What Canoo failure can teach cleantech scaleups?

De-icing a frozen water tower in the middle of nowhere is not on anyone’s job description. However, this is a reality that you can come up against when you are scaling up your climate tech and building your FOAK. Most climate podcasts focus on finance, policy, or shiny new tech. But real stories of scaling climate hardware? Rare. That’s why The Green Blueprint episode, “𝗕𝘂𝗶𝗹𝗱𝗶𝗻𝗴 𝘁𝗵𝗲 𝗪𝗼𝗿𝗹𝗱’𝘀 𝗕𝗶𝗴𝗴𝗲𝘀𝘁 𝗗𝗔𝗖 𝗙𝗮𝗰𝗶𝗹𝗶𝘁𝘆,” caught my attention. Host L

Over 37% of climate investors decide not to invest in hardware companies because of the business model and long sales cycles. These are the results of a survey, carried out by Planet A, Norrsken, and Speedinvest. The survey also highlights investors' preference for X-as-a-service and licensing business models over others. So, choosing a business model can make or break your startup. The business model aims to determine how exactly you will make money. There are many ways fo

The best guide so far on scaling up climate tech from Breakthrough Energy Catalyst

A year ago, I launched ETR , a startup aimed at disrupting sustainable heating and cooling. Today, I’m closing it. This wasn’t an easy decision, but in hindsight, it was inevitable. What went wrong? Let me break it down. 👨🏼‍💻👷🏻‍♂️ Losing a Co-Founder = Losing Momentum My engineer co-founder, who was critical to our core idea, left the project. I tried to find a replacement, but I couldn’t. VCs always stress the importance of the team—and now I fully understand why. Take

Here is my 4-step framework to determine if your tech is a drop-in solution

Why do you need a Chief Production Officer in your startup?

𝗛𝗼𝘄 𝗺𝘂𝗰𝗵 𝗱𝗼𝗲𝘀 𝘆𝗼𝘂𝗿 𝘀𝗼𝗹𝘂𝘁𝗶𝗼𝗻 𝗿𝗲𝗾𝘂𝗶𝗿𝗲 𝘁𝗵𝗲 𝘁𝗮𝗿𝗴𝗲𝘁 𝗶𝗻𝗱𝘂𝘀𝘁𝗿𝘆 𝘁𝗼 𝗰𝗵𝗮𝗻𝗴𝗲?

Main FOAK risks

Why should you avoid Green Premium and look for 10x value?

𝗛𝗼𝘄 𝗱𝗼 𝘆𝗼𝘂 𝗸𝗻𝗼𝘄 𝘆𝗼𝘂 𝗮𝗿𝗲 𝗿𝗲𝗮𝗱𝘆? 𝗕𝘆 𝗮𝗻𝘀𝘄𝗲𝗿𝗶𝗻𝗴 𝘁𝗵𝗿𝗲𝗲 𝗾𝘂𝗲𝘀𝘁𝗶𝗼𝗻𝘀.

Twice in my career, I’ve dealt with intellectual property (IP). Both times, I came out with one big realization: IP isn’t the holy grail investors think it is—especially when scaling hardware. The first time, I was buying a license to manufacture wind turbines. It looked promising: a ton of encrypted files, sent to our HQ with much fanfare. But when we finally cracked open the IP treasure chest, we discovered it only explained how to build one wind turbine. The know-how to m

You have to choose between your ego and your fees. This was a phrase I heard while listening to the Redefining Energy podcast episode “Northvolt - Epitaph.” It sums up perfectly the choice Europe is facing in the battery industry. Here is why. This year, I’ve actively traveled around Europe, meeting with battery industry players. I was representing my client, a Korean company specializing in the most difficult part of battery manufacturing - making anode and cathode electrod

How to negotiate a term sheet for your offtake

A Climate First VC artile got me thinking

How do you negotiate a Letter of Intent for your offtake agreement?

Review of Clean Tech ScaleUp Manual by Climate Brick

Hydrogen is like real estate, there are three main criteria for project success: location, location, and location.

$𝟭𝟮 𝘁𝗿𝗶𝗹𝗹𝗶𝗼𝗻/𝘆𝗲𝗮𝗿? $𝟯 𝘁𝗿𝗶𝗹𝗹𝗶𝗼𝗻? 𝗛𝗼𝘄 𝗮𝗯𝗼𝘂𝘁 𝗷𝘂𝘀𝘁 $𝟭 𝘁𝗿𝗶𝗹𝗹𝗶𝗼𝗻 𝗳𝗼𝗿 𝗘𝗻𝗲𝗿𝗴𝘆 𝗧𝗿𝗮𝗻𝘀𝗶𝘁ion

There are three things to keep in mind when going for series B.