Sustainability for everyone: Pi Labs’ investment in Omnevue
We’re excited to announce that we have co-led Omnevue’s $3.1 million Seed round, along with Elbow Beach Capital, with participation from zone2boost and a number of angel investors.
Background to our investment
It is no secret that, at Pi Labs, sustainability has been at the core of our investment thesis — 76% of our investments fit within the ‘realm’ of ESG and the ones that don’t, are looking to. Through our research, we have deeply explored how to bridge the gap between the built environment and net zero emissions, since this vertical is responsible for 40% of global emissions.
Until recently, most companies in the space have paid little attention to what is going on. With the International Sustainability Standards Board (ISSB) looking to have a better grasp around emissions and launching tighter reporting frameworks, larger corporates are now incentivised to keep track of their Scope 1, 2 and 3 emissions, as most have started to work towards reducing them.
SMEs have, to some extent, been excluded from regulation and the need to report non-financial data, particularly around sustainability KPIs. However, not only are corporate clients, suppliers, lenders and investors starting to ask for non-financial reports, but also the implementation timeline for the Sustainable Finance Disclosure Regulation (SFDR — a Europena regulation introduced to improve transparancy around sustainable investments) indicates that by January 2026, all listed SMEs will need to start reporting their non-financial KPIs.
But, most companies with less than 30–50 employees some times don’t even have a CFO, let alone a Head of Sustainability. How will they be able to comply with incoming regulation?
How the investment came about
Enter Daniel and Marc, founders of Omnevue (formerly known as ESGGen). We had known of Daniel from his previous company, flatfair, which he had left for family reasons a few years ago and were reconnected in October 2022. However, the itch for building something was still there, and when he met Marc, one of the leading experts in the world regarding ESG, Daniel knew that what Marc had been researching could solve the problems he had seen around non-financial reporting.
Therefore, they decided to create Omnevue, the ‘Quickbooks for ESG’ — a SaaS platform for SMEs and their accountants, which can pull data from a company’s accounting system and sources such as HR records and audit them across 29 measures (8 environmental, 15 societal and 6 for governance). By doing so, Omnevue greatly reduces the need for additional resources to be used when a customer or investor demands non-financial data from a company.
Considering how vast supply chains are in the built environment, this investment fits entirely not only in around our goal to back sustainable ventures, but also business continuity.
🤝 Source of intro: Alex Lorenz (Loric Ventures)
An overview of the company
Industry — ESG
Location — London, UK
Founded — May 2021
Problem — Non-financial reporting will receive as much scrutiny as financial audits and SMEs are not well equipped to address this.
Solution — A SaaS solution that automatically pulls data from a company’s systems, in order to produce a non-financial report. The ‘Quickbooks for ESG’.
Why we invested
Founder-market-fit: While Daniel has all the attributes of a serial entrepreneur and knew Pi Labs’ and our vision, Marc is one of the leading experts in the field, who has managed to simplify a massive problem for SMEs. They have both been successful founders before, with Daniel knowing how not only how to start a business from scratch but also the intricacies of SMEs and the built environment, while Marc has led large corporates before, having successfully exited a company before. And to add to his resume, Marc decided he wasn’t done, and secured a PhD from King’s College to dominate the space of sustainability
Product differentiation: while sustainability has been on the top of everyone’s agenda, competition is fierce. Nevertheless, Omnevue took a completely different approach from anything we had seen in the market, by having the vision of becoming an accounting and audit tool for non-financial reporting.
What’s next?
Omnevue raised their Seed round to not only grow the team, but also to further develop their product, which includes the soon-to-be-launched ‘VueCO2e’, which will allow UK and EU businesses to view and report their CO2 emissions impacts securely by only having to connect their bank account (at the very reasonable price of £5/month).
At Pi Labs, we feel this investment represents our thesis perfectly, and are incredibly proud of joining not only an impressive team but also amazing investors. We can’t wait to see them fully become the ‘Quickbooks for ESG’!
