You are currently browsing Jeremy McCarthy's articles.
With growing portfolios of clean energy and environmental technology startups under their belts, Virgin Green Fund of the U.K. and Dubai’s Masdar Clean Tech Fund turned to the buyout market for a major foray into the “dirty” side of cleantech. The funds announced the acquisition of established refinery services operator DuraTherm Inc. to vastly expand the market for recycling and remediation of hazardous hydrocarbon waste.
The company has teamed up with Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger to say it has changed its mind about building its four-door sedan, now called Model S, in New Mexico.
The report says investors planted $148 billion into solar, wind and other renewable energy projects in 2007.
Solar thermal company Ausra on Monday opened a Las Vegas factory meant to produce enough equipment each year to provide 700 megawatts of power.
A123 Systems has signed on electricity utilities to use its lithium-ion batteries for short-term energy storage, according to a company executive.
Cleantech is becoming all the rage, and stories are being published almost weekly about the shortage of employees for this booming new industry segment. So how do you get in on this action? The entire industry is quite new, and there are very few people who have any direct experience with the cleantech field. How do you get into cleantech if you’ve never been clean???
Get Real
First, be realistic. So you’ve worked your whole career in the software industry marketing enterprise software. How in the world can that qualify you to market solar panels? Well, it really can’t. There are many facets to the cleantech industry, and you should focus on areas that more closely mirror your experience. For example, Verdiem is a company that creates software to save enterprises on costs with laptop and PC energy management. That sounds like a company that could use a marketing expert from the software industry. And while you still might get the Director of Marketing job at the solar panel company, be careful what you wish for. Are you really confident as a lifelong software marketing guru that you know what it takes to be successful in solar?
The Same But Different
Continuing this approach, look for cleantech companies that are similar to the industries in which you have expertise. Solar manufacture and design has many similarities to semiconductor manufacture and design. New fuel development companies can be similar to biotech firms. In fact, some cleantech companies do both fuel and biotech development. Battery development can have similarities to the electronics industry. Car design may have transferable skills from the general manufacturing arena. And if you’re having a hard time matching up your industry experience with another cleantech segment, look at their customer profiles. Who do they sell to? How do they need to market their product? You might find there are many similarities with the customer base you have worked with in the past.
How Did THEY Get Hired?
Take a look at the backgrounds of the executives and employees who work for different cleantech companies. Search LinkedIn for their profiles and see what kind of people already work where you want to work. See where they went to college. You may be surprised to find a common industry or background that you didn’t expect would be a fit for that industry.
Save a Tree Only After You Make a Buck
Finally, make sure you understand exactly what you’re getting into. If you want to join a hot startup company for the sole purpose of saving mother earth and humanity, you may find it tough to land a job if you express that attitude in interviews. Remember that most cleantech companies, at least those on CleanLoop, are backed by investors who want a return on their money. If they couldn’t make money saving the planet, then they wouldn’t invest. This isn’t meant to be a negative comment either. Newbies to the cleantech startup world should be aware that these are businesses who have received investment dollars to create hugely successful companies. You can feel great about the work you do, but never forget that cleantech is a business first. If you want to feel great and not worry about pressure to become a successful corporation, you would likely be much happier in the non-profit arena. You should still focus on your passion for the industry in interviews, but make sure it doesn’t overshadow your desire to work hard at growing a dominant cleantech company that is a smashing success.
It’s a common story: people are interested in the clean energy business but don’t have a clue how to get in.
On Tuesday, CleanLoop was launched as a job search site dedicated to the clean-tech industry.
VentureLoop, a niche job site catering to the venture industry and startups, is spinning off a new board today: CleanLoop, a dedicated site for jobs in the cleantech field. Readers who have written in of late asking about how to jump into a cleantech startup may find the board useful.
Employment listings site VentureLoop, which specalizes in posting job openings at venture-backed companies, is hoping to piggyback on the growth in cleantech funding while focusing its offerings. It has launched a new CleanLoop site exclusively listing jobs in emerging solar, alternative fuels, advanced materials and software technology companies.
