2023 Agenda Old

Welcome to the SOSV Climate Tech Summit. The event is virtual, free and will be held on Sept. 26-27, starting at 8 a.m. Pacific Time. Register today.

We will publish the full agenda with exact times for each session soon, but in the meantime we wanted to provide a peak at most of the amazing sessions (3 more in the works!) we have in store, plus a breakdown of all the show’s components, including (1) the VC AMA breakouts (2) our signature Investor/Founder matchmaking event (3) a Carbon Removal startup challenge. Details on those are at the bottom of this page.

Main Stage Agenda

Here are the 20+ topics we are covering this year:

The Cost Conundrum: How to Scale Carbon Removal with Heirloom Carbon Technologies, Charm Industrial, and Verdox

SPEAKERS

  • Peter Reinhardt, CEO and Co-Founder, Charm Industrial
  • Shashank Samala, CEO and Co-Founder, Heirloom
  • Brian Baynes, CEO, Verdox
  • Moderator: Candice Ammori, Founder, The Climate Vine

Better than batteries: How Renewell Energy, Energy Dome, and Malta Inc. aim to transform grid-level energy storage

SPEAKERS

  • Kemp Gregory, CEO and Co-Founder, Renewell
  • Claudio Spadacini, CEO and Founder, Energy Dome
  • Ramya Swaminathan, CEO, Malta
  • Moderator: Casey Crowhart, Climate Reporter, MIT Technology Review

First Checks for Big Ideas: A Conversation on Early-Stage Climate Tech Funding with SOSV, At One Ventures, E²JDJ, and Material Impact

SPEAKERS

  • Laurie Menoud, Founding Partner, AtOne
  • Stephanie Dorsey, Founding Partner, E2JDJ
  • Corinna Chen, Partner, Material Impact
  • Dr. Pae Wu, General Partner SOSV & CTO IndieBio, SOSV
  • Moderator: Alex Wilhelm, editor, TechCrunch

Climate Tech Investing in the Global South: How Wavemaker Impact, Africa Climate Ventures Avaana Capital, and Grid Exponential back innovation

SPEAKERS

  • Marie Cheong, Founding Partner, Wavemaker
  • James Mwangi, Founder and CEO, Africa Climate Ventures
  • Anjali Bansal, Founding Partner, Avaana Capital
  • Matias Peire, Founder and CEO, GridX
  • Moderator: Ben Joffe, Partner, SOSV

Climate Tech Analysts: Taking the Temperature with Bloomberg NEF, CTVC, and Voyager VC

SPEAKERS

  • Nat Bullard, Partner, Bloomberg NEF
  • Mark Taylor, Co-Founder and Chief Product Officer, CTVC
  • Moderator: Sierra Peterson, Founding Partner, Voyager VC

Scientists at Venture Funds

SPEAKERS

  • Dr. Ken Caldeira, Senior Scientist, Breakthrough Energy
  • Dr. Clea Kolster, Partner and Head of Science, Lowercarbon
  • Dr. Susan Schofer, Partner & Chief Science Officer, SOSV
  • Moderator: Tim De Chant, Senior Climate Reporter, Techcrunch

Are Small Nuclear Reactors Finally Here?

SPEAKERS

  • Bret Kugelmass, Founder and Chief Executive Officer, Last Energy
  • Mikal Bøe, Chairman and CEO, Core Power
  • Stefano Buono, CEO, NewCleo
  • Moderator: Shannon Bragg-Sitton, Director, Integrated Energy & Storage Systems Division | Energy & Environment Science & Technology, Idaho National Laboratory

Adaptive Agriculture: Growing Our Future Food

SPEAKERS

  • Brendan Collins, Co-Founder, CEO, Avalo
  • Franco Martinez Levis, CEO and Co-Founder, Puna Bio
  • Ramadan Borayek, CTO, Co-Founder, Drip.ai
  • Moderator: Marina Schmidt, Founder and Editor in Chief, Red to Green Solutions

Greener Mining for Critical Minerals

SPEAKERS

  • Dave Snydacker, CEO and Founder, Lilac Solutions
  • Renee Grogan, Co-Founder and Director, Impossible Metals
  • Dr. Jon Vardner, CEO, co-Founder, Still Bright
  • Moderator: Andy Gollach, Principal, SOSV / HAX

Solugen: The $2B+ bioeconomy unicorn that is decarbonizing the chemical Industry

SPEAKERS

  • Dr. Gaurab Chakrabarti, MD, Co-founder & CEO, Solugen
  • Moderator: Dr. John Cumbers, Founder and CEO, SynBioBeta

Backing Breakthrough Climate Companies: A Conversation With Vinod Khosla and Sean O’Sullivan

SPEAKERS

  • Vinod Khosla, Founder, Khosla Ventures
  • Sean O’Sullivan, Managing General Partner & Founder, SOSV

Funding Firsts-of-a-Kind (FOAK)

