Neo banks are Silicon Valley’s new favorite investment target. With companies like Plaid – which if you didn’t hear, failed to merge with Visa – and Treasury Prime making financial infrastructure easier to access it was only a matter of time before founders with a strong background in climate/energy and finance started a bank.
The two new kids on the block with a whole lot of potential and impact are Ando (backed by Jigar Shah) and Atmos (Led by Ravi Mikkelsen & Pete Hellwig). These two companies offer savings accounts that are designed to help you grow your money and help the environment at the same time.
Why does this matter?
- This helps address a growing frustration on capital usage by banks and the government in the blooming clean tech industry
- The key differentiator for any of these banks is really going to come down to what kind of interest rates they can provide to account holders and the resulting impact per dollar
- What a “clean” bank really enables is tapping into the general public as opposed to depending on large funds to make investments into clean infrastructure projects – Think of this as the Robinhood for Cleantech in the sense that anyone can now easily support and fund cleantech projects
What's next?
- Adoption will likely be slow at first, but with Atmos providing an up to .51% APY on new accounts – it’s likely to drive people to sign up and move accounts
- We wouldn’t be surprised if more Neo banks pop up offering climate positive returns like Atmos and Ando are guaranteeing
- It will be interesting to see how banks respond to this or if larger banks decide to become the back bone platform for companies like Atmos and Ando
- I see this as the new wave – kind of how offering a credit card became a smart way for Visa/Mastercard to acquire new users without having to build niche brands themselves
Thoughts
Atmos and Ando are emerging at the right time – with the market expecting an onslaught of policies that will tighten up emissions standards while subsidizing climate focused infrastructure projects nation wide a climate focused bank could be a great option for those seeking new ways to make an impact with little effort.
About The Author
Swarnav has over 10 years of experience in the energy & climate tech space, holds 2 patents and is active in the tech, climate and media industries. He specializes in Product/Product Innovation as well as Go-To-Market and Growth Strategy.
By training he’s a Materials Engineer with a background in research from his time at Georgia Tech and University of Illinois (UIUC).
He founded TouchLight a utility backed energy company focused on developing IP for utilities and startups pushing electrification forward. He also serves as the appointed Chairman for the Town of Yorktown’s Climate Smart Communities Task Force, where he helps with drafting legislation and enabling sustainability efforts within the town.
Concurrently, Swarnav founded The Impact to help investors, emerging founders and driven climate enthusiasts discover and identify new climate-tech startups, technologies and opportunities before they hit the traditional media sources.