Kevin
Zhang

Tell me about your career trajectory and how you arrived in your current role as a climate tech investor at Gigascale.

Born and raised in Houston, Texas, I learned about the energy industry from an early age. As a kid, I received a solar panel toy kit and saw the potential of future energy sources by using the free power of sunlight to run small electronics. This sparked my curiosity about how innovation would shape our energy future. During my undergraduate studies, I focused on chemical and biomolecular engineering. I spent four years researching carbon nanomaterials for energy applications and interned at Shell as an engineer working across their New Energies groups.

After college, I joined at Boston Consulting Group (BCG) where I helped companies develop innovation strategies, with a focus on how to bring AI capabilities into large companies, well before the recent boom in Generative AI. Exposure to technology solutions gave me the early-stage company bug and I moved to BCG’s venture studio where I helped build early-stage startups from product and business lenses.

In 2021, I had the opportunity to work with Rich Lesser, then CEO of BCG, preparing for his climate talks at COP26 and the World Economic Forum. This pivotal experience led me back to working in climate with projects across startups, large companies, investors, and nonprofits.

Knowing I wanted to bridge my innovation experience with my chemical engineering background, I decided to do the MBA program at Stanford and continued advising and investing in climate tech startups.

Now, at Gigascale, I’m excited to explore developments in electrification, ag-tech, and new chemicals, among others. I believe we’ll see significant progress in applying proven innovations to new applications.

What was it about the 2021 experience with Rich Lesser that made you shift back into climate?

Thinking about the climate challenge on a global scale was eye-opening. The climate was changing at an alarming rate, affecting every sector. Energy demand, driven by increased access and broader electrification, was rising. It pointed to how much we need cheaper, cleaner sources to both fill the gap and replace fossil fuels. Rich Lesser, also a chemical engineer by training, demonstrated how to balance shareholder and stakeholder value while also validating whether a technology made fundamental sense.

Through this experience, I realized that economic incentives ultimately drive behavior regardless of what companies or consumers say they want. That’s why, as an investor, I’m looking for companies that align better economics with climate benefits. Companies that offer a better or cheaper product can scale to have the climate impact they envision. If you are in the process of building one of these products, I would love to connect.

Based on your experience with early-stage teams, what’s critical for rapid scaling?

First off, you need a product that’s much better in some way than existing solutions and a clear path to get there in a reasonable amount of time. You also need the right mix of people on the team–folks to tell your story, understand customer needs, and achieve technical milestones. Another critical step is finding the initial customers who can barely survive without your product. Not only are these initial customers more likely to pay you the best rates, but they are also more likely to spread the word to supercharge your growth.

It takes many things falling in place to scale rapidly, which is what makes it so hard. Fortunately, after you raise initial funding, you hope to have found capital partners who can help you navigate challenges.

In climate tech specifically, operational and scaling expertise is critical. Many tech innovations succeed in the lab but struggle to scale because it necessitates engineering excellence beyond science. Good climate tech companies are often limited by manufacturing capacity rather than demand. That’s why scaling production while maintaining strong gross margins separates good growth-stage climate tech companies from great ones.

What keeps you motivated and inspired while working on climate?

I believe we all benefit from this world, so share a responsibility for shaping it. I first decided to do my part after seeing the effects of climate change firsthand in Houston and experiencing extreme weather events, from extreme hurricanes to ice freezes and heatwaves.

Now, the energy of the climate tech community keeps me inspired. There are entirely new majors and schools producing students who want to make a difference, and I continue to see a density of top talent from across industries, particularly oil and gas and technology, migrating to work on climate solutions.

Being in nature also keeps me motivated–whether it’s visiting awe-inspiring national parks, skiing in a tranquil winter wonderland, or facing the never-ending learning curve of golf in Bay Area parks. I see climate change in all of these places. One experience I’ll never forget is hiking to see a glacier in New Zealand that shrunk to  <5% of the size of the exhibit sign photo. That’s the image I think about when I need a push.

Last question, what do you think the world will look like in a decade?

We’ll be scaling climate technologies from a few units to hundreds of thousands, which will bring costs down and make cleaner solutions the go-to economical option.

Decarbonization technologies will be making a material impact on our emissions curve. By then, I believe carbon capture technologies could become cheaper than alternative abatement levers and once that happens we just might be able to start reversing the effects of our cumulative emissions on the Earth.