VCs put $1.2bn up for grabs for start-ups

There are some eye-watering sums of cash being flung around world of green tech at the moment but every time Greenbang thinks she’s heard the most number of zeroes she’s ever going to hear attached to the words ‘clean tech’ and ‘venture capital’ someone likes to roll out a couple more for good measure. Greenbang hasn’t seen this many zeroes since the opening rounds of X Factor.

Today’s ‘my investment is so big it looks like a freephone telephone number’ winner is Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers, who’ve just taken the wraps off a new fund, the KPCB XIII, which will see them spanking $700 million over three months “backing entrepreneurs and innovation in greentech, information technology and life sciences ventures”.

And if that wasn’t enough, it’s also raided the piggybank for another $500 million for its Green Growth Fund, which will “help speed mass market adoption of solutions to the world’s climate crisis”.

The KPCB XIII will focus its efforts on “early stage entrepreneurs” and the Green Growth Fund will look to companies that are already getting their swerve on and will give its company-building nous to those companies that it takes under its wing.