James Cole, Executive Director, Chief Innovation Officer at Cambridge Institute for Sustainability Leadership (CISL) has spent 15 years working at the intersection of business, sustainability, innovation and entrepreneurship. As part of CISL’s senior leadership team he works across business policy and finance initiatives building the capacity of leaders, and leading institutions, to drive systemic change for global sustainability. In 2022 he launched The Canopy - CISL’s incubator, accelerator and workspace in central Cambridge, to activate an international community of impact-led startups, entrepreneurs, investors and innovators.
In an engaging Q/A session with Shaheen Shafique, discussing the latest climate technologies, trends and how CISL is driving innovation and collaboration to help businesses and policymakers. He shared his insights on accelerating the transition to a net-zero future, the importance of systems-level innovation, and the pivotal role the London Climate Technology Show plays in catalysing progress.
#Shaheen: How can stronger collaboration between startups, corporates, and policymakers accelerate the transition to a more sustainable future?
#James: The transition to a sustainable economy will require a reconfiguration of whole sectors and systems – not only a plug and play of a single new technology, or a ‘green unicorn’ which displaces incumbent businesses. We can see this in net zero aviation efforts though our Aviation Impact Accelerator – where we need airports, airlines, aircraft manufacturers, fuel producers, policymakers all aligned on the pathways to Net Zero and making the same bets in terms of the innovation, technologies, finance, policy and infrastructure to enable it. We call this systems-level innovation.
Within this, corporate-startup collaboration will be vital – alongside policy engagement. Famously, startups can move fast and break things, but they do not have access to resources and markets at scale, and so it can be hard for them to get their solutions into the mainstream.
Corporates on the other hand have established brand, scale, access to market and resources – but are not optimised for radical innovation, nor to be disruptive. By collaborating, corporates can access new ideas and tap into the entrepreneurial culture that can iterate rapidly and test concepts and new business models; start-ups on the other hand can gain advantage through access to resources and markets by working with a corporate partner.
#Shaheen: What emerging climate technologies or trends are you most excited about, and how do you see them shaping the future of sustainability?
#James: The International Energy Agency (IEA) concludes we have around 65% of the technology needed to reach net zero by 2050. So although a lot of attention goes towards the missing 35% we also need to focus on proven technologies like heat pumps, renewables, insulation and energy efficiency software – which require innovation in finance, policy, culture to scale the technology. Innovative companies like Octopus Energy in the UK are showing how they can innovate around customer and citizen engagement, financial and business model innovations can unlock these technologies to scale. I think that’s very exciting for any new ventures and investors trying to understand how to access these markets at scale and drive the transition.
Therefore, I’m most excited about the cultural and policy innovation, new business models that will enable sustainability tech to scale. Anyone that ignores these factors is mis-representing their ability to meet their total addressable market, and they will not scale as fast as we need.
All that said – I think there are very interesting innovations in new materials from fabrics to buildings, which offer high sustainability performance alongside quality and cost; and new digital technologies that enable smarter management of resources and decision making in assets and operations from manufacturing to buildings and whole cities. AI of course shows huge potential but it’s a double-edged sword for society.
#Shaheen: How is the Cambridge Institute for Sustainability Leadership driving innovation and collaboration to help businesses and policymakers transition towards a more sustainable future, and what key initiatives are currently making the biggest impact?
#James: Through the Canopy, our incubator and accelerator, we have supported around 500 sustainability focussed startups on their scaling journey over the past four years, and it’s heartening to see their progress, securing major funding, major contracts and recognition from Earthshot prize nominations to Purple Plaques. We ourselves were pleased to be named as one of Europe’s leading startup hubs last year. Where we see the greatest potential for progress is connecting the great work of these innovators to the seemingly (to them) out of reach and high level international negotiation and national policies which affect their markets. From the international UNFCCC climate talks, to the EU’s forthcoming Celan Industrial Deal and potential changes to the EU Finance Taxonomy – these things all shape the market for startups. For sustainability startups in particular, they are relying on markets which value sustainability - which today markets largely do not. Sustainable startups are at the vanguard of making sustainable markets in practice, and by working with leading and ambitious companies, and connecting them with international policy platforms they can also inform market development. As I said in a recent blog, entrepreneurs help create the future, and ‘policy change and innovation are symbiotic. The solar industry needed both pioneering entrepreneurs and strong policy support to scale. This “solutions loop” of entrepreneurial action and supportive policy can accelerate the shift to sustainable markets.’ Connecting up high level industrial and clean growth strategies with the startups and corporates who can drive and adopt solutions at scale is critical for the changes we need to make.
#Shaheen: With your extensive experience across the public sector, startups, corporates, and NGOs, what do you believe is the biggest challenge in scaling sustainable ventures, and how can it be addressed?
#James: Many sustainability challenges require whole industry change and the pre-competitive level. This is especially true in shared value chains where margins are thin, trust is low, and suppliers are meeting the different needs of many. Industries can come together to derisk precompetitive solutions, and create ‘demand signals’ for sustainable solutions, for example providing an advanced market commitment to ‘pull’ through new innovations that benefit all, such as the recent Innovate UK AMC in the concrete sector.
Public private partnerships and collaborations are required where public infrastructure or policy is needed to facilitate sustainability solutions. The circular economy is a good example where many well-intentioned policies created for the linear economy constrain the development of the circular economy. The simplest example in the UK was highlighted in our Future of Plastic Packaging work, which showed that if all local authorities take a different approach to recycling – and all brands take a different pathway to sustainability innovation (eg biobased bottles or betting on closed loop plastics recycling) the public/ private system is misaligned and cannot support the overall goal without aligned private sector investment, policy and public infrastructure changes.
#Shaheen: As a leader focused on building high-performing teams in high-trust environments, what strategies have you found most effective in fostering innovation and real-world impact?
#James: Innovation at its heart is a mindset – but it’s not all science or big ideas and whiteboards – it's in the hard work of executing – as any change is – and this can take its toll when the barriers are met. Being clear about the ultimate goal and seeing everything else as means is important, as is being clear eyed about the cultural and political barriers to change, and the need to build understandable business cases for innovation. Building teams with the right combination of soft skills and commercial expertise – and the ability to both inspire and execute is key.
#Shaheen: How do you see events like the London Climate Technology Show playing a pivotal role in accelerating the adoption of sustainable innovations, and what key outcomes do you hope to see from this year’s edition?
#James: Events such as the London Climate and Technology Show are important in showcasing the art of the possible and bringing together communities of innovation and change to share knowledge and build collaboration across sectors and organisations. This year I hope the conference will show the progress being made in climate technology and innovation, and build links to the wider policy environment which is looking for growth and competitiveness, both nationally and internationally – so that we can show how sustainability and competitiveness can go hand-in-hand.
