The Brief: Turning agricultural waste into biofuels and biochar

Greetings Agents of Impact!

In today’s Brief:

• Transforming agricultural waste into low-carbon, high-impact products
• Pediatric care for children with special needs
• Acumen nears $250 million for hardest-to-reach solar fund
• Measuring wealth-creation for founders in small-business lending 

Featured: Climate Tech

Charting a commercial path from low-carbon biofuels to carbon-negative biochar. Mash Makes mostly has what every climate tech startup wants. It has commercialized its advanced pyrolysis process from technology developed at the Technical University of Denmark. It has two commercial plants operating in Karnataka, India. And, in the Danish shipping company Norden, it has a solid corporate offtaker as well as a major investor. What Mash Makes doesn’t have is a simple business model. The company, based in Denmark and India, supplies biofuels for shipping companies; makes biochar to help farmers improve soil health and sequester carbon dioxide; and even produces electricity, as a byproduct of pyrolysis, that could provide renewable energy for rural communities. “We have this rainbow of potential impact,” Mash Makes’ Jakob Bejbro Andersen tells ImpactAlpha. “We want to make sure that every potential for impact – whether social, biodiversity or greenhouse gas emissions – is pursued. That means that we have a rather complex business model, and business in different verticals. But I don’t really see us having any choice.”

• Sustainable shipping. Mash Makes is increasing its production to leverage technology learning curves and lower its unit costs. For immediate revenues, Mash Makes is capitalizing on the strong demand for biofuels, as commercial shipping companies move to decarbonize their fleets. “The demand is completely outpacing supply right now,” Andersen says. Mash Makes borrowed €3.7 million ($4 million) from the Nordic green bank Nefco to develop its two plants in India and is raising capital to set up four more commercial plants. The plants in India use cashew waste as a primary feedstock. Mash Makes is experimenting with invasive plant species in Kenya and South as an alternative feedstock. Norden took a minority stake in the company in 2023, which helps Norden expand its biofuel supply, and helps Mash Makes reach more buyers in shipping.
  
• Value for farmers. Biofuels still release emissions when burned; their lower carbon footprint comes from their more sustainable, non-petroleum input. Mash Makes’ pyrolysis process also produces biochar, turning agricultural waste and other biomass into stable carbon that can be stored in soil or other sinks, removing carbon from the atmosphere. As a fertilizer, biochar restores soil health, increasing farmers’ yields and incomes and reducing the use of synthetic and often imported fertilizers. “We have a product that creates a crazy amount of value for farmers,” he says. In Ghana and Madagascar, Mash Makes is testing its next-generation pyrolysis technology, which can convert byproduct gases into renewable electricity. “Whereas others might simply ignore the other verticals, I see that as wasteful,” Andersen says. “I’d rather take the complexity over the wastefulness.”
  
• Keep reading, “Charting a commercial path from low-carbon biofuels to negative-carbon biochar,” by Lucy Ngige.

Dealflow: Healthy Youth

Imagine Pediatrics raises $67 million to provide pediatric care for children with special needs. Nashville-based Imagine Pediatrics partners with major health insurers, including UnitedHealthcare in Texas and Florida, to provide virtual and in-home care to roughly 40,000 children with special needs. One in five kids in the US has a special care need, and care can be costly to under- and uninsured families. Imagine’s model integrates medical, behavioral and social care from its team of pediatricians, nurses, social workers and therapists. The company says its services have reduced emergency room visits and hospital readmissions, saving partners more than $65 million last year. Its Series B round was backed by Oak HC/FT, Optum Ventures, Rubicon Founders and the Autism Impact Fund.

• Maximizing Medicaid. Federal health spending cuts in the Trump administration’s One Big Beautiful Bill Act are expected to hit low-income children with special care needs hardest. Health startups are stretching remaining Medicaid dollars and keeping vulnerable families enrolled through outcomes-based funding and partnerships with state Medicaid insurance providers. New Orleans-based Nest Health works with AmeriHealth Caritas in Louisiana and Blue Cross Blue Shield in Arizona. Recovery Cafe is partnering with Medicaid providers in order to curb emergency room visits by recovering addicts.
  
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Acumen nears $250 million goal for its hardest-to-reach solar fund. The world has made significant progress in getting people connected to electricity and energy sources: more than 90% of people have access to electricity (though reliability remains a problem in many places). Acumen’s Hardest to Reach energy initiative focuses on the remaining 670 million unconnected people, most of whom are in Africa. The impact investor has raised $246.5 million for the flexible financing strategy, just shy of its goal of $250 million. “At a time when many are pulling back, this coalition is stepping up with capital designed not just to invest, but to solve,” said Acumen’s Jacqueline Novogratz (listen to ImpactAlpha’s recent podcast interview with Novogratz).

• First-time solar users. Hardest to Reach, or H2R, was launched in 2023 at COP28 in Dubai, as a blended-finance initiative to deliver off-grid solar products and systems to households and businesses in Somalia, Benin, Lesotho, the Democratic Republic of the Congo and other energy-poor countries. Funding is deployed via two vehicles. H2R Amplify provides impact-linked loans and receivables-backed financing to cover solar companies’ working capital needs. It has $189 million in commitments from the International Finance Corp., British International Investment, the Soros Economic Development Fund, the Nordic Development Fund, Signify Foundation, ImpactAssets and others.

