Jack Ma , along with other high-profile investors, will splurge money on cleantech firms over the next 20 years. (Photo : Getty Images)
High-profile business leaders have inked a new venture fund, which will splurge more than $1 billion on cleantech firms over the next 20 years.
Microsoft's Bill Gates, Alibaba's Jack Ma, Amazon's Jeff Bezos and Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers's John Doerr are just some of the top leaders to invest in Breakthrough Energy Ventures (BEV), a fund for "next-generation energy technologies."
The fund aims to pour money into technologies that can bring clean and cheap energy.
"Anything that leads to cheap, clean, reliable energy we're open-minded to," Gates told Quartz in an interview.
The business magnate expressed his surprise as to why many had not thought of technology innovation to combat climate change.
"All of that takes place just as a normal market mechanism as you replace energy sources with other ways to do it," Gates said. He also stressed that splurging on energy is harder and riskier than on information technology.
"People think you can just put $50 million in and wait two years and then you know what you got. In this energy space, that's not true at all."
The lack of willing investors, however, makes the area an uncrowded field and brings opportunity to those who have the guts.
"It's such a big market that the value if you're really providing a big portion of the world's energy, the value of that will be super, super big."
BEV, through its website, said that its goal is "to provide everyone in the world with access to reliable, affordable power, food, goods, transportation, and services without contributing to greenhouse gas emissions."
The venture firm also unveiled a framework called "Landscape Innovation," which is said to be "a guide to other public and private investors committed to reducing global greenhouse gas emissions."
Meanwhile, BEV's board will still have to decide on where to pour the money into, with considerations that include scientific feasibility and climate impact.
