About this episode

This episode explores how climate philanthropy accelerates the climate tech pipeline through non-profit support.

Climate philanthropy does far more than fund advocacy and conservation—it bridges critical funding gaps for breakthrough technologies that traditional, financially driven investors often overlook. In this special episode, we continue our ongoing Climate Philanthropy series in partnership with the Skyline Foundation to explore how non-profit support accelerates the climate tech pipeline. Shereen D’Souza (Climate Solutions Portfolio Lead at Skyline Foundation ) sits down with two powerhouse CEOs from her grantee portfolio, Deepa Lounsbury of LabStart and Andrew Chang of New Energy Nexus , to discuss what it really takes to move climate innovation from a university lab to global deployment. Why This Episode Matters Bringing a "hard tech" climate startup from initial lab concept to commercial scale takes an average of 10 years , and every single step of that journey faces a unique "valley of death." Because scaled deployment looks drastically different depending on the geography, supporting entrepreneurs requires a highly specialized ecosystem. This conversation highlights how philanthropy strategically funds distinct, critical phases of the lab-to-market pipeline to scale viable…

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