• Market building. The second vehicle, H2R Catalyze, provides a mix of equity, debt and grants for early-stage solar companies working in H2R’s target markets. It has raised $57 million and deployed $10 million. Its portfolio includes Yellow in Malawi, KIMS in Somalia, and RDG Collective in Zambia. Hardest to Reach was anchored with $65 million from the Green Climate Fund. Its earliest funders include South Korea-based Shinhan Bank, the now defunct USAID, the Global Energy Alliance for People and Planet, and British hedge fund manager Christopher Hohn.
  
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Dealflow overflow. Investment news crossing our desks:

• EcoEnterprises Fund raised nearly $100 million in a first close of its fourth fund for regenerative and nature-based businesses in Latin America. Investors include the International Finance Corp. and IDB Invest as well as development finance institutions from Japan, Switzerland, Canada and the Netherlands. (EcoEnterprises Fund)
  
• AXA IM’s Natural Capital and Impact Investments group made an equity investment in Pantheon Regeneration PBC, which is restoring peatlands in the southeastern US. (Global AgInvesting)
  
• Netherlands-based Revyve secured nearly €24 million ($28.2 million) in Series B funding to launch its yeast-based egg alternative. The round was led by ABN AMRO’s Sustainable Impact Fund and Invest-NL. (EU-Startups)
  
• TPG’s Rise Fund invested in UK-based Tide, which provides business management services for small and mid-sized businesses. (Tide)
  
• Germany-based geothermal power system developer Factor2 Energy raised $9.1 million in a seed round from At One Ventures, High-Tech Gründerfonds, Verve Ventures, Siemens Energy Ventures and others. (Tech.eu)

Impact Voices: Shared Prosperity

Measuring founder ‘wealth creation’ to track the impact of small business finance. Until last year Founders First Capital Partners measured the impact of its small business financing using traditional metrics like job creation and revenue growth. The San Diego-based firm is now also considering projected wealth creation for the entrepreneurs it supports. Wealth creation “is how families achieve stability across generations and how communities break cycles of poverty,” writes Founders First’s Kim Folsom in a guest post. “Wealth creation is not just a financial milestone. It is a structural change agent.” Cynthia Muller of the W.K. Kellogg Foundation, an investor in Founders First Capital, says, “Measuring wealth creation is critical if we want to capture the real story of economic mobility.” Since 2015, Founders First has provided revenue-based financing to small businesses led by women, people of color, veterans and founders in low-to-moderate income areas (see, “Helping diverse founders grow businesses with revenue-based financing”). Its model emphasizes non-dilutive capital, recurring revenue generation, and contract acquisition.

• Long-term value. To track wealth creation, Founders First establishes baseline valuations at the time of funding, drawing on third-party reports and industry revenue multiples. As companies increase their revenues, those same multiples are reapplied to assess changes in value. Their calculations, detailed in the firm’s latest annual report, showed $31.6 million in projected new wealth across the portfolio in 2024, averaging $877,000 per company. Folsom stresses that the measure is “directionally accurate, but not definitive,” since valuations are shaped by external factors like market conditions and sector dynamics. Still, she says, the metric creates a visible link between capital, advisory support and the ability of underinvested founders to build appreciating assets.
  
• Asset-building. Other investors are also beginning to hold themselves accountable for their impact on wealth-creation in low-income communities. “That is going to be our north star: increase in assets, increase in wealth,” said Caitlin Rosser of Calvert Impact, which adopted such metrics for the Mission Driven Bank Fund, managed with Elizabeth Park Capital Management. The Aspen Institute’s Financial Security Program has developed a New Wealth Agenda, with a target of increasing 10-fold the wealth of low-income and households of color. Among the levers: positive cash flow, debt resolution, wealth-building career pathways, and home ownership.
  
• Keep reading, “Measuring founder ‘wealth creation’ to track the impact of small business finance,” by Founders First’s Kim Folsom. With the W.K. Kellogg Foundation, ImpactAlpha is spotlighting investment strategies expanding opportunity in today’s complex environment.

Agents of Impact: Follow the Talent

Blueridge Climate Ventures welcomes Jeremy Siegel, former consultant at Boston Consulting Group, as a venture consultant…. O’Shaghnessy Ventures appoints Jean-Marc Daecius as chief of staff… Health Forward Foundation adds Anthony Lloyd, previously with Livingston Hill Group, as chief financial officer… Finnfund taps Otto Ahonen, previously with Deloitte, as an investment analyst… The Annie E. Casey Foundation has an opening for an investment manager in Baltimore. 

ECMC Group is recruiting an impact investing analyst… Partners for Public Group seeks a director of strategy and impact… CrossBoundary Energy is looking for an investment analyst and associate in Nairobi… Quona Capital is on the hunt for an investment analyst in Cape Town… UC Berkeley’s Haas School of Business will host an event on investing in the ownership economy, Thursday, Oct. 9. 

The Global Innovation Lab for Climate Finance is looking for innovative finance solutions to drive private climate investment in emerging markets. The deadline to apply is Sunday, Nov. 9… ImpactAlpha’s David Bank will have a fireside chat with David Erickson of the Federal Reserve Bank of New York, Thursday, Nov. 19 in New York.

👉 View (or post) impact investing jobs on ImpactAlpha’s Career Hub.

Thank you for your impact!

– Sept. 25, 2025