Venture Capital Funding

Two years ago, I stepped into something completely new—building a life insurance business from 0 to 1. Before this, I had spent years in leadership roles, navigating the structured world of actuarial science, finance, and strategy. But at Acko Life, the rules were different. Unlike traditional setups where processes, playbooks, and legacy systems guide decisions, here we were faced with a blank slate—no product, no processes, no precedent. Besides, building insurance systems for policy administration, reinsurance, operations management, accounting and claims from scratch is not for the faint-hearted. I had to unlearn some things, learn many new ones and embrace a mindset where speed, adaptability and first principles thinking mattered more than past experience. This is where I had extensive help from Varun Dua, ACKO Founder. Here is what I realised: ✅ Decisions > Perfection: The need to move fast means there’s no room for analysis paralysis. Early on, we learned that making decisions, even with limited data, is better than waiting for the “perfect” answer. ✅ Iterate Relentlessly: What looks great on a whiteboard often fails in the real world. The best way to build? Launch → Learn → Adapt → Repeat. ✅ Consumer Obsession is Non-Negotiable: In a market where life insurance has remained largely unchanged for decades, we focused on understanding what consumers really want, not just what has always been done. The 5 Whys approach came in handy—digging deep to understand the real pain points instead of just treating symptoms. ✅ Conviction Matters: When you're creating something new, skepticism is inevitable. But belief in the problem you're solving and the impact you can create is what keeps you moving forward. ✅ No Job Descriptions in 0→1: At ACKO Life, I’ve been an actuary, strategic  planner, accountant, risk manager, salesperson, and customer advocate—all at once. In an early-stage build, you do whatever it takes to move things forward. ✅ Great Ideas Come from Everywhere: Not just from leadership or industry veterans, but from engineers, designers, customer service teams, and even casual conversations. The best solutions often come from unexpected places. ✅ The Small Wins Matter: In 0→1, you don’t always have big milestones to celebrate. The real sense of achievement comes from solving that one small problem—a friction point in the customer journey or an operational bottleneck—that earlier didn’t even appear to be a problem. The last two years have been challenging yet incredibly rewarding. 0→1 isn’t just about launching a product—it’s about creating momentum from Zero. As ACKO continues to challenge the status quo in insurance, I’m excited about what’s next. If you’ve been part of a 0→1 journey, I’d love to hear your experiences—what lessons stood out for you? #Leadership #StartupLife #Learning 

Alastair Marsh's recent thought-provoking piece in @Bloomberg highlights critical challenges with the current climate tech investing landscape Climate tech projects are capital-intensive with long timelines. Unlike software, much of climate tech requires massive upfront capital for R&D, pilot plants, and manufacturing before significant revenue. This demands longer development and deployment cycles (often 7+ years to scale) that exceed typical 5-7 year VC exit horizons. The classic VC model - built for rapid, asset-light scale-ups - often misaligns with the realities of many climate tech solutions, especially "hard tech." While there’s an abundance of early-stage VC capital for entrepreneurs, later-stage growth that bridges these projects from venture to infrastructure stage is basically absent—that’s called the missing middle. We need to adapt and supplement that approach by layering in other types of capital and bridge the "missing middle." A broader array of financing instruments is essential for climate tech to scale, including patient equity and growth capital, project finance, blended finance, and specialized debt models. Marsh’s piece lays out how family offices are uniquely positioned to be catalyzing players in this space. Their flexibility allows them to deploy capital across diverse segments, filling the gap and driving significant financial returns alongside impact. https://lnkd.in/gUf85Bwy

Outset Ventures closes $25 million fund to power New Zealand’s deep tech breakthroughs #Outset Ventures, the Auckland-based firm behind unicorns like Rocket Lab and LanzaTech, has raised $25 million for its second fund, targeting science-driven startups working on hard tech with global potential. With its NZD 41.5 million oversubscribed close, the firm doubles down on #deeptech moonshots in energy, aerospace, and infrastructure—sectors where New Zealand’s capital efficiency and technical depth can compete globally. Led by partners including Angus Blair, Outset Ventures is betting on energy generation and storage as the downstream foundation for AI’s explosive demand, focusing on grid resiliency, fusion, and long-duration storage. Notable portfolio companies include OpenStar Technologies, which is advancing nuclear fusion with levitated dipole reactors, and EnergyBank, developing energy storage for floating offshore wind systems. Founded as an incubator and VC hybrid, Outset combines early-stage funding with a 60,000 square-foot R&D facility in Auckland, giving portfolio companies access to critical lab and engineering infrastructure. While the fund’s size may seem modest by global standards, its model is tailored to New Zealand’s resourceful innovation ecosystem and is supported by both local institutions and international investors committed to the country's long-term scientific potential. The article on TechCrunch in the first comment.

