Opna, a London-based climate fintech company, has announced today that it has closed its $6.5M (€6M) seed funding round. The funding round was led by European venture capital firm Atomico, with participation from existing supporters, including Pale Blue Dot, MCJ Collective, Angelinvest, and Tiny VC. As part of this round. Atomico Partner Terese Hougaard will join the board of Opna.
The round also welcomed several influential individuals, such as Cristina Stenbeck, former Gainsight COO and DBT Labs board director Allison Pickens, former chief commercial officer for Klarna Luke Griffiths, and Collibra co-founder Stijn Christiaens.
About Opna
Founded in February 2022, Opna, formerly known as Salt, is dedicated to creating a carbon project financing platform that empowers businesses to discover, fund, and oversee reliable and top-tier carbon projects in a way that is transparent, cost-efficient, and timely.
Opna’s CEO and founder, Gautam, is a Guinness world record-breaking climate advocate. Driven by her love for nature and passion for climate justice and advocacy, Gautam recognised the need for a shift in attitude and infrastructure within the voluntary carbon market.
Opna’s platform comprises four components:
- Improving discovery: Opna’s platform connects companies with trusted project developers. This saves companies time and money when looking for good projects to support and helps project developers find new funding sources.
- Facilitating financing: Opna uses its team’s know-how in commodities and fintech to make financing carbon projects seamless. This means less money wasted on complicated processes and a fairer system for everyone.
- Monitoring project portfolio: Opna offers a digital tool to monitor funded projects. Companies can easily track how well their projects are doing over time by checking key performance indicators (KPIs) and getting updates on potential issues.
- Assessing risk with its proprietary engine: Opna’s special risk engine looks at both public and private data to make sure projects are of high quality. The engine considers over 280 data points, including the track record of project developers, the project’s financial and technical health, and how much carbon it can capture.
Opna founder Shilpika Gautam says that an increasing number of corporates are taking charge of their net zero goals by directly funding carbon projects.
“However, these businesses are having a hard time mobilising their capital due to a lack of in-house expertise, high transaction costs, analogue infrastructure and time-consuming processes,” Gautam says.
“Opna’s goal is to provide the platform, data, and financing innovation that unlocks this capital, bridging the gap between corporates committed to reaching net-zero and carbon projects that seek financing,” she adds.
New board member
As part of this round Atomico Partner Terese Hougaard will join the board of Opna. Founded in 2006, Atomico invests in ambitious tech founders at Series A and beyond with a particular focus on Europe, leveraging deep operational experience to supercharge their growth.
Hougaard says, “Producing meaningful climate solutions at the scale and speed we need to combat climate change is a monumental challenge, that’s why we’re so excited to work with Opna – through its data-driven platform, it is building the infrastructure necessary to transform the way that businesses interact with the voluntary carbon market and allow for meaningful emissions reduction.”
Atomico has partnered with over 100 ambitious teams, including those at Klarna, Supercell, Graphcore, Compass, MessageBird, Masterclass, Attentive Mobile, Pipedrive, and Hinge Health. The firm currently has $4B in assets under management.
Read the orginal article: https://siliconcanals.com/news/startups/opna-raises-6m/
