Clean Tech Investments Soaring in 2010

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Worldwide, investors put $1.9 billion into clean tech startups in the first three months of 2010. That is an 83% increase from the same quarter last year and a 29% increase from the fourth quarter of 2009. Additionally, the number of deals hit a record high.

This is what a new report from Cleantech Group and Deloitte shows.

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Sheeraz Haji, president of Cleantech Group, says: “The bounce back in venture investment from lows in early 2009 has continued, with the first three months of 2010 representing the strongest start to a year we have ever recorded.”

The results come from a survey of investments made in 180 companies from North America, Europe, Israel, India, and China.

Electric car-related startups and solar technology startups received the most investment.

$704 million went to electric car-related startups, half of which went to one company — Better Place. Better Place is a Silicon Valley company that has signed contracts to build electric car charging stations and other infrastructure in Australia, California, Canada, Denmark, Hawaii and Israel.

Another $170 million is going to two electric car production companies in California — Fisker Automotive ($140 million) and Coda Automotive ($30 million).

$322 million was invested in solar startups. SpectraWatt, an Intel spinoff that makes solar cells, received $41.4 million and Enphase Energy, a company that makes microinverters for solar panel systems, received $40 million.

Energy efficiency startups, especially efficient lighting companies, received the third most in investments — $217 million in total.

The US accounted for 81% of 2010 first quarter investments (an increase of 133% from the first quarter of last year), followed by Europe (14%), China (4%) and India (1%).

via The New York Times, Green Inc

Image Credit: Fisker Automotive via flickr under a CC license


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Zachary Shahan

Zach is tryin' to help society help itself one word at a time. He spends most of his time here on CleanTechnica as its director, chief editor, and CEO. Zach is recognized globally as an electric vehicle, solar energy, and energy storage expert. He has presented about cleantech at conferences in India, the UAE, Ukraine, Poland, Germany, the Netherlands, the USA, Canada, and Curaçao. Zach has long-term investments in Tesla [TSLA], NIO [NIO], Xpeng [XPEV], Ford [F], ChargePoint [CHPT], Amazon [AMZN], Piedmont Lithium [PLL], Lithium Americas [LAC], Albemarle Corporation [ALB], Nouveau Monde Graphite [NMGRF], Talon Metals [TLOFF], Arclight Clean Transition Corp [ACTC], and Starbucks [SBUX]. But he does not offer (explicitly or implicitly) investment advice of any sort.

Zachary Shahan has 7324 posts and counting. See all posts by Zachary Shahan