Many have bemoaned the lack of experienced talent in the cleantech sector as of late: the Los Angeles Times in an article this week, former GreenFuel interim CEO Bob Metcalfe when trying to find his replacement, and the New England Clean Energy Council when launching a green fellowship program. And while another green job board won’t help create more talent, a good one could help companies find those talented few and far between.
VentureLoop
, the job site that features postings exclusively for venture-backed growth companies, is delving into a new vertical with the launching of CleanLoop today. This new niche job site aims to match job hunters with employers that are heavily involved with the green movement.
San Francisco, CA – June 24, 2008 – As reported in VentureBeat, venture capitalists invested $2.2 billion in cleantech companies over the last year, excluding debt and other non-venture financings. That’s a significant 45 percent growth in 2007, according to a MoneyTree report from PricewaterhouseCoopers, and a more robust level than earlier expected. To meet with this demand and upward trend, VentureLoop, the leader in job postings exclusively for venture-backed growth companies, today announced the launch of CleanLoop (www.cleanloop.com), a jobs web site dedicated to cleantech job postings for emerging solar, alternative fuels, advanced materials and software technology companies.
“As the number of cleantech job opportunities continues to surface, job candidates will have the option to locate emerging cleantech companies,” said Jeremy McCarthy, CEO of VentureLoop. “With more than 600 venture-backed companies at VentureLoop, we’re excited to branch out with a site focused on our client base that is in a market that is poised for immediate and long-term growth.”
During its Beta phase, June through August, CleanLoop is offering free job posting for companies. Visitors to the web site can also sign up for a free CleanLoop newsletter, an aggregation of industry articles and blog postings about the cleantech sector. Bloggers and cleantech websites can even add the CleanLoop widget to their site to display the latest news on happenings in the industry.
“The timing is excellent for this kind of website,” said Homer Antoniadis, CTO of Innovalight, a Silicon Valley startup that has developed a novel method of manufacturing low cost silicon based solar modules. “We are hiring several technical people for our company, and identifying top talent in a new market space can be a challenge. We’re hopeful that CleanLoop can help drive quality candidates to our job openings.”
About VentureLoop
VentureLoop is the leading website dedicated to job postings for emerging venture-backed companies. VentureLoop creates direct relationships with the world’s top venture capital firms to connect their portfolio companies with quality candidates. Candidates can search the VentureLoop website for thousands of jobs at startups and growth companies backed by top-tier venture capital firms. VentureLoop’s VentureCareers product is a hosted career page for venture capital firms, allowing portfolio companies to advertise job openings directly onto their venture capital firm’s public website. VentureLoop also publishes the weekly VentureLoop Emerging Growth Newsletter, which communicates valuable information about emerging growth company news, funding, and career advice. Find out more at www.ventureloop.com.
About Innovalight
Innovalight, founded in 2002 is based in Sunnyvale, California. The company has developed low-cost, high-performance solar cells based on a proprietary silicon ink technology. Innovalight is venture-backed by top tier venture capital firms including Apax Partners, Convexa, Scatec, and Sevin Rosen Funds. More information on Innovalight can be found at www.innovalight.com.
# # #
Ford and GM got money from the federal government to create plug-in hybrid car fleets ready to go by 2014. Unfortunately, this comes on the heels of a Toyota announcement to do the same by 2010. Innovation is alive and well in the auto industry. In Japan.
RockPort Capital Partners of Boston has announced a new $450M venture fund devoted to cleantech investments. RockPort is definitely a VC firm to watch, as they will need to put that money into emerging cleantech companies over the next 3-5 years and create job opportunities.
A report by New Energy Finance and Heidrick & Struggles shows that cleantech CEOs are facing a shortage of human capital in the industry. Some of the highlights:
- 96% see the recruitment shortage as serious to moderately serious
- CEOs, CTOs and project managers are tough to find
- Most of the employees are being hired from outside of the cleantech industry
The question is whether or not the flood of money into cleantech will be able to hire enough experienced workers to meet VC expectations for business growth.
The NVCA announced that over $2.5 billion was invested by venture capital firms in the cleantech industry in 2007. This is a 40% increase over 2006. This is less than the $3 billion investment reported by Thomson but still shows significant money going into the cleantech industry.
