Climatetech venture builder Wavemaker Impact announces first close of its debut fund

Wavemaker Impact (WMI), Southeast Asia’s first climatetech venture builder, announced the first close of its debut fund to drive decarbonization in the region at scale.

Wavemaker Impact’s limited partners include Pavilion Capital, an investment company established in Singapore in 2012; JG Digital Equity Ventures, the VC arm of the Philippines’ JG Summit Holdings; Kajima Ventures; Grantham Foundation, a Boston-based climate investor; and a number of family offices and high net worth investors in Asia and Europe. EDB New Ventures, the venture-building arm of the Singapore Economic Development Board, also supports Wavemaker Impact as a new strategic partner.

Previously, Wavemaker Impact also signed strategic partnerships with Enterprise Singapore, which is helping the firm grow its venture-building program in Singapore, and the United Nations Development Programme or UNDP, which is assisting in stage-appropriate impact measurement.

Just last October, Wavemaker Impact, Bill Gates’ Breakthrough Energy Ventures, GenZero, and Singapore state investor Temasek announced a plan to set up a first-of-its-kind agri-tech startup that would bring together climate-tech, agri-food, and venture-building capabilities to accelerate rice decarbonization in Asia.

Central to Wavemaker Impact’s investment thesis is the idea that successful climatetech companies must focus on value creation for their customers, not just emissions reduction. “All our companies are 100x100 companies—i.e. businesses with the potential to reach US$100 million in high-margin recurring revenue and abate 100 million tons of CO2e emissions per year,” said Quentin Vaquette, one of Wavemaker Impact’s founding partners.

Wavemaker Impact furthermore believes that the best companies are driven by solid founding teams going after well-understood and validated problems. “To convert opportunities into scalable companies, we work with proven entrepreneurs, who have built businesses before, exited them, and are looking for the next challenge that will leave a legacy behind,” added Marie Cheong, another Wavemaker Impact founding partner.

Since its October 2021 launch, Wavemaker Impact has grown its presence to 3 key markets in Southeast Asia (Singapore, Indonesia, and Vietnam) and launched 4 new companies through its venture-building methodology. It plans to launch another 8-12 new companies in the next 2 years, funding them from launch to Series A and, in some cases, Series B.

The venture builder is enabling business models in land use and deforestation, agriculture, mobility, industry, buildings, and energy. “We start from our carbon map that points us to where greenhouse gas emissions are in the region, and based on this, we identify customer segments that are interesting to pursue,” said Doug Parker, another founding partner at the fund.

Wavemaker Impact’s decision to go for a venture-building approach rather than more traditional investing stems from the wide range of valuable opportunities it sees in the space and the lack of existing ‘100x100’ companies available for investment.