ImpactAlpha Open

Raising red flags on defense investing + how LPs are shoring up GPs

Dennis Price · February 3, 2026

Greetings Agents of Impact! Welcome to ImpactAlpha Open, a free weekly sampling of the top news and views from ImpactAlpha.

🎉 Stay ahead of the curve in 2026 with an individual or team subscription to ImpactAlpha. Learn more. 

In this week’s Open:

  • In Europe, impact investors raise red flags on shift to defense spending
  • Going ‘beyond the check’ to shore up impact managers
  • Podcasts: Krisztina Tora’s Women Changing Financepodcast joins the ImpactAlpha Podcast Network
  • Spotlight: Obvious Ventures finds impact alpha in “world positive” investing

Let’s dig in. – Dennis Price

Must-reads on ImpactAlpha

  • In Europe, many impact investors reject the notion that ‘Camouflage is the new green.’ As record sums of money flow to armaments and defense tech, some European impact leaders have grown increasingly uneasy, warning that investments in “security” could displace social and environmental goals and undo years of work in aligning finance with sustainability, reports ImpactAlpha’s Danielle Rossingh. They’re even more concerned that military applications are being called “impact investments.” Read on.
  • Ten ways LPs are going ‘beyond the check’ to help impact managers survive the fundraising drought. To keep a new generation of high-impact managers afloat during a period of challenging fundraising, committed family offices, foundations and other asset owners are stepping in with new ways to help general partners bridge operational gaps, reports ImpactAlpha’s Erik Stein.See how.
  • Solar projects in Africa and Latin America pay dividends to US retail investors. Solar projects in South Africa, Colombia and Brazil are being financed in part by 4,000 non-accredited investors in the US, who have put down as little as $100 in one of several private energy infrastructure funds offered by Energea, reports ImpactAlpha’s Lucy Ngige. The Connecticut-based sustainable infrastructure investor launched its online investing portal in 2020. Learn more.

Agents of Impact

🏃 On the move

  • Darren Walker, the former president of the Ford Foundation, was appointed president and chief executive of Anonymous Content, a media production company backed by Laurene Powell Jobs’ Emerson Collective.
  • Priyaka Dhingra, previously with the Principles for Responsible Investment, became head of impact and sustainable finance.
  • Noveena Padala, former summer fellow at CapShift, joined New Leaf Climate Partners as an investment associate.

The Week’s Podcasts

🎧 This Week in Impact

Host Brian Walsh takes up ImpactAlpha’s top stories with editor David Bank. Up this week: How some LPs are going “beyond the check” to help impact GPs navigate the tough fundraising landscape; opportunities for US retail investors to buy slices of solar projects in Africa and Latin America; and recognizing men who champion women in asset management. Plus, Kat Taylor’s new spin on a Bob Dylan classic.

👩‍🏫 Women Changing Finance

Women Changing Finance, hosted by GSG Impact’s Krisztina Tora, joins the ImpactAlpha Podcast Network with conversations with women driving social and environmental impact through financial innovation. In this episode, Krisztina speaks with Carolyne Kirabo of Uganda-based M-Kyala Ventures about transforming capital flows to women-led businesses in Africa. 

📯 Criterion Institute Podcast: How we learn to let go, listen and pivot 

Host Joy Anderson reflects on the power of letting go of beliefs, assumptions and fixed identities that may no longer serve us, and offers an example of that clarity in practice: the decision to postpone Criterion’s next “Convergence” gathering.

The Week’s Spotlight

🌏 Obvious Ventures finds an obvious edge in ‘world positive’ solutions 

Call it impact. Call it sustainability. Call it “world positive”. Obvious Ventures, co-founded by Twitter and Mediumco-founder Ev Williams, is among a handful of San Francisco-based venture and private equity firms, finding opportunities for financial outperformance, or alpha, in megatrends such as decarbonization, mobility and health, even if they don’t call themselves impact investors. Obvious this week closed its fifth fund at $360,360,360, defying the fundraising drought. With the new fund, Obvious will continue backing early-stage companies across the three pillars of planetary, human and economic health. “We love the metaphor of taking a 360-degree view in each of those areas,” Obvious Ventures’ James Joaquin told TechCrunch. “We made it to fund five, which is actually a big deal in the venture landscape.”

Get in the Game

💼 Step up

  • The Nature Conservancy seeks an impact investment associate for a 12 month role in Brazil, Washington, DC, Toronto or remote.
  • Capricorn Investment Group is looking for an investment analyst to join its two year program in New York.
  • Connecticut Innovations is hiring a senior associate for its climate tech fund in New Haven. 

🤝 Meet up

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