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Downey is looking to sustainable technology to
tackle issues like deforestation and microplastics.
The "Iron Man" and "Avengers" star, 55, announced on Wednesday
he was launching venture capital funds, aiming to "accelerate
groundbreaking technologies that are addressing the world's
largest environmental challenges".
Downey's FootPrint Coalition, founded in 2019 and made up of
"investors, donors and storytellers committed to scaling
technologies to restore our planet", has already invested in
companies like Ynsect, which breeds mealworms, and Cloud Paper,
which makes bamboo toilet paper, among others.
Now he wants to "quickly mobilize more people and catalyze more
capital".
"There's groundbreaking technologies we're going to vet and ...
keep doing what we're doing, finding the best in class and
accelerate scaling them up," Downey told Reuters.
"We feel (the funds) is a move towards just a little bit of
democratisation in this usually very exclusive space."
FootPrint Coalition Ventures will have an early- and late-stage
fund, with a $5,000 quarterly subscription fee and minimum
one-year subscription.
It says it wants to invest in food and agriculture technology,
sustainability-focused consumer products and services, energy
and transport, materials and industrial tech, education and
media and advanced environmental solutions.
"Rather than raising money infrequently from very large
anonymous institutions ... we do the opposite," Jonathan
Schulhof, who will co-lead FootPrint Coalition Ventures, told
Reuters.
"We raise money constantly because it's constantly an
opportunity to tell the story and activate and mobilise the
audience."
Downey, who also took part in a panel about the Arctic at the
virtual World Economic Forum on Wednesday, narrates short videos
made by his creative team on the coalition's site, talking about
topics like aquaculture and deforestation.
"I always feel that if you have great content and the community
feels that, the audience grows, that helps us with our access to
deals and then we get better outcomes," Downey said.
(Reporting by Marie-Louise Gumuchian; Editing by Giles Elgood)
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