I prioritise smaller conferences that focus on connecting like-minded people and fostering content-rich discussion when planning my annual conference schedule. This year, I attended The Drop for the first time and, spoiler alert, it already earned a top spot on my list for next year.
The easy going atmosphere and strong sense of community helped spark engaging conversations and generated valuable learnings about all-things climate related. Both the Ripples and the side events had the format of hands-on workshops rather than the one to many panels we are used to in most tech events. Below, I’ll share some of the learning from the sessions I was fortunate to attend.
Credits: LinkedIn post by The Climate Brick
The day I arrived in Malmö, I headed straight to the Climate Brick. The Climate brick, started by the founders at EQT Ventures and Contrarian Ventures, is a community that brings together ecosystem players to accelerate the deployment of climate technologies. This workshop was split into discussion groups for all seven bricks, which are segmented by company archetypes. I was in the New Technology brick discussion, moderated by Thong Le Hoang and Adam Ross. We discussed how groundbreaking technologies need to become affordable and accessible to unlock disruption and get us closer to cost-parity for overall adoption. However, cost-parity was a tricky term in this discussion, as these innovative solutions bring added functionalities to those already existing and that should be accounted for when discussing price. Funding was also a big part of the discussion, namely how financing working capital needs to be top of mind for climate founders and how later stage companies can combine capital to continue financing R&D and growth. Last, we discussed how IP strategies need to be managed carefully to truly unlock defensibility and freedom to operate, allowing products to come to market to be tested earlier. It was great to meet Amanda Ritter from Lydian, Finn Aretz from Deepsense and Manshu Agarwal from Colbridge Ventures, who contributed greatly to this discussion.
Credits: LinkedIn post by The Drop
The next day was the conference. I joined conversations about fundraising in industrial bio and the costs of biomanufacturing, and misconceptions about Direct Air Capture (DAC). I learned that making synthetic biology cost-effective requires collaboration across the ecosystem, with corporates playing a crucial role piloting new solutions to prove there is a market for bio innovation. I also learned that this goes beyond LOIs as, despite being a good hint that there is interest from the market, investors are mostly concerned about understanding what’s behind the text and hearing how corporates perceive these innovations (i.e. can the new products/inputs really integrate their supply chain at scale) and the premium they are available to pay for it. I suggest reading the Max Mundt post on the session he moderated, where he highlights the different risks between bioproducts and bioprocesses, here.
"Misconceptions about DAC" we debated whether if DAC can hit the $100/tC02 mark and to what extend more deployment will be needed for costs to gradually decrease, with innovations in new materials also playing a crucial role. There were different views on whether DAC companies should prioritise buyers who will utilise vs bury the CO2 and how increasing the overall DAC market is a goal in itself. If you want to geek out on DAC, this post from Extantia is a great read, which greatly contributed to our discussion at The Drop.
I also had a great dinner with Anjum Rangwala, Max Mundt, Ana Sofia Almagro and Jasper Wigley. From book recommendations (I’m currently reading "The Ministry for the Future" - thank you, Ana Sofia!) to learning about companies reincarnating mammoths to fight climate change, the dinner was not short of interesting topics.
Credits: LinkedIn post by The Drop