August 31, 2018 – (LinkedIn) – I attended the Electrification 2018 EPRI conference last week in Long Beach. I came away inspired to further invest in ‘electrifying everything’ to reduce carbon emissions and enhance performance and employment.  But I was also schooled by utility experts on the challenges to the grid, such as increasing peak loads,…

June 28, 2018 – (MobiHealthNews) – It is highly likely that the following statement has been erroneously attributed to Albert Einstein, but we can hope he, at least, also had some internal debates on the topic. “It has become appallingly obvious that our technology has exceeded our humanity.” At SJF Ventures, we’re both impact and…

In our most recent blog post, we discussed how venture capital can help scale solutions that mitigate the impacts of climate change. This post will focus on one of those solutions, energy storage, which we believe is at an inflection point within its life cycle. Energy storage has the capability to make the electrical grid…

President Trump pulled the United States out of the Paris Agreement in July prompting cities, states, organizations of all sizes and everyday Americans to step forward and pledge to uphold the core tenets of the Paris climate agreement and fight climate change. 274 mayors have signed on as part of the Mayors National Climate Action…

Benjamin Franklin famously wrote that “nothing can be said to be certain, except death and taxes.” And yet the inherent optimism of human nature causes us to avoid talking about the inescapable truth of death. Studies have repeatedly shown that while we widely recognize the value in end-of-life consideration and planning, we do not take…

SJF Ventures has joined thousands of investors, businesses, and universities along with nine states and hundreds of cities to sign on to the “We’re Still In” pledge to join the global effort to hold warming well below 2C.  Climate wealth investment opportunities abound, as recently illustrated by the 100 solutions profiled in Drawdown-The Most Comprehensive Plan…

SJF is proud to release its 2016 Impact Report, which highlights the organization’s impact strategy and portfolio company achievements across six impact objectives: mitigating climate change, conserving natural resources, increasing nutritious food & sustainable agriculture, improving education access & outcomes, enhancing health & wellness, and enabling greater economic access & quality job creation.  The report…

In 2016, SJF Ventures undertook a project to better understand the climate change impact of its portfolio.  SJF Ventures worked with a team from the Center for the Advancement of Social Entrepreneurship (CASE) at Duke’s Fuqua School of Business, along with its partners at the Duke Carbon Offset Initiative and with review by the Environmental…

Last week I had the chance to toast Dan Shugar, CEO of NEXTracker, a global leader in tracking systems for solar power plants, such as the 70MW Javiera Solar project in Chile pictured above.    Since SJF Ventures led a Series B financing with the company in December 2014, Dan and his team grew the company…

When we ask education entrepreneurs “Who will buy your company X years from now?” the answer, more often than not, is either limited or defies reality. Entrepreneurs are busy building great companies that tackle extraordinary problems and impact the lives of (hopefully) millions. These aspirations make me most excited to partner with them. A company…