THE OPPORTUNITY
This is an exciting opportunity to transform how the world matches capital to innovative, deep science climate opportunities. We are seeking a mission-aligned Associate to help in the technical assessment of technologies in our FOAK Development Capital Fund to help identify, diligence the winners across all climate pathways and actively support the scaling and impact of our portfolio companies.
ABOUT FOAK FUND
We are a 'multi-asset, multi stage’ investor / asset owner / manager and project developer that is offering investment opportunities that offer both cash flow through project investment / management and significant upside through investment in the technology company. We specialise in investing in First-of-a-kind Projects and TopCo’s pre-TRL9.
Deep Science Ventures (DSV) is a partner in the FOAK Fund - The role will report both into DSV and into the FOAK Development Capital fund.
ABOUT DEEP SCIENCE VENTURES
Deep Science Ventures (DSV) is a venture creator, combining available scientific knowledge and founder-type scientists into high-impact ventures, to build a future where both humans and the planet thrive.
In the Climate team we are focusing on driving and accelerating the net-zero carbon transition. We think it is key to deliver innovations in carbon mitigation as well as carbon removal technologies to achieve maximal impact in solving climate change. In investigating carbon mitigation technologies, it will be essential to identify routes by which we can decarbonise heating, avoid material breakdown to CO2 or propose novel materials that can replace carbon intensive matter. Equally maximising CO2 drawdown capacity of biotic, abiotic and artificial strategies and proposing new ways of how CO2 can be stored or utilised are in the centre of our attention. On our path to achieve these outcomes we need to solve numerous constraints related to planet-positive investing, material development, process design and automation.
ABOUT THE ROLE
As an Associate you will work in close proximity with the Partners of the FOAK Fund and the Director of Climate and the Head of Scoping, and other Associates, focusing on systemic analysis or “scoping”, as we call it, working on the Outcomes graph and screening the sort of technologies that should exist but don’t and are ready for scaling.
While your main focus will be on technology opportunity analysis, you’ll be involved across all core functions of Investments, including business development, fundraising and portfolio management to quickly develop a broad understanding of the scope of all activities within the business.
KEY RESPONSIBILITIES
- Help design a quick pass Due Diligence framework for assessing investment opportunities in the early stages of assessment
- Conduct due diligence on technologies potential to scale, assess their scale-up and integration risk.
- Assess hundreds of technology companies’ IP and their projects each month, and advise the FOAK fund management’s investment process.
- Help in refining a sector / technical thesis for what the Fund invests in
- Evaluate technical feasibility, scalability, and efficiency of projects, ensuring alignment with FOAK Fund thesis goals
- Ensure regulatory compliance through budgeting, forecasting and financial reporting
- Build and manage relationships with key external stakeholders including: engineering firms, EPCs, corporate partners (e.g. offtakers), regulatory agencies & permitting
- Support with developing marketing collateral of the Fund
- Investor / LP mapping
- Being a core part of arranging roadshows
- Co-authoring thesis-driven communication externally
- Support fundraising and business development efforts for the sector.
Requirements
- Deep technical understanding of any of the following disciplines, which will relate to potential applications in the climate space (acquired either through a PhD or MSc of physical sciences such as but not limited to the following:
- Chemical Engineering
- Process Engineering
- Geochemistry
- Mechanical Engineering
- Minimum of three years of relevant work experience, for example in start-up, industry, consultancy, VC/PE, investment banking
- Based in the UK or willing to relocate (we are able to sponsor UK visas).
- Strong domain understanding and interest in climate tech e.g. negative emissions technologies, critical minerals, water availability, decarbonising industrial heat, decarbonising built environment, carbon neutral or negative fuels;
- Able to generate, iterate and digest technical documentation including: techno-economic analysis (TEA), process flow diagrams (PFD), Lifecycle Assessment (LCA)
- Able to work with large structured and unstructured data sources and manipulate data to extract key insights from it. Has a passion for systematisation and automation.
- Able to evaluate project feasibility and risks, and derive mitigation measures to ensure project success
- Having worked in some projects and experienced the requirements of early commercialisation is a huge plus;
- Demonstrable first principles and creative thinking;
- Demonstrated level of achievement, taking own initiative and delivering outcome-oriented projects from start to finish. You make things happen.
- An aspiring entrepreneur who wants a rare window into the VC and fundraising side of the business.
- A business generalist with a passion for technology and a penchant for learning new things fast.
- A project manager or operations guru with startup experience who thrives on keeping the trains running on time with little oversight.
- Attention to detail — you take pride in your attention to the “small things”.
- Passion for automation
- You cringe when work is done sloppily, you spot small mistakes, things are formatted weirdly, etc.
- Organized, strong writing skills, strong research skills
- Intellectually curious and deeply immersed in Climate tech
- Humble and eager to do both fun and not so fun tasks
- Strong work ethic, disciplined execution skills, willingness to do whatever it takes to deliver results
Benefits
- Flexible working environment (remote or hybrid);
- Rapid personal development and massive learning curve;
- Working with some of the most ambitious and impact-driven individuals you'll ever find;
