Chris Skidmore, the former UK Conservative energy minister who quit over oil and gas drilling, has opened an investment bank to help fund green-energy startups.
Desmos Capital Partners, started by Skidmore a month ago, will advise early-stage clean-energy companies seeking to raise at least £5 million ($6.5 million) from venture capital funds and family offices.
“We do not finance enough green,” Skidmore said Tuesday. “The disconnect between investors and their potential investments has perhaps never been wider: private capital accumulated in funds standing unused is now at record levels.”
The Conservative Party, recently kicked out of government, pledged in 2019 to meet net zero emissions by midcentury. But as energy-security concerns rose in the following years, it faced accusations of rolling back climate commitments — especially after introducing a law allowing new North Sea oil and gas licenses.
Insufficient support in the UK has “too often seen excellent and world-leading technology companies forced to relocate,” Skidmore said in a speech. Desmos will launch formally in September and have offices in London, Paris, Dubai and Toronto. It won’t hold its own balance sheet, focusing instead on advising companies, with investments made by partners.
Accelerating climate change is prompting a rethink of how companies developing critical green tech are financed. JPMorgan Chase & Co. and Barclays Plc are among banks warning that too many of these firms are left stranded in a “valley of death” between venture capitalists and infrastructure investors.
As a minister in the Department for Energy Security and Net Zero, Skidmore conducted a net zero review for former Prime Minister Rishi Sunak, which delivered more than 100 recommendations. He resigned from the front benches in January.
Skidmore has called on the recently elected Labour Party to create an investment roadmap that sets out in detail what projects and infrastructure can be delivered and when. He’s dismissed speculation that he may take a role in the new government, saying he has no plans to return to frontline politics.
“I feel that I can now make the greatest difference helping to deliver the energy transition on the ground by supporting companies grow and scale up.”
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