My journey to decarbonisation tech investing

With the recent announcement about the official launch of Smart Society Ventures, and sharing our thoughts on the decarbonization tech investment case and the scale-up investing opportunity, I thought that today I'd answer a common question I get:

Why did an ex-software Founder and CEO, who led a UK scale-up to global operations, decide to build a venture capital growth firm focused on investing in decarbonization technology scale-ups?

Way back in 2006, I actually started my career in investment banking and private equity in Asia, where I had a rapid immersion in both finance and international business. I worked on the $22 billion IPO of Indian real estate developer DLF, at the time the largest IPO in Indian history. I helped a major bank evaluate the divestment of a portfolio of assets in Korea. I analysed hotel and residential investments in China. And I helped build a $500M+ fund in Singapore co-sponsored by Standard Chartered Bank and Dubai World in the most harrowing of financial markets, getting a crash course in fund management and a lifelong love of investing and capital markets. I knew then that I wanted to build an investment firm, but I also thought I’d make a much better investor if I actually learned how companies worked and started one of my own.  So off I went to London Business School for my MBA. (At SSV, we value a background of both professional services - banking, PE, consulting - and - operating experience in our team members. More on this in another post, but we think over-indexing for one or the other creates blind spots for investing and Boards at the growth stage.)

During my MBA, I spotted a niche for software disruption.  I had moved around the world quite a bit at that point and so had my friends — and everyone complained about how laborious it was.  So I teamed up with fellow SSV GP Steve Black and over nearly a decade, we built what is now Topia, a global talent management technology platform that helps large companies plan, manage and support a global workforce.  We founded Topia in 2010 (initially called MOVE Guides).  At the time London was in the midst of developing its tech ecosystem and we had the opportunity to participate in many conversations between government, entrepreneurs and investors.  Many of the results of these discussions are visible in London’s thriving ecosystem today.

In 2017, I moved to the US to lead Topia’s expansion there and raise scale-up capital (Europe had a significant scale-up capital gap. Nearly a decade, later it still does and we're still all talking about it). Our Co-Founder Steve Black stayed in the UK to lead our EMEA and APAC businesses.  As I ramped up our US business, I got similarly involved in innovation policy discussions in the US through TechNet, an organization that supports the US innovation ecosystem. The work of TechNet ranged from looking at how to create more startups, to how to accelerate diversity in the innovation economy, to how to use technology to solve global problems like climate change.  This experience grew my interest in using cutting-edge technology innovation to solve our largest societal challenges, like decarbonization.

With some encouragement and nearly a decade under my belt as the CEO of a rapidly scaling company, I decided that it was time to bring the real-world experience of building a company to politics. So in 2018, I launched an improbable upstart campaign for US Congress in California on a platform of innovation and decarbonization. Among other things, this experience gave me a front row seat to the effects of climate change. I ran in a district directly adjacent to the Paradise Fire, ravaged by escalating wildfire risk and home insurance cancellations, and with many people struggling with the effects of the energy transition, such as increasing gas prices, power shutdowns and job losses in traditional industries.

And, I met countless people in their 20s and 30s completely disenchanted with their futures amid growing climate risks.

I lost the campaign, but also now knew what was next.

As a steadfast believer that innovation, entrepreneurship and capital can solve nearly any problem, I knew that my path was to build an investment firm over the next few decades that focused on decarbonization technology investment, supporting exceptional entrepreneurs to build valuable global companies and deliver top tier investor returns.  After the first couple of years, we moved the firm back to Europe (London and Geneva), given the breadth of decarbonization tech innovation, maturing tech ecosystem, need for local scale-up capital, and, most importantly our deep roots and relationships in the UK and European tech ecosystems. And we're off and running!

A brief note - You might previously know us as BCP Ventures. That's our first fund from our GP team. We're now Smart Society Ventures, based in Geneva and London