#86 | Supply Chain war in Clean Energy
Hello everyone! If you didn’t see us virtually or in person in December, we missed you! We hope to see you in January and early next year. We have a lot of things planned. Needlessly to say, this year has been huge for sustainability finance and climate tech. Question is where to go from here. What will next year be like? We think VC money will continue to pour into climate tech, and institutional investors will look to incorporate more sustainability finance into overall portfolio.
📚 Worth Reading
Which country will control EV? Hard to say but one thing is clear, China is controlling the supply chain. China is now the key owner of cobalt mines in the Democratic Republic of Congo, pushing out U.S. and other countries. Cobalt is a key input in batteries.
Rise in demand does not matter the tight supply from metals used for clean energy to lithium chemical processing. Again, China is a world leader in lithium chemical processing. WSJ published an article that lays out the key dynamics in the battery market. It is a BIG question as to how countries other than China can devise a strategy to procure supply to make EVs while not increasing price significantly.
One of the showcase startups, Matter, published a white paper on 50 sustainability ETFs and what you need know about this.
If you are thinking about starting a climate tech company, it’s a great time. Read here for why.
🚀 Funding and Congrats!
Logical Buildings, a NYC-based sustainability, smart building, and virtual power plant (VPP) software and solutions provider, closed a $10m financing.
Damon Motors, a Vancouver-based electric motorcycle maker, raised $30m in financing.
💡 Startup Spotlight
Sortera Alloys - uses AI technology for production of low-cost high-quality metal alloys for domestic manufacturing
🎧 Podcast
Ed Thomas of Hazel: climate empowerment with a single click
Ryan Jeffery of gener8tor: accelerating climate innovation
Zachary Witman of GrowSquares: transforming the home gardening experience
The Understory Podcast is also available on SoundCloud, Apple Podcasts, Amazon Music, and Google Podcasts.
⚙️ Jobs
Find and share your open positions on the Understory Slack channel.
🆕 National Director - Campus Solar at Nelnet
🆕 VP of Sales at Rheaply
🆕 Head of Legal at Energize Ventures
🆕 Senior Environmental Social Governance & CSR Analyst at Cox Enterprises
🆕 Lead Product Manager, Enterprise Sustainability Product Solutions at Google
🆕 Senior Manager, Environmental Sustainability at Electronic Arts
🆕 Senior Manager, Climate & Sustainability at Expedia Group
🆕 Project Leader / Principal, Climate & Sustainability at BCG
Data Scientist, Sr. Full-Stack Engineer, and more at GrowSquares
Global Head ESG Transformation at CBRE
Business Development Associate and Data Scientist at Seqana
Sr Manager / Director - Food Product R&D at New Age Meats
Sustainability Strategy Leader at Microsoft
Sr Program Manager, EU Circular Economy at Amazon
Scope 3 and Circular Economy Manager at Jabil
Multiple roles at Plan A
Program Manager, Inclusive Circular Economy at PYXERA
Logistics Manager at Sesame Solar
Director of Sustainability Education at Salesforce
Sustainability Accelerator Entrepreneur in Residence at Techstars
Manager Strategic Relationships - Circular Economy at TerraCycle
🗓 Events
January 20: Understory’s Startups Driving Sustainability - January Showcase
February 16: Understory’s Startups Driving Sustainability - February Showcase
March 23: Understory’s Startups Driving Sustainability - March Showcase
April 23: Atlanta Green Business Market Fair
Do you have any events to share? Post them in our Understory Slack community.
📧 Stay in Touch!
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