In brief: Credit Suisse backs VoLo’s $90m climate tech fund

VoLo Earth Ventures, a climate tech venture capital firm, has closed its debut fund on $90 million, almost double the size of its targeted $50 million.  

VoLo Earth Climate Fund I secured backing from Credit Suisse’s $318 million Climate Innovation Fund alongside foundations, funds of funds, private equity and public equity managers, and high-net-worth individuals, according to a press release.  

Founded in 2020, the Colorado-based firm invests in climate solutions that help to decarbonise the global economy. It started fundraising for its inaugural climate tech fund in January 2021.

A spokesperson for VoLo told New Private Markets: “We believe that now more than ever, the combination of policy, capital and entrepreneurial talent is accelerating the new energy economy, providing an impetus for LPs to enter the space and in turn a ripe opportunity set for firms like VoLo Earth to combat the climate crisis while generating attractive returns for our investors.”

The fund is targeting pre-seed through to Series B investments in technologies that address the climate crisis across four core sub-sectors: electricity, mobility, buildings and embodied carbon. 

So far, VoLo has deployed half (54 percent) of its committed capital in 28 investments across both the supply and demand sides of the energy transition. Its typical ticket size is from $500,000 to $5 million.

VoLo complies with Greenhouse Gas Protocol to classify the carbon impact for each of its portfolio companies. “We also work to raise the bar by introducing new venture-capital-appropriate reporting methods such as carbon per paid in capital (CPI), which parallels DPI reporting,” the firm said.

VoLo was founded by a team of five, consisting of a mix of investment professionals with experience in cleantech and data science.