywhere-migration, and 2021 might even bring profitability and further growth (with some money raising added to the mix). In terms of the #ClimateTech influence and impact of the DeepStream solution, they are enabling and further helping the startups in the Gigafactories battery space all around in Europe and the EV auto industry to become even more efficient. Therefore, helping the digital transformation of all these companies to move faster, reduce friction and increase transparency. Jacks sees even from a clean-accreditation point of view (in terms of carbon emissions, etc) lots of potential to use DeepStream as a mechanism to shed light into CO2 footprint within the supply chain. Very exciting area to explore.
DeepStream Technologies website: https://www.deep.stream/
Techstars: https://www.techstars.com/
David's LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/davidcontrerasdiaz/
Art by: Maria Alexandra Monteverde / Instagram: @mariale.ilustra.asi
Editing, mixing and mastering by: Julio César Fernández / Instagram: @juliocfdez
Disclaimer: This podcast was prepared by myself in my personal capacity and the views and opinions expressed in the podcast are my own. They do not necessarily reflect the opinion or views of TGS and TGS does not guarantee the accuracy or reliability of the information provided herein.
3 – Nada Ahmed, VP of Transformation at Aker Solutions – Daring to lead and mastering change
In this episode, we talked to Nada Ahmed, VP of Transformation at Aker Solutions. Nada has a quintessential cosmopolitan upbringing. She grew up and studied in Pakistan and finished her International Baccalaureate in Hong Kong. She then continued her undergrad studies in the University of Richmond (US), a year in France and then back to Houston. Her first experiences exposed her also to an international journey, that got her an offer from DNV to join their offices in Norway. Humanities and a multi-cultural curiosity helped her progress well in her career and fine-tune her understanding of her colleagues and ultimately enable her to be a better leader via empathy. It's all about connection.
Adaptation was another key skill that she has mastered during her career to navigate the ups and downs of the energy industry. Nada put a particular emphasis on “understanding people better”, to infuse enthusiasm and inspire her colleagues to get to the required change to achieve high performance in a rapidly changing energy landscape.
What kind of transformation is she trying to instill? It’s the shift necessary to drive our industries towards #netzero and match and accompany her clients into the #renewables energies.
Aker Solutions have set an ambitious goal of making two thirds of their revenues by 2030 coming from low carbon solutions or coming directly from renewable services like offshore wind.
What kind of skills are necessary? Adapting to a future that will be very different Nada relies on #agileleadership. She sums it up with the following 7 tenets: empowerment (leading with questions, being humble and to enable growth in others), clarity (clear objectives), adaptability, learning the culture, being collaborative, positivity and accountability, and focusing on outcomes vs. outputs.
Finally, we discussed the difficulties women face in the energy industry. Nada has learned from the biases towards women to become an outspoken and candid leader that challenges preconceptions. She recalls the research done by BCG and McKinsey that performed quantitative research showing that diverse groups provide better financial outcomes and make better decisions. She therefore makes diversity & inclusion as a guiding principle to lead her teams.
United World College: https://www.uwc.org/
Aker Solutions: https://www.akersolutions.com/
"Dare to Lead" by Brene Brown (recommended book): https://cutt.ly/tkX4kLS
David's LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/davidcontrerasdiaz/
Art by: Maria Alexandra Monteverde / Instagram: @mariale.ilustra.asi
Editing, mixing and mastering by: Julio César Fernández / Instagram: @juliocfdez
Disclaimer: This podcast was prepared by myself in my personal capacity and the views and opinions expressed in the podcast are my own. They do not necessarily reflect the opinion or views of TGS and TGS does not guarantee the accuracy or reliability of the information provided herein.
2 – Knut Vassbotn, CEO of Deep Wind Offshore – Riding the giant offshore wind wave
In this episode, our guest was Knut Vassbotn, CEO of Deep Wind Offshore. We discussed about Knut’s journey from offshore engineering teams in the O&G sector, developing high-performing teams both in Norway and in the UK, and his organic transition into the offshore wind industry. Knut worked in LNG development as a young engineer (a great first experience for any young engineer) and then, little by little, gathered more experience in London, setting up the Aker organisation. He is bringing the whole wealth of experience at Aker (where he’s spent most of his career) to the huge wave of offshore wind with the newly launched Deep Wind Offshore.
We discussed the clear transferable skills from one offshore environment to another: mechanical, electrical, materials engineering, naval & marine architecture, utility systems, procurement, etc.
