An Integrated Control Tower: Unlocking Long-Term Investment Capital for Clean Energy Innovation

As recent history highlights, there are numerous challenges in bringing novel energy technologies from the lab all the way to the global energy marketplace. But one challenge in particular has proven particularly intractable recently; the lack of financing for clean energy entrepreneurs. This failure to connect clean energy entrepreneurs with aligned, long-term capital sources is often referred to as the “valley of death” (VoD), and it has two distinct manifestations: The first is the “technology valley of death”, which refers to the inability to fund new technologies to the point of becoming viable businesses; and the second is the “commercialization valley of death”, which refers to the inability to fund businesses to the point of full commercialization of the technology. The two valleys are, however, related. Because the commercialization VoD demands such a high quantum of capital, it limits the amount of capital willing to flow into the earlier stage companies, thereby exacerbating the technology VoD.