Matthew Nordan
I'm Managing Director of Prime Impact Fund, where we fund breakthrough start-ups that could have a big impact on climate. I also serve on the boards of five audacious tech start-up companies and two supporting organizations. In past lives I learned venture capital at Venrock, co-founded and led Lux Research, developed energy and environmental projects in China at MNL Partners, and forecasted technology futures at Forrester.
I really do live and breathe this stuff.
I'm also chromosomally incapable of keeping quiet. This blog hosts opinions (mine alone) on energy, venture capital, human behavior, start-ups, societal collapse, hope for the future, and everything in between: hopefully useful, usually numerate, and occasionally long-winded.
Category Archives: Venture capital
PRIME Coalition: A New Funding Model for Radical Energy Innovation
tl;dr: PRIME launches today, bringing a new source of funding – philanthropic capital – to clean energy tech. How will we scale the world for 10 billion 11 billion people? How will we double the size of the consuming class … Continue reading
Posted in Philanthropy, Venture capital
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Square Pegs, Round Holes, and Innovation
I spoke a couple of weeks ago at the NextWave Greentech Investing conference (organized by my friend Rob Day at Black Coral Capital). My aim was to describe the past, present, and future of investment in energy and environmental innovation … Continue reading
Posted in Numbers, Venture capital
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The State of Cleantech Venture Capital: What Lies Ahead
(A version of this post also appeared at GigaOM.) tl;dr: Cleantech VC is receding because of poor short-term performance – no surprise in a post-bubble field with outsized time and money requirements. The category is about to go on a … Continue reading
Entrepreneur Tools: The Returns Analysis
tl;dr: To successfully target VCs, view your deal through their eyes. I got an outstanding piece of advice in my first job: “Always see the world from the other person’s point of view.” If you’re trying to sign the pivotal … Continue reading
Posted in Numbers, Unsolicited advice, Venture capital
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“Financing Your Start-up 101” in 45 Minutes
For this year’s ARPA-E Summit I was asked to give a talk about different ways to finance an energy start-up. The challenge as it was given to me was “cover all sources of financing – VC, angels, grants, debt, everything … Continue reading
Posted in Unsolicited advice, Venture capital
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Secret Formula 