Insurance breaks startup timelines. Most startups plan 12-18 months for MVP → early traction → the next raise. But insurance takes 2x longer than founders expect. Your first 18 months vanish into authorisation, capacity and integrations. Why nothing moves fast here: 👉  Regulation isn't a checkbox: - Using another firm's licence (AR route): weeks to months, but move at your principal’s pace - Direct FCA authorisation? 6-12 months of detailed business plans - Full carrier (FCA + PRA)? 12-24+ months including mobilisation 👉 Partners shape your path: - You don't just "get a panel" - you earn capacity - Insurers want 12+ months of loss ratios, pricing models, and fraud controls - If you’re new, bring a credibility pack: team pedigree, explainable pricing, early selection signals, a claims plan - Translation: prove your book won’t blow up their balance sheet 👉  Integrations take quarters, not sprints: - Core systems, policy administration, claims platforms - most require lengthy integrations with legacy infrastructure that predates the internet - Everything moves at the speed of compliance, not code Extended timelines demand patient capital. When it takes 24+ months to prove your model, you need bigger investment rounds earlier, with backers who understand insurance cycles. A playbook that works: 1. Start lean (AR/MGA/DA). Ship narrow, fast - one product, one channel, configurable systems. 2. Prove the model. Show you can pick good risks, price fairly, stop fraud, and pay claims fast + accurately. 3. Earn capacity. Turn proof into paper/terms; engage early with partners and regulators. 4. Go deeper (MGA → full-stack) when you have a repeatable selection edge. Add lines, limits, markets. Few make it through the gates - and the survivors build outsized moats. The defensibility in insurance isn’t (just) the tech. It’s the track record you earn over time, proprietary distribution and data to improve pricing. The hardest thing to copy is a multi-year book that partners and customers trust. Which other sectors take years to reach the metrics most startups hit in 12–18 months? ----------------------------------------- ♻️ Share with someone building in insurance. 🔔 Follow Phoebe Chibuzo Hugh for more like this.

🚧 Capital is not the bottleneck. Execution is. 🏗️ OpenAI and Oracle’s new 4.5 GW data center plan is significant. The larger $500B Stargate project is delayed. Not because of a lack of money. Not because of a lack of demand. The issue is execution in the physical world, where concrete, copper, permits, and electricians matter more than GPUs and pitch decks. In deep tech, especially in AI and climate tech, it is easy to overlook that scaling is not about doubling code. It is about building real infrastructure: data centers, energy systems, supply chains, and the skilled people to make it all work. At TDK Ventures, I’ve seen that: 🔹 AI scale hits physical limits. Groq rethought the chip for inference from first principles, achieving over 10x throughput compared to legacy GPUs, while reducing sprawl and power requirements. 🔹 Energy resilience is essential. Type One Energy’s stellarator fusion approach focuses on practical deployment, including siting prototypes at retired coal plants to connect to the grid. 🔹 Storage must scale in a realistic way. Peak Energy chose sodium-ion to avoid lithium supply constraints. It is a contrarian choice, but one with long-term potential. 🔹 Electric panels matter. SPAN turned a retrofit challenge into a smart, dynamic load controller, helping speed up home electrification. The core lesson is that execution defines whether deep tech companies move forward or stall. Founders need to think like builders, not only inventors. That includes: ✅ Starting with permitting, not waiting until later ✅ Working with people who have built factories and infrastructure before ✅ Accounting for supply chain and skilled labor constraints ✅ Applying first principles to hardware, business models, and scale-up plans Innovation is not just about what gets built. It also depends on how it gets built, and at what scale. 💡 For deep tech founders: ask hard questions early. The less glamorous parts of execution often determine whether scale is possible. The next wave of meaningful companies will not just create software. They will also build the physical systems to support it, step by step, permit by permit, and watt by watt. These are the kinds of topics we regularly discuss with partners like Peak Energy and investors like Ryan Gibson at Eclipse, who are focused on building the next generation of industrial companies.

