How and Why Climate Tech Teams Should Leverage Non-Profit Actors

Here's what makes climate tech different from every other vertical: we all need these solutions.

Unlike a SaaS product targeting enterprise customers or a fintech app serving specific demographics, climate technology addresses a universal challenge. That shared urgency creates unique opportunities for climate tech startups to tap into growth levers and influencers that simply don't exist elsewhere.

This reality hit home this week when Pope Leo XIV interrupted his holiday to issue a stark warning about our "burning world," urging Catholics worldwide to address the climate crisis. What made it particularly notable? It was the Vatican's second significant climate appeal within a week, referencing the need for the human family to care for our common home.

That shared sense of urgency is dissolving the boundaries that once separated philanthropy, public policy, and private investment. Solving climate change requires collaboration across sectors, and increasingly, nonprofits traditionally seen as grantmakers, conveners, or advocates are stepping into a new role: central players in the venture capital ecosystem.

With deep community ties, mission-driven mandates, and the flexibility to deploy catalytic capital, these organizations are now actively shaping how and where climate innovation happens.

For climate tech companies fortunate enough to receive support from foundations or nonprofits, a golden opportunity lies in plain sight: those routine reporting requirements.

This week, we delve deeper into why strategic climate tech teams recognize these reports as one of their most powerful and underutilized marketing tools.

Till next week.

Investment Insights: The Climate Tech Funding Landscape

This week, check out this insightful conversation from PAC's "On the Record/Off the Record" series featuring three climate tech investors: Alena Solonina at CurvePoint Capital, Jonathan Azoff at SNØCAP, and Yao Huang at The Hatchery.

Investors are enabling climate startups to build new technologies more sustainably and collaboratively, and arguably more cost-effectively, by offering climate tech builders flexible and blended types of financing and resources beyond traditional venture capital. In this discussion, they examine what’s interesting and unique about climate tech investing, explain the need for a collaborative-minded approach to investing and sharing resources across climate portfolio companies.

Climate Tech Investing: On the Record/Off the Record

The conversation covers structured capital solutions, decarbonization efforts, and how collaboration within the climate tech ecosystem is shaping the future of sustainable investments.

For Climate Tech Startups: The Hidden Opportunity in “Mandatory” Reporting

Foundation funding for climate technology has increased significantly, with climate funding surging 20% outpacing the overall growth in global philanthropic giving for the first time.

Organizations such as Prime Coalition, The Rockefeller Foundation, or The Cisco Foundation, which have committed $US 100 million over 10 years to fund non-profit grants and impact investing in climate solutions.  They are providing crucial “patient capital” to bridge the notorious “valley of death” between research and development (R&D) and commercial viability.

It’s very common for foundations to have a reporting requirement as part of their grants or investments, which reflects their own internal and external compliance requirements.   Very often, when a foundation funds an initiative for a climate tech company, they will want a detailed report on how the investment was used, the impact achieved, and what comes next. The natural startup reaction? Treat it like a compliance checkbox—dash off something perfunctory to satisfy the requirement and get back to “real work.”

And for climate tech companies, this report is one of the most powerful—and underutilized—marketing tools.

This is a massive strategic mistake.

Instead, think of that foundation report as your golden ticket to credibility with stakeholders who would typically never give an unknown startup, no matter how impressive its mission or solution, serious consideration.

Read on here to understand how, when a respected foundation puts its name behind your work, it's essentially lending you its reputation and why a report bearing a serious foundation logo carries infinitely more weight with policymakers than your standard pitch deck.

At HOTHOUSE, we provide a support hub, tools, and exclusive growth opportunities to help connect high-growth climate technology companies with the people and resources they need to expand their impact. Want to maximize your next foundation report for strategic advantage? We focus on helping climate tech teams turn compliance moments into credibility-building opportunities that connect you with the right stakeholders to achieve your next business goals.