Insights
The Multi-Trillion-Dollar Opportunity: Deep Tech for Climate Impact | Masters of Scale
Mar 20
In this conversation at the Masters of Scale Summit 2024, Gigascale Founding Partner Mike “Schrep” Schroepfer explains how deep tech is creating trillion-dollar opportunities across the physical economy. From fusion and grid-scale batteries to market-driven carbon capture, Schrep explores how clean technologies can transform trillion-dollar sectors.
Learn more about how Schrep’s perspective on technology as leverage in this conversation with Microsoft CTO, Kevin Scott.
Conversation Highlights
- The Economics of Deep Tech for Climate Impact: Technologies like solar and batteries are on 20% annual cost decline curves, competing with systems that have been flat for 50 years. “I like businesses where things get cheaper while I’m sleeping,” Schrep says. As clean energy costs fall, new markets open and become not just possible, but profitable.
- Cost Down Curves Make this Moment Different: “In the 2000s, everyone tried to make solar cheap. Now, solar is cheap.” Over 90% of new U.S. electricity capacity comes from renewables, driven not by virtue but by market demand. Technologies like fusion, long-duration storage, and electrochemistry are moving from lab to commercialization and are well positioned to compete on fundamentals.
- It Takes People to Scale Deep Tech for Climate Impact: “You’ve got to hire, sell, build, and ship.” Schrep emphasizes that every skill set matters: law, finance, engineering, and operations all have a place. “Find your lane and deploy it.” He goes into this on 20 Minute VC, talking about leadership, humility, and scaling with intention.
Key Takeaways
- Deep tech is transforming multi-trillion-dollar sectors of the physical economy.
- The commercial success of clean technology drives climate impact.
- Fusion, batteries, and electrochemistry are moving from labs into real-world deployment.
- Building physical systems requires patience, capital, and conviction.