Kleiner Perkins was the first major Silicon Valley VC to bet big on climate – Fortune Magazine called it a "disastrous detour" in 2006. Fast forward: Kleiner Perkins (KP) Clean tech investments:  -Beyond Meat explodes from $1.5B to $3.8B. -Enphase Energy soars to a staggering $20B market value. -Nest, Proterra, QuantumScape – breakthrough after breakthrough. The result: $1 billion invested. $3 billion returned. Failure? Depends on the goal. But a disaster? Not by a long shot. KP's clean tech gamble wasn't their most lucrative bet, but it outperformed many others who lost money or netted flat returns. The real test: Is Kleiner Perkins still in the game? The truth is that they have scaled back and moved away from capital-intensive upstream renewable projects. It continues to invest in climate tech but with a more targeted approach. In February 2024, KP invested in Watershed, a climate economy company, as part of a $100M Series C funding round. The firm now focuses more on technologies and services that touch the end customer, such as residential solar installation and smart home technologies KP pioneered institutional climate tech investing over a decade before "climate tech" became mainstream. Their early bets revealed an important insight: Heavy infrastructure plays ≠ VC-style returns. This lesson is what John Doerr admits in his book ‘While venture is where the entrepreneurial journey begins, we need much larger infusions from growth capital and project financing (from banks, companies or the public sector) at scale’. Climate tech's funding challenge isn't just about venture capital – it's about orchestrating multiple financing streams at the right time. I'm capturing these critical insights from founders and investors in an upcoming book. More soon on climate tech's funding evolution. Share your thoughts in the comments. #climatetech #climateVC #kleinerperkins #energytransition #energytechnexus

My insurtech career began with something simple but powerful: Some text and a "Sign Up" button. Here's how I turned a landing page into an insurance product: 1. Checking Demand This page validated the market for what I wanted to offer. I drove traffic with ads and in-person events. The people who clicked “Sign Up” became leads. Now I needed something to sell. 2. Licenses I applied for a producers license and insurance license, to legally sell insurance. To get licensed as a broker (or producer), I took an online course, passed an exam and got fingerprinted before I could apply. Once I got licensed, getting the business entity license was easy. Just complete forms for name approval and licensing, pay a fee and wait for processing. With both licenses, I could turn leads into deals. 3. Appointments With an agency, I sought carriers that would let me sell their product. How I got my 1st appointments: - Independent agency wholesale networks for new agents - Applied online to sell for insurance companies - Cold emailed other territory managers and insurance companies I got appointments with almost a dozen companies and started quoting leads. Eventually we sold our first policies. This was the best way to learn about our customers. 4. Building the Product With lessons from our insurance agency, I asked: - Who is our ideal customer? What are their problems? - How will we price our insurance and differentiate our product? - Where is our customer? How can we reach them? With those answered, we developed our underwriting rules, forms/contracts and rating model. We then structured partnerships to realize our vision. 5. Partnerships As a bootstrapped startup, we structured ourselves as a Managing General Agent. We needed partnerships to get to market, including: - Fronting carrier for the “paper” or compliance support and regulatory structure - Reinsurer for capital to pay claims - 3rd-party admin to handle claims These partnerships moved us forward. Our legwork before finding these partners was essential for their support. 6. Building the Tech Tech is a key differentiator in our market. The core tech was our policy admin system, along with customer-facing tech for seamless onboarding. We evaluated all options, including building our own. With our policy admin system, we automated everything from issuing policies to managing renewals. Now we had to sell policies. 7. Distribution I've read that every insurance success story is a distribution success story. How do you find customers? We’d sold policies by phone. Now we had to do it without any customer interaction. Some insurance can be sold through independent agents. We went direct. We tried different channels before building an engine with best-in-class acquisition costs. The secret is, there’s no secret. Iterate until you find what works for your product and customers. These steps began my journey to selling millions in insurance.

FOAK (first of a kind) climate projects are all the rage right now - and it makes sense why. They're desperately needed. I've spent the last few months digging into this big opportunity for climate startups, the challenges that come with it, and the organizations who are working to fill the gaps. Here are the spark notes on what I’ve learned so far: Climate startups are facing a bottleneck. Many have built prototypes and shown proof of concept, mostly on the back of VC dollars, but taking the necessary next step of piloting and deploying their tech at a commercial scale is more akin to a massive leap. Challenges include… Funding - VC dollars are no longer enough. Building capital intensive infrastructure requires risk tolerant project finance, non-dilutive funding, and often philanthropy, all working in tandem. Expertise - Startup founders are innovators, not developers or financiers. Nor should they try to become those things. Rather, they can succeed by pulling in support from experts in these areas. Partnerships - This is the biggest one, in my opinion. Commercial-scale tech deployment by growth stage startups is a hugely multifaceted process. In addition to the startup team, the financial stakeholders, and the development experts, you also need buy-in from market incumbents (public or private) who can champion the technology within the market and serve as initial customers, as well as community-based organizations where projects will be built. And you need all of these stakeholders aligned and collaborating smoothly. Talk about herding cats! I will be focusing my efforts in 2024 on building more collaboration and better partnerships within this space, so that we can drive climate impact and get these amazing technologies to market. Here is a list of some companies I’ve come across who are already doing amazing work in this space: Elemental Excelerator is playing a big role as a convener with leadership from folks like Dawn Lippert, Saritha Peruri, and Danya Hakeem. Many orgs are focused on funding scale up projects, like Breakthrough Energy’s Catalyst group, Prime Coalition, Trent Yang’s Galway Sustainable Capital, Inc, Generate, FullCycle, Keyframe, and Wavelength Infra (Caroline McGeough). Third Sphere is making it easier for startups to understand the process and access capital (Shaun Abrahamson, Shilpi Kumar, Stonly Blue) Others are running programs to help connect growth stage startups with market incumbents for pilot projects, like Newlab (Shaina Horowitz, Carlos E. Trevino, Liz Keen), Uptake Alliance (Chris Richardson), Black & Veatch’s Ignite Program, Accenture (Jonathan Weitz), and Deep Science Ventures’s FOAXIAL Accelerator (Ahmad Butt). Sightline Climate (CTVC) wrote an awesome article recently about two successful FOAKs with LanzaTech and H2 Green Steel. I can’t list them all and even if I could, I’m sure there are so many who I’ve missed. So I’ll ask you: who are the orgs leading the way on FOAK climate projects?

