Cleantech Innovate | Steering committee

We are delighted that the following advisory committee has provided strategic input to the event and entry process.

Bio

Jim Totty

Managing Partner, Earth Capital

Jim has 25 years’ experience in sustainable investment and technology, gained through 18 years in private equity, and earlier advisory and academic work. He was previously at Citi Alternative Investments, and before moving into private equity he was a management consultant in the Energy and Utilities group at PricewaterhouseCoopers. Jim has a PhD and an MSc in Physics from Imperial College London, holds an MA in Physics from the University of Cambridge, and is a Chartered Financial Analyst.

Beverley Gower-Jones

Beverley Gower-Jones is an innovation professional with a proven track record in pre-revenue cleantech investments and commercialisation. She founded CLT in 2006 and has supported low carbon ventures in a wide range of sectors including power, buildings, transport, waste and energy intensive industry. She specialises in accelerating innovation to market and scaling companies by providing strategic insights, providing access to funding and industry partnerships and identifying novel ways to overcome barriers to entry. Beverley is a thought leader in the commercialisation of sustainable technologies.

During her tenure at Shell she gained wide international business exposure and delivered the £500 million subsurface technology transfer programme to Shell’s operations globally. Beverley was founder and Vice President at Shell Technology Ventures. In this role she was instrumental in defining Shell’s technology venturing strategic approach. She has 30 years’ industry experience in corporate venture management including at QinetiQ, where she managed a portfolio of 8 ventures with a total value of £60 million that went on to deliver an IRR of 18%.

She chaired the DECC Energy Entrepreneurs Fund VC panel regarding grant investment decisions and served as Chair of a flywheel energy storage venture during which time she set the strategy for the company, moved the technology from early research to commercial readiness, secured the management team, raised £4.8 million in investment funding and led the company to its first sales in its launch market.

Andrew Wordsworth

Managing Partner, Sustainable Ventures

Andrew Wordsworth is a Founder and Managing Director of Sustainable Ventures which works with investors, entrepreneurial managers and corporate partners to originate, build and grow businesses in the low carbon and sustainability sectors. The company also established Sustainable Workspaces, the UK’s largest cluster of start-up companies in the sector with over 20 ventures based in two locations near London Bridge.

Sustainable Ventures portfolio includes E-Car Club which created the UK’s first crowdfunding exit in 2015 when Europcar acquired a majority stake; and Powervault which is seeking to disrupt the domestic electricity storage industry. In 2017, the Company launched a new Sustainable Accelerator programme which has invested a total of £800k into 7 start-ups.

Prior to establishing Sustainable Ventures, Andrew had over 15 years’ experience in the energy and climate change sector – including roles within Esso, Bain & Co, Arthur D Little and Managing Director of Carbon Trust Enterprises. Andrew holds an M.Eng from the University of Cambridge.

Richard Barker

Adviser and Investment Committee Member, Iona Capital

Richard is an Adviser and Investment Committee Member at Iona Capital, a leading investor into the UK bio-energy sector with over £300m FUM. Richard was previously CEO of Biogen, the largest UK food waste AD builder and operator. He has also founded businesses in the aluminium recycling and chemical process technology sectors, following his early career in strategic consulting and investment banking. Richard is passionate about addressing the threat of climate change and is a member of Al Gore’s Climate Reality Leadership Corps.

Michael Ruggier

Michael is a Chartered Engineer with 34 years of global work experience including over 24 years with Shell International. His last role at Shell was as a “GameChanger”, with a remit to seek out radical and mostly disruptive ideas, fund & support them to prove the concept & deploy the technology. He has an impressive track record with many inspiring “Rags-to-Riches” stories. He believes strongly that radical / disruptive / game-changing technology innovation is critical to solving today’s sustainability challenges.

Prof. Richard Templer

Richard Templer is the Hofmann Professor of Chemistry at Imperial College London and the Director for Innovation at the Grantham Institute: Climate Change & Environment. He has spent the last decade supporting students, innovators and entrepreneurs address the challenges and opportunities of climate change through the creation of cleantech businesses. In doing this he co-founded the Climate-KIC in 2010 and more recently has been working on a plan to create a cleantech innovation cluster in London.

Karen Lawrence

Director, KML Intermin Ltd.

Karen is Director of the consultancy KML Interim Ltd. Karen has spent the past 30 years in several diverse sectors and a mixture of blue chip and SME organisations. Working for the Energy Saving Trust for over a decade provided Karen with broad sustainability knowledge, which was further strengthened in a role as a trustee and latterly Vice Chair of the community energy charity Pure Leapfrog. Karen has also recently provided key services for Grant Thornton to support the growth of small businesses in all sectors, with a particular interest in how smaller, ethically-driven entrepreneurial businesses can help drive a vibrant economy in London and deliver profits with purpose.

Natalie Fredericks

Natalie’s experience covers small business start-up and growth, strategic consulting and coordination of CleanTech incubation programmes. She is currently managing the commercialisation support provided to SMEs in BEIS’s Energy Entrepreneurs Fund. Natalie has provided support for a wide variety of low carbon innovators, helping them reach commercialisation milestones.

Prior to joining CLT, Natalie spent 10 years as part of a management team building a start-up telecoms business through rapid growth to profitability and sale. Natalie holds a degree and MA in Aeronautical Engineering from Cambridge and an MBA from INSEAD.

Nusrat Yousuf

Sustainability Senior Programme Manager, Greater London Authority.

Nusrat is a sustainability professional with over 20 years experience in the public delivery, policy and campaigning sectors. Currently the Head of Sustainability at the Greater London authority Nusrat has more recently has been working with the London Sustainable Development Commission on a plan to create a cleantech innovation cluster in London. Nusrat has also successfully led the development of a EU funded Cleantech business Incubator programme led by the GLA called Better Futures.

Heather Hodgins

Project Manager, Greater London Authority

Heather has led several projects to fund and develop clean technologies. She currently manages the Mayor of London’s flagship cleantech business support project Better Futures, which supports cleantech innovators in London to develop products and accelerate the growth of their business. Having worked in both public and private sectors, Heather has a wealth of experience in bridging the challenges and opportunities between academia, public authorities and private sector innovators.

Christian Inglis

Senior Innovation Lead – Growth and Scale

Clean Growth and Infrastructure, Innovate UK

Steering committee

Bio