First-time fund manager AWE Funds hit its stride in 2023 fundraising for what was then an overlooked and novel strategy: investing in climate solutions that would also have an outsized impact on women.
At that time, a small but growing cohort of fund managers were trying to bring opportunities at the intersection of climate and gender to investors’ attention. AWE, which stands for Achieving Women Equity and is based in Gurgaon, India, sealed a $15 million first close that summer, backed mostly by Indian high net-worth individuals.
As fundraising for first-time managers, for VC firms, for climate funds, for women, for emerging markets has gotten harder, AWE has gotten creative. The women-led firm recently closed its second big-name philanthropic backer, Bayer Foundation, which investedonprofit entity, AWE Foundation. Capital raised through the DAF, called AWE Evergreen Philanthropic Fund, then gets invested in AWE’s for-profit fund
“There’s not enough philanthropic capital to solve the world’s problems,” AWE Funds’ Seema Chaturveditells ImpactAlpha. There is $326 billion in DAF dry powder, for which donors are getting a tax break while it waits to be deployed for charitable causes or impact investments. “We have to find a way to move it out of its inertia and trigger it into action.”
AWE is aiming to raise $65 million for its first fund to deploy in early growth-stage climate tech companies that also promote gender equity.
Autodesk Foundation was the first institution to invest in AWE, finalizing its commitment early last year. Bayer Foundation, which strives to be a catalytic funder for science and social innovations addressing health and food security, helped AWE get its Evergreen Philanthropic Fund going and became its first investor. The DAF will now enable AWE to raise from other philanthropic entities in the US.
The firm has built up a portfolio of six ventures since reaching its first close, writing checks of $500,000 to $3 million for solutions in energy, water, mobility, industrial decarbonization and health. Its latest is Ikin, a startup in the southern Indian city of Kochi that makes smart locks for freight cargo. The firm participated in Ikin’s $2 million pre-Series A round in June, framing it as a plastic reduction play.
“Every 1,000 locks deployed keeps 19.2 tonnes of plastic out of landfills,” Chaturvedi wrote about the deal.
KB Cols Sciences is a biosciences company that makes natural dyes and color ingredients for textiles, paints and cosmetics. Monitra Health is a health tech firm that’s developing a way to monitor heart rhythm disorders, which can be exacerbated by extreme heat. Uravu Labs is developing a way to pull water from the air for both drinking and to meet the intense water needs of data center operators. EyeROV makes marine robots and drones. Digital EcoInnovisionhas sensor and AI-based applications for wastewater treatment monitoring.
AWE also has three investments from a warehoused portfolio.
Most of its portfolio has at least one female founder, as AWE Funds is on a mission to get more venture capital to female climate-tech entrepreneurs. Just under 10% of the $10.5 billion in VC investments in India last year went to companies with at least one female co-founder (compared to about 14% of VC globally).
The fund manager strives to have a positive impact both on women and on climate change while being a commercially-focused venture investor.
“People do not appreciate that climate, as much as it is associated with impact, offers the most robust business case right now on the planet because it’s about survival,” says Chaturvedi, “and people are willing to pay for survival.”
