Did I really sell my soul?
I had already built a few startups and enjoyed the success, failure and journey that each one brought. I wanted to do more. I wanted to have more impact than turning an idea into a business venture. I was looking for my next mission where I could put my experience in launching and scaling startups to the best use. I was looking to be challenged to grow personally, to work with fun, talented individuals and to make a real impact on the world.
To grow personally, I knew it was time to build on being an entrepreneur, but the question was in what capacity and to what end?
Was it to become an investor?
As passionate as I am about investing in startups that will shape the future, I knew I still wanted to be involved in building businesses and giving back to founders. When I was launching my first startup in 2003, I wish I’d had access to mentors, accelerators and incubators as that idea was pretty new back then. Now I want to use all my failures, successes and resources to help entrepreneurs on their journeys of building great businesses.
The Challenge: I sought setout to find somewhere that combined investment and business building, and most importantly, somewhere willing to take risks to truly make an impact on how we live. As if these criteria weren’t rare enough to find, I wanted to get involved in something still in stealth mode so that I could help shape its future.
The Solution: Enter Launchpad: A company in growth mode with the INTENT, VISION and POTENTIAL to IMPACT the world in a very real way. Launchpad is a business builder spun out of BP with a mission to build and scale new business that help deliver cleaner, more affordable and more reliable energy. The opportunity was one of a kind. It was a true opportunity to make a widespread and lasting impact. It was an early stage opportunity with the backing and resources of a major player in the energy industry. It is a challenge to change not only the controversial perception of oil and gas and its effects on the environment, but to truly make a positive impact on the way energy is produced and delivered. This intricate combination of upside potential and unique challenges is where I saw opportunity!
I knew that by joining Launchpad, I shouldered the responsibility, along with every member of the team, of making a truly positive impact. I knew that by shaping the vision and executing on it, we would make bringing these seemingly impossible ambitions a reality. I know this is a bold statement, but this is something I know we can, and will, achieve.
How it Works: At Launchpad, making an impact on society starts by giving back to our startup founders, our partners, and the ecosystem. We support founders and partners on their journey whether or not we invest in their ideas or have any financial gain. We are looking to partner with talented founders at various funding stages from Seed to Series B, who share our mission to solve the climate challenge: clean, affordable and reliable energy for everyone. The real value we add is our ability to help founders scale their businesses at competitive speed. In order to do so we have worked on bringing on a diversified talent of business builders that help you at every stage of your growth whether that is strategic advice or hands-on business building in critical areas like tech, talent, commercial growth, and entrepreneurs who have felt your pain. We are continually on the hunt for unique business builders who have lived the entrepreneurial journey and want to give back by helping other founders scale.
To compound our business building capabilities and accelerate your commercial traction we unlock unique advantages for startups through our investor, BP, our network of customers and strategic partners, our access to data and ability to quickly conduct pilots.
By no means do we have it all figured out. At Launchpad, the team has made a commitment to continuously challenge ourselves to reinvent and improve what we do.
If you are founder, investor or interested to make a positive impact on delivering cleaner, affordable and reliable energy we want to hear from you. We know that the only way we can make an impact on the climate challenge is through collaborating and giving back to the ecosystem. We do that by doing what we do best: investing in the people that can make our vision a reality.
