Sustainable Materials

Sustainability may be over the top of it's hype (Onrust over het klimaat daalt, De Standaard, Dec 7 2009). But at the same time, the important challenges concerning effective use of limited resources deserve and attract growing attention, both in the academic world and businesses. The so-called "green economy" grows rapidly and offers an excellent opportunity to replace low-added-value and threatened activities.

Venture Capital is an exponent of the emergence of this new economy. Under the influence of the worldwide crises, the clean technology venture investment went down from $ 8.4 B in 2008 to $ 5.6 B in 2009. But this decline was much smaller than in other sectors, and rather limited in Europe (minus 12%) compared to North America (minus 42%). Cleantech currently accounts for about a quarter of the global venture investment, which is more than ICT, biotechnology or virtually any other sector (clean technology venture investment totaled $5.6 billion in 2009 despite non-binding climate change accord in Copenhagen, http://cleantech.com/about/pressreleases/20090106.cfm).

In the Sustainable Materials workshop, we want to explore the vision and approach of Clean Technology Venture Capital insiders. How do they see this market evolve? Which tendencies can they depict? Which conditions are crucial for a sustainable shareholder value creation? We expect a vivid interaction between the public and this inside view about market opportunities and risks, new business models, tips & tricks, possible pitfalls, business integration and so on in the world of cleantech and sustainable innovation. This will not only be of interest to start-up companies. Indeed, similar considerations apply for existing companies that are involved in sustainable innovations. By means of our call for topics and challenges, we would like to give you the chance to put your relevant questions and items on the discussion agenda. Take advantage of this opportunity now!