Good lessons on how to increase the internal capabilities of Aker to be prepared for the rapidly changing offshore wind environment even 6 years ago. With current momentum from countries like the Netherlands, Ireland, UK, Norway, Knut is convinced that the market is huge.
We also touched upon the great momentum from a government stimulus both in Europe ($750B will be spent in renewables by the EU as part of the Green Recovery) and from the new US administration. And although there might be some regulatory challenges in certain countries, Knut recognises the major tailwinds in favour of offshore wind and that obviously led his move to lead a new organisation focusing on capturing this accelerating market.
Finally, we talked about how Norway faces a risk of being too exposed to O&G in particular with the pressure coming from neighbouring countries society and investors alike. In here, knowledge/capability/expertise/talent capture is crucial for Norway to develop a national supply chain that can create jobs and actually set them into a path to export technology to other countries.
We also explored the exciting question of what the role of the super-majors will be in this shifting landscape where NextEra or Iberdrola have similar valuations as their O&G counterparts.
Would Latin America/Africa/SE Asia be able to ride this wave? Knut believes that yes, believing that isolated energy systems, mini-grids, and the combinations of renewable production with energy storage. He gave the example of the Utsira Island where a new battery plant is being installed to depend less of the power cable coming from onshore. This could serve as a footprint for other regions.
Aker Solutions: https://www.akersolutions.com/
Deep Wind Offshore website: https://dwo.no/
David's LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/davidcontrerasdiaz/
Art by: Maria Alexandra Monteverde / Instagram: @mariale.ilustra.asi
Editing, mixing and mastering by: Julio César Fernández / Instagram: @juliocfdez
Disclaimer: This podcast was prepared by myself in my personal capacity and the views and opinions expressed in the podcast are my own. They do not necessarily reflect the opinion or views of TGS and TGS does not guarantee the accuracy or reliability of the information provided herein.
1 – David Hunt, CEO of Hyperion Executive Search - From Search to CleanTech and back to Search
In this episode, our guest is David Hunt, CEO of Hyperion Executive Search. He’s also a very prolific podcaster, participating in Leaders in #CleanTech.
David started his career in Executive Search, but he gotthe Clean-energy-entrepreneur tick quick and launched with a couple of co-founders a #Solar business in the UK, way ahead of its time. So we discussed the challenges he faced, zero subsidies at the time, high costs, regulatory changes (feeding tariffs), and selling to mostly “hippies”.
We then explored his journey from 2014 in the #CleanTech ecosystem when he founded Hyperion that was shaped by his own solar entrepreneurial background. He made it his vision to help early stage businesses to grow by providing key talent. Having been there and done that helped David to connect with founders and grow his own business.
Hyperion is focused on Europe and US and help founders to scale. They’re focused on CxO level, but also the hard to find senior to mid-level talent in sales, operations, engineering. He has helped Sonnen, the German manufacturer of residential energy storage systems right when they were just 30 people (they are now more than >500) and were acquired by #Shell in 2020 for an undisclosed sum). Also, David worked with #EVBox acquired by #Engie. Hyperion serves mostly the European market, but also provide services the Middle East, US, and Asia.
Discussion on ClimateTech in Europe: changes are coming from large hedge funds like BlackRock requesting companies to set ambitions #ESG agendas. Another huge trend is institutional investment (from #CVCs or Corporate Venture Capitalists) and private equity getting into the game.
What is David seeing in terms of cultural and talent shift from the traditional O&G sector in the #startup, #GreenTech and #ClimateTech world? David believes that purpose driven decisions are big part of the equation especially for young generations. We had to touch on what were the learning, the tough lessons and in hindsight some of the upsides from dealing with COVID and working remotely.
David’s podcast: https://open.spotify.com/show/5tXQYrCL89optwyJz8WZPI
David’s company: https://insights.hyperionsearch.co.uk/
Sonnen: https://sonnengroup.com/sonnenbatterie/
EVBox: https://evbox.com/uk-en/
Breakthrough Energy Venture that Bill Gates & Jeff Bezos are part of: https://www.breakthroughenergy.org/
The Energy Gang: https://open.spotify.com/show/0GT5BuD33AiPnqOzQE7YAE
David's LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/davidcontrerasdiaz/
Art by: Maria Alexandra Monteverde / Instagram: @mariale.ilustra.asi
Editing, mixing and mastering by: Julio César Fernández / Instagram: @juliocfdez
Disclaimer: This podcast was prepared by myself in my personal capacity and the views and opinions expressed in the podcast are my own. They do not necessarily reflect the opinion or views of TGS and TGS does not guarantee the accuracy or reliability of the information provided herein.