If you’ve ever wondered what happens when #miningwaste meets molecular swagger, meet Exterra Carbon Solutions. This Montreal-based disruptor just closed a C$20M Series A, because apparently, turning #asbestos tailings into #carbonvaults and #EVbattery ingredients isn’t just good science, it’s damn good business. Founded in 2021 by Olivier Dufresne and David F., Exterra isn’t chasing #carbonoffsets like it’s some side hustle. They’re engineering #carbonremoval at a geological scale, using tech that doesn’t just sequester CO₂, it locks it up faster than you can say “net zero.” While most startups pitch dreams, Exterra’s LOW™ and ROC™ platforms run on hard science, a little alchemy, and the leftovers from Canada’s asbestos era. This is environmental judo, flipping #industrialwaste into gold-standard #carboncredits, and then selling the byproducts to industries begging for decarbonized materials. And let’s be clear, this isn’t the usual #cleantech theater. Exterra mineralizes CO₂ without traditional capture infrastructure. No pipes. No underground injections. Just CO₂, reactive #oxides, and a few hours of chemistry that moves seven million times faster than nature. The result? A portfolio of carbon-neutral #magnesiumoxide, #nickelconcentrate for EVs, and amorphous silica for low-carbon construction. It’s a full-stack climate solution with receipts. With Series A led by Clean Energy Ventures and BDC Capital’s Climate Tech Fund, and backed by the Gouvernement du Québec – Carrières, Investissement Québec, MOL Switch LLC, and Kinetics (via Karpowership), the funding isn’t just a pat on the back. It’s fuel to expand #pilotops, engineer Hub I (set for 2027), and turn southern Quebec into the world’s largest #asbestosremediation and #carboncapture hub. Oh, and they’ve already sold out their carbon credits to Climate Frontier and Mars. Read that again, sold out. The company’s secret? A 13-person team punching above its weight with the precision of a Swiss watch and the ambition of a heavyweight champ. Props to Olivier and David for building something audacious, something that forces both the #miningsector and the carbon market to sit up and take notes. There’s no pivot here. No “potential.” Just execution. Exterra’s not waiting for the future, they’re excavating it. And as Quebec stares down 800 million tonnes of legacy tailings, this isn’t a cleanup crew. It’s a resurrection team. Carbon solutions, mineralized. Value, extracted. Legacy, rewritten. Welcome to the new carbon underground. It’s rock solid. #Startups #StartupFunding #VentureCapital #SeriesA #CarbonFootPrint #CanadaTech #DeepTech #ClimateTech #Technology #Innovation #TechEcosystem #StartupEcosystem

One of the most overwhelming parts of building in #climate is constructing a "capital stack". Unlike building in SAAS, in #climatetech you need to fund physical "stuff" and returns on investments take longer-- this means you can't only rely on VCs and need to get creative. Daniel Kriozere put a panel together this week to demystify this, bringing together companies from across the stack: from where we at Streamline Climate sit with grants, to VC funding, to equipment financing with Luc Gerdes and Camber Road, etc.. ( 🧩 See the chart below for how it all fits together ) Having a full capital stack represented on a panel meant we could explore when and why each capital sources was relevant. A lot of climate tech is early and unproven, making traditional funding harder to access and you need to combine multiple. Financing these "first of a kind" #FOAK projects requires a larger risk appetite which fewer lenders have. Some of the key takeaways shared: 1) Match the type of capital to the specific business function. Ex: if you need expensive equipment, consider equipment financing rather than operating off of your balance sheet 2) These capital sources are not competing against eachother, rather they are collaborating. For example, the best time for Venture Debt is right after raising a VC round. 3) This is hard. There is no one-size-fits-all. --- 💚 Shoutout to the 9Zero Climate Innovation Hub for hosting us. They're bringing the sf climate ecosystem together - thanks for all the awesome work done by Matthew Joehnk and Duncan Logan