Private equity investor and founder of Avaana Capital, Anjali Bansal believes sustainability will make as deep an impact as digitisation did across the globe. Businesses with a clear climate and sustainability agenda would have an edge, she says. For the former McKinsey India partner and CEO of TPG Growth, last year’s highlight has been the launch of a $150 million climate and sustainability fund. “Climate and sustainability as a theme are resonating. Just like digitisation was for the last 20 years, this is going to get embedded in every enterprise function in every aspect of life over the next 20 years.”
It’s a huge investment opportunity too,” she adds. Her climate fund, she claims, has attracted interest from global and Indian institutional investors as well as high net worth individuals and entrepreneurs.
Through the fund Avaana has already invested in Turno, which helps power batteries of electric vehicles and Terra.do, a global community in climate which comprises 100 million climate workers. The fund has also invested in Eeki Foods, an agricultural produce company, which does industrial scale farming in a controlled growth environment. “We are tech investors so we are taking the tech approach of growth and problem solving to climate,” says Bansal. — Ajita Shashidhar