SPEAKERS

  • Doug Schultz, COO, Office of Clean Energy Demonstrations
  • Scott Jacobs, CEO and Co-Founder, Generate
  • Dr. Lara Pierpont, Director, Early Climate Infrastructure, Prime Coalition
  • Moderator: Kim Zou, CEO, Co-founder, CTVC

The Hydrogen Value Chain

SPEAKERS

  • Raffi Garabedian, CEO and Co-Founder, Electric Hydrogen
  • Dr. Seonghoon Woo, Founding CEO, Amogy
  • Natasha Kostenuk, Founder/CEO, Ayrton Energy
  • Moderator: Maria Gallucci, Senior Reporter, Canary Media

Iceland: Fire, Ice and Climate Tech

SPEAKERS

  • Áslaug Arna Sigurbjörnsdóttir, Minister of Higher Education, Science and Innovation, Iceland Government
  • David Helgason, Climate Tech Investor, Transition, Co-founder and Board Member, Unity (NYSE: U)
  • Moderator: Ben Joffe, Partner, SOSV

How Corporate VCs Invest in Climate Tech

SPEAKERS

  • Coppelia Marincovic, Partner, Solvay
  • Daniel Griffis, Managing Director, ADM
  • Lisa Coca, Partner, Toyota Ventures Climate Fund
  • Moderator: Jon Shieber, Venture Partner and Editor in Chief, Footprint Coalition

Category Specialist Climate VCs

SPEAKERS

  • Rob Leclerc, Founding Partner, AgFunder
  • Greg Smithies, Partner, Fifth Wall
  • Kate Danaher, Managing Director, S2G Ventures Ocean Fund
  • Moderator: Katie Fehrenbacher, Climate tech reporter, Axios

The IRA Effect: One Year In With Jesse Jenkins

SPEAKERS

  • Dr. Jesse Jenkins, Assistant Professor and Macro-scale Energy Systems Engineer, Princeton University
  • Moderator: Robinson Meyer, Founding Executive Editor, Heatmap, Contributing Opinion Writer, New York Times

Our New Relationship With Electricity

SPEAKERS

  • Paul Lambert, CEO, Quilt
  • Donnel Baird, Founder, BlocPower
  • Arch Rao, Founder & CEO, Span
  • Moderator: Emily Pontecorvo, Founding Staff Writer, Heatmap 

The Climate Tech View of Mainstream VCs

SPEAKERS

  • Gabriel Kra, Managing Director, Prelude Ventures
  • Dr. Rachel Slaybaugh, Partner, DCVC
  • Christina Karapataki, Partner, Breakthrough Energy Ventures
  • Moderator: Connie Loizos, Silicon Valley Editor, Techcrunch

Measure What Matters for Climate

SPEAKERS

  • Peter McHale , Co-Founder and CEO, Gaia.ai
  • Sonia Kastner, Founder and CEO, Pano AI
  • Antoine Rostand, President and Co-Founder, Kayrros
  • Moderator: Devin Coldewey, Writer, TechCrunch

Re-inventing the means of production

SPEAKERS

  • Dr. Mohammad Farhani, founder, Seppure
  • John O’Donnell, co-founder, Rondo Energy
  • Dr. Khorcheska Batyrova, co-founder, OzoneBio
  • Moderator: Duncan Turner, General Partner, SOSV

After USDA and the FDA greenlights, what’s next for cell-cultured protein?

SPEAKERS

  • Dr. Uma Valeti, CEO and Founder, Upside Foods
  • Moderator: Po Bronson, General Partner and Indiebio Managing Director, SOSV

The Earth Is Hiring: Tackling the Talent Transition

SPEAKERS

  • Jamie Alexander, Founding Director, Drawdown Labs
  • Eugene Kirpichov, Co-Founder and Executive Director, WorkOnClimate
  • Anshuman Bapna, Co-founder and Chief Learning Officer, Terra.do
  • Moderator: Matt Myers, Founder and General Partner, Climate Tech Circle

Carbon Removal & CCUS Startup Challenge

In partnership with Extreme Tech Challenge (XTC)

We partnered with Extreme Tech Challenge to bring you a pitch competition focused on Carbon Removal and CCUS. Five startups will be selected to pitch top climate investors. The winner will be invited to the main stage on the final day.

Breakout Session Live AMAs

Presentations and live AMAs led by the top early stage investors and ecosystem partners. Their presentations are designed to help founders understand better how these firms make investment decisions. Already confirmed are:

  • EIP, with Sam Bursten, Principal
  • Fifth Wall, with Francesca Whitehead, Vice President
  • GridX, with Matias Peire, Founder and CEO
  • Prime Coalition, with Sarah Kearney, Executive Director
  • Prelude Ventures
  • SOSV (HAX and IndieBio)
  • Pale Blue Dot
  • Goodwin
  • CTVC

VC/Startup Matchup

Our signature virtual matchmaking event is back after enabling over 1,500 meetings last year, leading to multiple investments. Registrants to the summit will be invited to sign up. To quote one of the most active founders: “I met more investors in a week than in the previous 12 months.”