Builders Private Capital Launches $300M Clean Energy Investment Platform

CHICAGO, Oct. 27, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- Builders Private Capital (BPC), a system-driven, multi-stage, climate-focused investment organization, which includes S2G Ventures, announced today that it has launched a $300 million clean energy investment platform. Stephan Feilhauer and Francis O'Sullivan have joined the organization as Managing Directors to oversee this new energy strategy, while Andrea Woodside has joined as Vice President, Real Assets to support investments across all of Builders Private Capital's themes, including energy, food, agriculture, and oceans. Builders Private Capital is the direct investment arm of Builders Vision, an impact platform dedicated to building a humane and healthy planet.

The global energy transition, which has attracted over $4 trillion of capital since 2004, accelerated renewable energy from a marginal to meaningful role in the future of electricity generation. However, to fully mainstream its role in the 21st century economy, there needs to be more flexible and creative capital to meet the needs of an increasingly complex and integrated energy future - powering transportation, industry and other sectors in new and nuanced market structures.

Builders Private Capital will take a flexible, multi-asset approach to provide solutions for this next stage of the energy transition. BPC's goal is to invest and support the whole energy system in a way that aligns current technical solutions with evolving market structures and regulatory frameworks to mainstream the transition of a cleaner energy system across industries.

The investment platform leverages Builders Private Capital's existing value-added services which includes corporate development, policy and regulatory support, marketing and communications, community building, talent development, and data science.

"Having been an investor in sustainable energy for more than a decade, I am thrilled to be joining a platform that values flexibility in capital formation and a long-term mindset," said Stephan Feilhauer, managing director at Builders Private Capital. "Not only will we invest in core clean energy themes, but we will also focus on adjacencies in industrial and infrastructure sectors, which are often overlooked."

"The next decade of energy transition is about achieving massive scale and overcoming the many complex, system-level challenges that accompany deep decarbonization. Our focus is on investing to solve these difficult problems," said Francis O'Sullivan, managing director at Builders Private Capital. "Leading cross-sectoral expertise and the capacity to provide our partners with bespoke capital solutions, tailored to tomorrow's market needs, sets Builders Private Capital apart, and I'm looking forward to being part of this great team."

Real assets are a key part of the team's investment strategy, acting as a force multiplier and helping to deploy technology at scale. Andrea Woodside brings a decade of experience from the impact investing industry where she focused on climate transition investments throughout private markets.

"Given the capital intensity of the sectors in which we're working, I am excited to be part of a platform that thinks creatively and has a breadth of tools to achieve its goals," said Andrea Woodside, vice president of real assets at Builders Private Capital. "I'm looking forward to working with current and new portfolio companies within food and agriculture, energy, and oceans to help them scale and ultimately achieve more impact."

The Builders Private Capital clean energy investment platform builds on the success of S2G Ventures, today's most active food and agriculture investor, focused on the adjacent climate-focused verticals of food, agriculture, oceans and seafood. S2G Ventures' systems investing approach will be applied through this platform with deep consideration into how investments fit within the broader value chain.

"Stephan, Francis and Andrea's backgrounds are a great complement to our current investment platform - a systems approach to specialized underwriting by industry paired with experience in helping to scale "tough tech" technologies that drive more climate smart outcomes for our food, oceans and now energy systems" said Sanjeev Krishnan, chief investment officer and managing director at Builders Private Capital and S2G Ventures. "I am thrilled to be working with them to help mainstream the Energy Transition and leverage what we are building across the broader Builders Vision impact platform."

Stephan Feilhauer Bio
Stephan Feilhauer is a Managing Director leading the direct investment strategy in clean energy at Builders Private Capital, where he leads the investing efforts into growth stage companies at the intersection of technology with infrastructure, industrials and clean energy, as well as development platforms focused on energy transition. He has 15 years of experience as an investor and researcher in the US, Europe and Asia. Mr. Feilhauer joined Builders Private Capital from Macquarie Capital where he oversaw growth equity investments in industrial tech and cleantech in the US and Europe. Previously he worked in Deutsche Bank's principal investing, structured credit and corporate M&A teams in New York and Singapore. He began his career with Goldman Sachs in London, in the then newly-created ESG and thematic equity research team. He holds a BSc from the University of London (University College London and London School of Economics) and an engineering Master's degree from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, during the completion of which he also consulted for the World Bank. He lives in New York with his wife and two daughters and serves on the board of trustees of the German School Brooklyn.

Francis O'Sullivan Bio
Francis O'Sullivan is a Managing Director leading the direct investment strategy in clean energy at Builders Private Capital. Before joining BPC, Frank was Head of Onshore Strategy at Ørsted, where he also managed the company's early-stage and growth equity investment portfolio. Prior to Ørsted, Frank was Director of Research for the MIT Energy Initiative and Co-Director of the MIT Electric Power System Center. He continues to hold a faculty position at the MIT Sloan School where he teaches "Climate and Energy Ventures", a unique team-based class focused on supporting the next generation of clean energy innovators launch new enterprises. Frank also previously worked for McKinsey & Company. Frank's academic, public, and private sector work has focused on energy markets analysis and design, with a particular focus on overcoming the economic and technical challenges associated with large-scale renewables integration in the power system, and the decarbonization of industry and mobility. Frank has written and spoken widely on these topics, including presentations to the U.S. President's Office of Science and Technology Policy, the EIA, the EPA, the IEA, the Brookings Institute, the National Governors' Association, the National Association of Regulated Utility Commissioners, the American Physical Society, the American Geophysical Union and to numerous other academic, policy and industry forums. He was a lead author of the 2015 MIT Future of Solar Energy study. Frank is a Senior Associate with the Energy and National Security Program at the Center for Strategic and International Studies in Washington DC, and he is a Distinguished Associate with the Energy Futures Initiative. He received his Ph.D., E.E., and S.M. degrees from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, and his B.E. degree from the National University of Ireland, all in electrical engineering. He holds a US patent related to spectral shaping structures for photovoltaic applications.

Andrea Woodside Bio
Andrea Woodside is Vice President, Real Assets for Builders Private Capital where she supports the firm's real assets strategy development and investment process across food and agriculture, oceans and seafood and energy, identifying and backing opportunities that are force multipliers to our direct investment strategies. Previously, Andrea led market research and investment management within Food and Agriculture and Clean Energy at Imprint, an impact investing division within Goldman Sachs Asset Management. While there, Andrea led over $1 billion worth of private impact investment transactions within the climate transition theme. Before that, Andrea was an Associate at Imprint Capital which was acquired by Goldman Sachs in 2015. In her early career, Andrea also worked at two grassroots organizations, The Earth Island Institute and Friends of the Mississippi River, and for the University of Minnesota's School of Natural Resources researching the connections between agricultural fertilizer application, greenhouse gas emissions, and behavior change. Andrea received a bachelor of science degree from the University of Minnesota.

About Builders Private Capital
Builders Private Capital is the direct investment team for Builders Vision, an impact platform dedicated to supporting people and organizations building a more humane and healthy planet through philanthropy, investment, and advocacy. Builders Private Capital includes S2G Ventures and implements strategies focused on addressing climate change, including real assets and energy. Builders Private Capital has active funds in Food and Agriculture, Oceans and Seafood and Energy. To learn more, visit our website at www.buildersprivatecapital.com or connect with us on LinkedIn.

Media Contact: Ally Dunne, [email protected]

SOURCE Builders Private Capital

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