The built environment plays such a central role in our world. Think of the places we call home, the places we work, the places we gather, the places that manufacture the goods that power our modern world – all these places are buildings that require incredible amounts of energy. These buildings shape our lives and economy in such interesting, provocative ways. We owe it to ourselves, our communities and generations to come to build strong, healthy, functional buildings that serve us and our planet well.

Somewhere along the way, buildings got really expensive. Energy did too. Discourse today is dominated by inflation at a moment in time when we hope it would be dominated by decarbonization.

As clean technologies took hold over the last decade, an interesting tension emerged between sustainably and affordability. In some circles, the two concepts were seen as incompatible, with sustainable technologies positioned as luxury items that neither businesses nor individuals could justify or afford. The green premium quickly evolved from a temporary state of startup economics to a barrier of entry for price-weary customers.

But clean, sustainable technologies are just that: technologies that must first achieve meaningful scale before becoming cost competitive. Cost curves are a common part of technology development, especially for physical technologies being deployed in energy infrastructure or the built environment. Frankly, for most physical technologies, the cost curve is an acute challenge – one that can feel almost impossible to descend in a price sensitive environment where inflation has overtaken the social consciousness.

The focus on prices and inflation, which is a very valid concern in any economy, does no favor to the startup founder seeking to scale sustainable technology in the built environment. It is, however, not a reason to give up. Rather, for the ambitious founder, it is a reason to come well prepared for the climb you will face.

Welcome to Fortify Buildings & Energy, the next strategic initiative from the ClimateHaven team.

Fortify Buildings and Energy will tackle the tension that lies at the heart of the built environment: can you create the buildings and energy systems that are both sustainable and affordable? We believe the answer can be “yes” – even in this economic environment – with the right innovation and the right capital stack.

Through Fortify, we will hunt for that “yes” by building three pillars:

1. Build the Founder Bankability Framework to provide founders with a toolkit to build towards bankability from the start.
2. Seek ambitious founders to apply the Framework and chart the right pathway to scale.
3. Cultivate relationships with leading corporate partners who will be there to support our founders through mentorship, investment, and partnership opportunities.

Let’s share more about each pillar.

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Founder Bankability Framework

One of the challenges with physical technologies, especially those in infrastructure and the built environment, is identifying the right type of capital to ensure these technologies can scale. Venture capital may be the right way to start, but institutional capital is the way these technologies must all finish if they are to achieve scale in the physical world. The key to institutional equity and debt – bankability.

Founders shouldn’t hope the capital they need will show up when they need it, they must build with bankability in mind from the start. The Founder Bankability Framework is designed to share the key elements of bankability with founders in a digestible format so they can design, develop, manufacture, and sell their products in a way that will attract institutional equity and debt, not repel it.

The Founder Bankability Framework consists of ten parts, which will roll out one by one over the winter months:

1. Design for manufacturing / construction
2. Establishing the means of production
3. Certifiability, warrantability and insurability
4. Constant, credit worthy offtake
5. Financial structures for risk amelioration
6. Regulatory compliance
7. Throughput optimization
8. Replicate the means of production
9. Defensible assumptions for financial modeling
10. Sources and uses for different company stages

Combined together, the framework provides an understanding of the necessary features to build a bankable product or project capable of scaling up revenue and scaling down cost of capital.

Be on the lookout for bi-weekly posts starting next week and workshops to come over the winter.

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Startup Sprints

With bankability as a guiding principle, we’ll recruit startups tackling the technologies that unlock the tension between sustainability and affordability in infrastructure and buildings:

1. Construction technologies that enable means and methodologies to deliver better performance for equivalent or lower cost.
2. Building systems that manage the resources buildings consume and generate and create connectivity to optimize building and grid performance.
3. Hardware and materials that fundamentally change the user/owner experience, making better buildings more accessible, more affordable, and more prevalent.

We’ll issue a call for startups soon, and the startups we select will complete a Startup Sprint with a dedicated team of mentors and advisors who will guide the startup through the Founder Bankability Framework and identify the right pathway and partners for pilot opportunities.

Fortify matters when these startups achieve meaningful scale – and we’ll do everything we can to support them!

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Corporate Partners

To ensure we’re identifying the technologies that solve real business problems, we’ll cultivate enduring relationships with corporate partners who possess deep expertise in the built environment and genuine belief in the power of innovation.

Our partners will help shape the direction of Fortify Buildings and Energy to ensure we’re searching for the right founders, teaching bankability the right way, and identifying the right pathways for technologies to scale. In addition, our partners will work directly with the startup founders to ensure they are solving the right problems.

We look forward to welcoming our first corporate partners soon. In the meantime, if you are a forward-thinking corporate working in or around the built environment, then reach out to learn more!

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Buildings need energy. Energy Needs Buildings. Right now, the world is demanding we build a lot of both!

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Let’s Fortify!

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