We Leverage Our Deep Operating & Investing Experience to Help Founders Succeed
Our Experience
Our expertise extends across a diverse range of climate tech sectors, a variety of functions, and different stages of development.
Operating Experience
INVESTING Experience
Our Team
We are a nimble core team of partners supported by a network of expert advisors.
Russell is the Founder and Managing Partner of Virta Ventures. He has over 15 years of operating and investing experience across climate tech sectors and business models. He has invested in over 60 early stage companies over the past six years.
Most recently, Russell was one of the first employees and CFO at Full Harvest, the leading B2B marketplace for produce in North America. At Full Harvest, he helped scale the company from 5 to over 60 people and the company raised over $45 million in capital.
Prior to Full Harvest, Russell was VP of Business Development and Business Operations at RePower through its successful sale to Soligent and VP of Strategy of Product at Admirals Bank, focused on the bank’s rapidly growing solar and home improvement lending business. Russell also led FP&A and Sales Operations at Stem (NYSE: STEM) during a critical early growth period for the company, which debuted on the public markets in 2021.
Russell began his climate tech career at SunPower, where he developed and financed hundreds of megawatts of solar across all three business lines - utility, commercial, and residential.
Russell holds an MBA from Wharton Business School, a BA from Yale University, and is a CFA Charterholder.
history
VIRTA VENTURES
FULL HARVEST
Angel investing
stem
sunpower
PARTNERS AND ADVISORS
PATRICIA TANG
Investor
Patricia joins Virta Ventures from secondhand apparel marketplace ThredUp’s New Ventures team where, as a PM, she led zero-to-one strategy and platform development for ThredUp’s B2B resale platform, Resale-as-a-Service (RaaS). Previously, Patricia was on the investment team at Amino Capital ($1B early-stage fund, Midas List #10) and a strategy consultant at PwC Strategy&. Patricia holds a triple-major Bachelors degree in Applied Math, Economics, and Music from Northwestern University, and is pursuing an MBA at The Wharton School.
AVRA DURACK
VENTURE PARTNER
Avra is currently an Investor in Residence at Elemental Excelerator and serves as a Senior Advisor at The Ad Hoc Group. Previously, Avra was a Director at National Grid Partners. Avra has held senior leadership roles at Stem and One Block Off the Grid. Avra has a MBA from the Stanford GSB and a BA in Urban Studies from Stanford.
SCOTT PINIZZOTTO
VENTURE PARTNER
Scott leads all aspects of ENV's strategic venture capital investments for N. America. Scott has 20+ years of experience defining, developing and launching new products and services in energy, sustainability and consumer products industries. Scott has a BS in Mechanical Engineering from Penn State and MBA from UC Berkeley, Haas.
FARLAN DOWELL
OPERATING PARTNER
Farlan brings 20+ years of B2B SaaS sales leadership to the table, having guided multiple companies on the journey from $0 to $10M in ARR. Farlan previously worked with Russell at Full Harvest. Over the last few months, he has been working with Tyba, helping them refine their process and close key deals. Farlan has a Business and Information Systems degree from St. Francis Xavier University.
DAVID BILL
OPERATING PARTNER
David brings over 25 years in technology leadership across a diverse array of startups and companies, including ExactTarget (acquired by Salesforce for $2.5B) and Virta Health ($2B valuation). David worked with Dave Samuel and Josh Felser way back in 1997 to build Spinner (acquired by AOL for $320MM). David is also Founding Advisor and CTO to Freestyle Capital and is currently an Expert in Residence at First Round Capital. David's deep experience will come in handy during technical diligence and ongoing company support.
GARRETT GOLDBERG
VENTURE PARTNER
Garrett brings over a decade of venture investing and operating experience. He is currently a co-Founder and General Partner at Potion Capital in Paris. Recently he was COO of Wellplaece, a healthcare procurement marketplace. Prior to that, Garrett was a Partner at Bee Partners, where he focused on marketplace and SaaS based climate tech investments. He served on the boards of Knowde, Super.com, Florence Healthcare, InnerPlant, Jitsu, and others, working alongside top tier Silicon Valley investors. An entrepreneur at heart, Garrett has worked in professional sports, real estate development, and technology. Garrett holds an undergraduate degree from Stanford and a MBA from the Foster School, at the University of Washington.
WINTER MEAD
SENIOR ADVISOR
Winter is the Founder and Managing Member of the investment firm Coolwater Capital, which exclusively focuses on emerging managers and technology investments. Coolwater has helped launch over 175 emerging managers, establishing strong ties and trust with these managers, who form the foundation of the Coolwater community. Winter is also the author of "How To Raise A Venture Capital Fund". Prior to Coolwater, he played a key role in an evergreen investment fund at SAP, co-founded the LP transparency movement called #OpenLP, and served on the committee for the Institutional Limited Partners Association (ILPA), which sets the standards for the private equity industry. Winter's extensive experience includes private equity and venture capital roles in San Francisco, institutional fund investments, direct technology investments, and angel investing. He also served as junior faculty at Stanford Graduate School of Business, holding degrees from the University of Oxford and Harvard University.
