The highest risk-takers think clean and green is a safe bet

If you need it, here’s more evidence that it is time to get on the bandwagon and develop a roadmap to reduce your company’s environmental impact. The most recent report on quarterly venture capital investment from Dow Jones Financial Services shows that, while VC investing in general was down quarter to quarter over last year, investing in clean technologies matched last year’s first quarter pace.

That’s good news because last year saw a record level of VC investment in “cleantech,” as Dow Jones calls it. A total of $3 billion of VC investing went to cleantech startups in 2007, a 43 percent increase over the previous year.

Dow Jones explains: “Although ‘cleantech’ cuts across all industries, the majority of these companies can be found in the energy, agriculture, and advanced specialty chemicals and materials segments.”

The individual technology matters less than the bigger message implicit in this high-risk investing. VC investors often see the handwriting on the wall before others do. Although these investors take a shotgun approach – recognizing that many bets will fail and a few will pay off big– their investments are a leading indicator of technological trends.

If VC investors are more interested in clean and green than ever, then it can be argued that it is time for companies to confront reality and develop plans for more environmentally sustainable processes and products. OEMs, EMS providers and ODMs that wait to develop roadmaps to reduce their environmental impact risk remaining behind the curve.

As TFI Environment has shown in the past and will continue to show, green (sustainability) can be green (profitable). OEMs and others that have not done the analysis on their processes and products to see where clean/green can also be profitable, are hurting themselves and their shareholders by continuing to lag this growing trend.

As always, we’re interested in your thoughts.

Posted by Bill Roberts, April 24th, 2008

Filed to Environment, Lean Practices
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One Response to “The highest risk-takers think clean and green is a safe bet”

  1. From: Stephen Greene
      on April 29th, 2008

    I agree that green is in. It has more to do with building our knowledge and understanding the real cost or impact of design and material choices. You may not want to be the leading edge as market place changes occur but you can’t afford to be sitting still or heading in the wrong direction either.

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