Building Strategy and Business Operations at Earth Genome
Building a tech startup that doubles as an environmental nonprofit is challenging. Fortunately, my employer, EY Parthenon, gave me a three-month “externship” with Earth Genome to work with them and focus on business development, internal operations, and strategic planning. Here’s what I learned, and how I contributed.
After completing three years at EY Parthenon, I went looking for opportunities to apply my experience with a non-profit. Glen Low teaches corporate sustainability at my alma mater UC Berkeley, and with my interest in technology and sustainability, his work at Earth Genome stood out. Earth Genome is in a somewhat unique position to pair the growth potential and flexibility of a tech start-up with a non-profit mission for the environment. I also appreciated the focus on partnership within conservation science, ensuring that data and tools are not used in isolation but designed as a team within the full context of decision making processes.
Earth Genome’s go-forward plan is to quickly scale up the search and detection capabilities of Earth Index, while focusing on impact on strategic use cases in environment and climate science, particularly water, forests, food, and emissions. That means simultaneously investing in R&D of new technology, while implementing solutions today for partners that leverage a breadth of geographic and remote data processing, machine learning, and application design and development. All of this is built in close partnership and collaboration, developing a network that spans scientists, journalists, policy makers, activists, and educators.
Execution on this kind of plan requires a delicate balance. For Earth Index in particular, the business model in one part is philanthropic support for R&D and platform development, helping to drive economies of scale. On the other part, strategic selection of high-impact and visible use cases that provide funding for use of the service. The play off between the two parts of this model allows for rapid prototyping, responsiveness and rapid learning of user needs, while moving the fundamental technology forward to drive significant economies of scale that come from the shared resource of globally processed and indexed remote sensing data. This leads to an ever improving “cost curve” that lowers the cost of entry to untold environmental monitoring applications, ensuring even more targeted, discrete use cases can benefit from this level of data and analytical insight. Ultimately, this broader portfolio of environmental and social “watch apps” will dramatically scale conservation outcomes across the world.
During my externship, I focused on contributing to this plan in three areas. First I assessed the competitive landscape in the AI and environment space, and led strategic focus-group discussions to realign along a framework that views Earth Genome through three lenses: environmental topic areas, user segments, and the technological capabilitiesEarth Genome brings to the table. Second, for Earth Genome’s business development processes, I reviewed internal organizational systems for planning, budgeting and staffing, and particularly provided recommendations for improving the clientdevelopment funnel. This culminated in a more robust BD tracking and outreach management system. Third, I helped execute on the refined strategy and systems, by identifying several new opportunities for partnerships and funding, and provided support for turning opportunities into specific proposals.
My time at Earth Genome went fast. While only 3 months, it felt like I was part of a year’s worth of growth. That is life in a fast-paced startup, and it’s been very satisfying to be a part of pairing that with a strong mission in such creative ways. Flexibility and adaptability are key to leveraging the latest in environmental technology, while being grounded in a methodological approach and consistent goals. I’m excited to see this approach expand and accelerate the sustainable management of natural resources.
Are you interested in gaining experience and contributing to action on the most pressing climate and conservation issues of our times? Earth Genome welcomes placements of all kinds — internships, externships, fellowships — to learn and contribute along with us. Get in touch to talk.