ERIC BURAS
Advisor
At Arkestro, Eric is building ML recommendations into enterprise procurement. Prior experience at a unicorn data science studio platform, built a supply chain visibility product, and researched malicious activity in cyber domains for the DoD. Eric holds a Master’s Degree in Computational and Applied Mathematics from Rice and a BS in Mathematics from Georgetown.
AIMÉE CHRISTENSEN
Advisor
Aimée has three decades of climate and sustainability experience in policy, law, investment, philanthropy and business including at Baker & McKenzie, Google, The White House, The World Bank, and the U.S. Department of Energy. Aimée holds a JD from Stanford Law School and BA from Smith College.
LEE HOFFMAN
Advisor
Over the past 18 years, Lee has co-founded and managed technology for companies as diverse as Time Warner, Razorfish Studios, and Terabolic, Inc. Most recently, Lee co-founded and served as CEO of Veri, a venture-backed NY mobile startup that in 2018 was acquired by The Knot. Lee has a BA in Computer Science from Brown.
DAVID JARAMILLO
Advisor
Backed by Amazon Climate Pledge Fund and other top investor, Verne is developing a hydrogen platform solution for heavy-duty transportation, starting with Class 8 Trucks. David is a Breakthrough Energy Innovator Fellow and was named to the Forbes 30 under 30 in Energy. He completed his PhD in inorganic and materials chemistry from UC Berkeley and obtained a BA in chemistry from Harvard.
DEEPA LOUNSBURY
Advisor
Deepa runs LabStart, connecting entrepreneurs with scientists to launch climate tech startups. Previously she led Products & BD at Extensible Energy and managed the $25M CalSeed program. She also held positions developing new products at Enphase Energy, building new businesses at GE, and investing at Angeleno Group. Deepa holds a MS in Energy and Resources from UC Berkeley and BS from USC.
ALEX MITCHELL
Advisor
Alex was recently Senior Vice President of Unlocking Innovation (incubation services) at Los Angeles Cleantech Incubator. Deployed LACI’s $5M Impact Fund I and raised and deployed LACI’s $6M nationwide Cleantech Debt Fund. Previously: Stellantis (Peugeot SA), World Economic Forum, Coda (EV startup), Toyota & McKinsey. Alex has a BA from Stanford and MBA from Wharton.
GRACE PARK-BRADBURY
Advisor
Grace’s is an experienced climate tech executive focused on equity and access within a just clean energy transition. Most recently, she was COO and General Manager - West of BlocPower. Prior to BlocPower, Grace served in leadership roles at Solar Mosaic, Sunrun, Oracle Utilities and Enernoc. She is a graduate of UC Berkeley.
CHARLIE WARREN
Advisor
Charlie founded and built Convex into the leading commercial contractor sales platform in the world. He has over 10 years of experience in building data, energy analytics and enterprise software. Charlie holds degrees from MIT, Harvard and Bowdoin and has been featured by The Wall Street Journal, Forbes, and the U.S. Department of Energy.
SUDHIR RANI
Advisor
Sudhir Rani is a Co-founder and the Chief Corporate Development Officer at Terviva, a food and agriculture technology company that is building the world’s most sustainable supply chain of plant protein and vegetable oil. Earlier in his career, Sudhir worked in private equity at D.E. Shaw & Co and in asset management and investment banking at UBS. Sudhir has a BS in Industrial Engineering & Operations Research from Columbia University and an MBA from Wharton.
our approach
We support the growth & development of our portfolio companies by offering founders tailored support at the earliest stages of company building.
Coaching
We draw on our extensive industry experience to provide critical guidance and coaching when founders need it most.
Network Introductions
We leverage our network to make valuable introductions that support the growth of our founders and their companies.
Cross-Portfolio Collaborations
We foster introductions between our founders, encouraging collaborations and partnerships across our portfolio.
our focus
We have spent years refining our investment process and criteria. Today, we focus most of our investments on companies that match this profile.
stages
Pre-Seed / Seed
verticals
climate tech
customer segments
b2b; b2b2c
INDUSTRIES
Energy; transportation; built environment; sustainable agriculture
CHECK SIZE
$200-400K
BUSINESS MODELS
SaaS; marketplace; fintech; business model innovation
COMPANY LOCATION
U.S. PREFERRED
LEAD/BOARD SEAT
NO (ALTHOUGH WE MAY "LEAD" A PRE-SEED) / NO
TARGET INITIAL OWNERSHIP
2%+
If you are a founder building an impactful equity-light climate tech business but you don't exactly fit into these boxes, we still want to hear from you.