Why We Invested…
By Gabrielle Morgan, Senior Investment Manager & Natalie Otwoma, Operations Associate
With this being our first post in 2024, allow me to first catch-you up on the exciting couple of months over at the Conduit Connect. We kicked off January with some of our team members visiting Conduit Oslo, an incredible trip meeting local impact investors. In February, we had a fantastic evening at our Conduit EIS Fund 4th Vintage Launch Party which was a success. Huge thanks to everyone who joined us and contributed to the event’ success; our community never fails to impress us with its depth of knowledge and eagerness to get involved.
We are pleased to share the Conduit EIS Impact Fund has hit its fundraising target for the April 2024 close and we are in the process of closing our round. The next opportunity to reinvest in the fund will be in July 2024. If you would like to reinvest in the Fund to continue building your portfolio of impactful EIS ventures over the course of the coming year, please get in touch with the team for more information via conduitimpactfund@theconduitconnect.com.
The Conduit EIS Impact Fund is committed to supporting technology companies that will help drive carbon accountability as well as embedded carbon and emissions reduction in the sector. As such, we are pleased to share our investment into two standout companies tackling sustainability in logistics as well as the built environment.
Kamma: The property sector is the UK’s second largest source of GHG emissions, with buildings and their construction responsible for around 25% of all emissions. Property is also one of the slowest economic sectors to decarbonise, with incomplete, outdated, and inaccurate property data forming an active barrier to informed decarbonisation decisions.
Kamma acquires millions of disparate data sources to create an environmental property profile for every property and portfolio. Using this data, it has created a suite of products for lenders and brokers, real estate funds, rating agencies, energy providers and insurers. Combining this data collection and address-matching technology with insightful analysis, Kamma can articulate the fastest routes to net zero for the property. As these sectors face new climate risks, regulations and responsibilities, Kamma is positioned to support its partners with a suite of climate change solutions, ranging from ESG risk management and regulatory reporting to retrofit optimisation solutions. They have already successfully collaborated with J.P. Morgan, NatWest, CBRE, and JLL, among many others. We’re excited to be investing alongside the lead, The Clean Growth Innovation Fund, for the second time.
Our Take: Kamma is unique in that it creates its own datasets using multiple layers. It starts with the most accurate address matching (95% match versus industry norm of 80%), and then combines it with national grid emissions data, geospatial data, energy consumption from smart meters, local fuel costs, materials data, property attributes and realtime EPC certifications to create the most advanced profiles for 36 million properties.
Find out more about Kamma here.
Fin: The Covid-19 pandemic accelerated a shift towards eCommerce and home deliveries, and about 1/3 of all UK sales are already online. This explosive growth presents significant challenges for cities: customers are demanding ever-faster deliveries, putting more diesel vans on the roads, leading to congestion, pollution, and rapidly increasing carbon emissions. The ‘last mile’ – the final part of delivery from distribution centres to end consumers – is extremely inefficient. It accounts for over 53% of a retailers total shipping expense, and without intervention, we can expect a 32% jump in carbon emissions from urban delivery traffic by 2030.
Fin is a London-based logistics and delivery company using an electric fleet of cargo bikes, vans, and lorries combined with a network of micro fulfilment hubs to deliver parcels for the last mile. Fin’s mission is to make cities more liveable, meet customer demand for speed and convenience, and to help companies and cities achieve net zero targets. Fin uses a hub-and-spoke delivery model: electric vans pick up parcels from a customer’s distribution centre outside of the city, parcels are consolidated at micro fulfilment centres within the city, then e-cargo bikes make deliveries and returns within a 20-minute radius. See below for a picture of the team taking one of the bikes for a ride!
Fin is currently operating out of two micro fulfilment hubs in Bethnal Green and North Acton. It made its first delivery in early 2023, and is already delivering well over 3,000 parcels a week for customers including HelloFresh (the world’s largest meal kit delivery company), Grind Coffee, HOUST (an Airbnb servicing company), Ricoh and Hummingbird Bakery.
Our Take: Fin addresses three interconnected dimensions of impact:
Reducing carbon emissions of the last-mile
Providing decent work and economic growth to riders
Making cities more liveable by reducing congestion and air pollution.
From an emissions perspective, the research consensus is clear: optimising routes, consolidating loads, and utilising electric vehicles is essential to reduce the carbon impact of the last mile and help us achieve net zero – three strategies that are inherent in Fin’s business model.
Find out more about Fin here.
That’s all for now! As always, get in touch at conduitimpactfund@theconduitconnect.com if you want to find out more about our Fund, our portfolio, or anything else!
Kamma Co-Founder CEO – Orla Shields
Fin Founder – Rich Pleeth