👀 ClimateHack Vol. 45: Former Facebook CTO's new climate fund

Hey There,

This time next week we'll be tucking into lunch with 800 fellow climate tech builders and funders at the HackSummit in Lausanne. 

If you want to grab one of the final 30 tickets, secure your place here.

See you then 👋

In today's edition:👀 The list of 150+ CEO's attending the HackSummit. 💰 Former Facebook CTO launches a climate fund, Gigascale Capital.🛩 Joby Aviation brings in $180 million to develop all-electric aircrafts.

Digest x Climate 

💨 The University of Strathclyde estimates that, by 2050, there will be two million tonnes of wind turbine materials needing safe disposal globally. Here's a cool idea to repurpose them as bike shelters, and another as a playground.

🇦🇺 Australian companies Startmate and Boundless Earth are partnering to recruit and upskill 300 new founders and operators into climate tech startups over the next 18 months, including launching their inaugural 8-week Climate Tech Fellowship. 

👀 Sifted listed Europe's climate tech ‘soonicorns’ that are coming close to a $1 billion valuation.

Carbon x Climate 

🏗 Bahamas-based startup Partanna, founded by former NBA star Nick Fox, secured $12 million seed funding for its concrete that not only avoids carbon emissions but also removes carbon from the atmosphere.

🐄 US-based Athian closed its seed funding round with investments from DSM Venturing and California Dairies. Its cloud-based carbon marketplace for the livestock industry is designed to “enable livestock farmers who implement sustainable practices the ability to earn revenue to fund those initiatives”.

Food x Climate

🌱 Wageningen scale up revyve secured €8 million from Cosun and East NL to scale its patented technology, which produces protein and fibre ingredients from upcycled brewer’s yeast.

💡 Good Read: Foodlabs’ Christian Guba explores the “picks and shovels” (AKA the enabling infrastructure space) in the alternative protein industry.

Energy x Climate

🌡 Canada’s BrainBox AI raised $20 million for its energy optimisation platform, which uses autonomous artificial intelligence technology to optimise the heating, ventilation, and air conditioning for commercial buildings.

📊 AI energy software startup SMPnet, based in the UK, raised $1.4 million for its platform that uses AI to help established power grids cope with newer sources of power such as renewables, which cannot be forecasted.

💸 Researchers at the University of Nottingham’s Faculty of Engineering received two million pounds in funding to build a one-of-a-kind smart energy grid that will use multiple energy storage technologies to reduce the site’s energy bill and enable many of its testing activities to achieve Net Zero.

🤝 Heriot-Watt University, based in Scotland, has joined forces with hydrogen technologies experts Logan Energy and PlusZero to launch a new centre for green hydrogen innovation and product development.

💨 Also in Scotland, Katrick Technologies is developing an innovative new wind mapping software that models data for ground level winds, helping to capture them as a green energy source.

Materials x Climate

🌳 Finnish startup Montinutra announced a partnership with natural personal care product manufacturer Ole Hyvä to transform forest waste into sustainable personal care ingredients. SpruceSugar™ is a 100% natural hemicellulose extract from sustainable spruce sawmilling side streams, which contains antioxidants and SPF-boosting capabilities and can be used for various purposes in skin and hair care products, such as emulsifying and natural colouring.

Transport x Climate

🛩 Joby Aviation raised $180 million equity funding to develop all-electric aircraft for a commercial passenger service.

🚲 Australian subscription e-bike startup Zoomo announced a previously undisclosed $24 million funding round and is cutting its headcount by 8%, with the aim of achieving profitability in the next 12 months.

🔋 UK-based fast charging startup Nyobolt is partnering with design and engineering business CALLUM to “slash electric car charging times to minutes”, and will unveil its first concept in June this year.

🚗 US lawmakers are finding ways to tax cars that don’t use conventional fuel… The Texas Senate has passed a bill that lays out a $200 yearly registration fee for electric vehicles, with exceptions carved out for slow “Neighborhood Electric Vehicles,” as well as autocycles, mopeds and motorcycles.

Funds x Climate

🇺🇸 Former Facebook CTO Mike Schroepfer is launching a climate venture capital investment firm, Gigascale Capital, saying that this is an “inflection point in the industry”.

🇩🇪 German early and growth stage VC HV Capital closed its “Fund IX” at €710 million, its largest-ever fund to date. It’s already made four investments from the fund, into companies such as Agreena, which connects farmers to the voluntary carbon market to finance their transition from conventional to regenerative agriculture, and ecoplanet, whose platform identifies and implements profitable investments in green infrastructure.

🇨🇦 The51 Food and AgTech General Partnership, based in Canada, secured $30 million of its $50 million fund to support pre-seed to Series A startups working within the future of food and agriculture.

💰 The Yield Lab Latam secured $20 million at the first close of its third fund, from investors including Grupo Bimbo and SQM, which it will use to support early-stage agrifoodtech startups in Latin America

🇯🇵 Japan’s Mitsubishi Corp. is partnering with MUFG Bank and others to launch a $1 billion decarbonisation fund to invest in startups working on technologies such as floating offshore wind turbines and sustainable aviation fuel.

Lists x Climate

👋 Meet these 150+ CEO & CTO's attending the HackSummit in Lausanne. 

With 300+ attending startups in the room, we're spotlighting the CEO’s and CTO’s you need to know, and what they’re working on.

This list include Stealth to Series C+ startups:

• Manufacturing the future of food and biomaterials.

• Enabling technologies and infrastructure for the bioeconomy.

• Energy and chemical companies making greener alternatives.

• Climate tracking and mitigation tools to act on our emissions.

• Carbon Capture companies removing CO2 from the air.

• & everything in-between

Memes x Climate

The biggest barrier to starting a new carbon removal company is locking in a good domain..

Thanks for reading, and see many of you next week! 

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Editorial by Arman, Curation by Nicola.