Host: Antoine Walter
Guest: John Robinson | Partner & Co-Founder | Mazarine Ventures
Category: 🗣️ Opinion | Investing in Water
Podcast’s Essential Bites:
[8:20] “Our utilization of ESG as a framework is pretty straightforward. […] When we find a company, we have to score them for their potential to help their customer realize their E or S or G goal. So for water, the temptation is to say that it's all E. And clearly E is a big part of water. […] On the S side, I mean, I don't know how you can talk about water without talking about social. The most disadvantaged communities in the world are oftentimes the ones that have the most compromised water or are more prone to flooding.”
[9:48] “The way we see G is around transparency and democratization of water. So it just doesn't sit right with us that communities don't have visibility into their water risks, whether it's quality risks, like contaminated water or quantity risks, like flooding or drought or availability. So if a company isn't able to democratize that data and democratize tools to understand that data and create transparency, and enable the community to have a voice, […] that's a huge G.”
[11:12] “The water industry is generally defined as municipal and industrial water distribution and treatment. That's a traditional definition of the water industry. But there's so many applications outside of the water industry where there's risk.”
[16:41] “An evergreen fund is a fund that doesn't have a finite timeline and it enables us to continue investing in companies over the years as they grow. […] Mazarine is on track to cutting five or six checks a year. And we have the ability to keep doing that, I guess in perpetuity. So we don't have a very clear or very finite timeline like most funds do on a five year investment timeline and then five years of harvesting exits.”
[52:39] “The trend to watch out for in the water sector is opportunities outside of what is traditionally defined as the water sector. […] Two examples […] [are] snowpack forecasting […] [and] irrigation efficiency technologies. […] All of those are outside of municipalities and industrial water/ wastewater.”
[54:11] “We need more entrepreneurship and entrepreneurial activity within water, which means government leaders or corporate leaders ideally need to place more emphasis on cultivating an entrepreneurial community that is recognized as playing an important role in addressing global challenges. […] The entrepreneurial corner of water is getting more attention, but it still is not where it needs to be. And so if I could have a message of global leaders, I would say, support entrepreneurship within water with whatever resources you have available.”
[56:03] “Each investor within water […] has their own thesis. And in their mind, their thesis is right and accurate, just like any investment group. […] And I highly respect every investor's thesis because they see some things in the market that maybe we don't see. And so I think our thesis around water risk is just one of many theses out there.”
Rating: 💧💧
🎙️ Full Episode: Apple | Spotify | Google
🕰️ 57 min | 🗓️ 07/06/2022
✅ Time saved: 55 min
