With Greta Thunberg speaking at the UN nations last week, the climate challenge has hit again the headlines as well as the consciousness of millennials striking and protesting for a “better world”.
The challenge quickly bounced from the press to the tables of politicians who have the arduous task to identify an actionable roadmap to ease the pressure of the economical development on the environment.
Far away from the palaces of power, action is already taking place. Many entrepreneurs are working to convert the “going green approach” in a sustainable business model. This is the reality of cleantech, meaning utilizing technologies to achieve a more efficient usage of energy, water and other resources. The sector has a projected market value $4.3 trillion by 2030 – the fastest growing compared to any other sector- and it is mainly related to two key areas[1]:
- Circular Models – reducing industrial and manufacture waste by extending the life of appliances, cars and industrial machineries enhancing refurnishing and reusing.
- Expansion of renewables – renewable generators and equipment manufacturers to replace fossil energy
Data driven technologies such as AI and big data analytics are crucial enablers to achieve the objective of producing more by using fewer resources. In fact, most of the startups taking a leading role in the cleantech space are purely SAAS companies, bringing to the market business and environmental efficiencies.
Amongst many startups in this promising industry, we selected ten as the most representative of this pivotal sector:
- Lowbus: Software company leveraging on artificial intelligence to optimize the usage of busses, optimizing commercial efficiency and CO2 emissions.
- Circular IQ: online software that streamlines data-collection from the entire supply chain to make circular purchasing accessible and simple.
- Volterion: provides easy and efficient storage of renewable energy.
- Stem: Drive profitability, sustainability with AI energy storage. The company optimizes energy consumption to business through its distributed storage technology
- Phinergy: Developer of high energy density energy storage systems based on metal-air battery technologies
- Watersmart Software: combining water utility and external data, generating a predictive model to optimize water consumption
- Blueoak Resources: Provides a distributed and domestic solution for e-waste recycling, enabling circular integration in the technology supply chain.
- Rer-Hydro: Developer of river hydro-power engineering solutions
- Mutum: the platform allows to freely borrow or exchange objects among its users, reducing redundant production and wastes.
- Hexafly: Develops new material sources from the sustainable farming of insects for the Aqua feed, Chitin and Plant Nutrition Industries.
[1] http://report.businesscommission.org/report
