While chemicals company DuPont was the largest corporate venturing group of the 1960s and before, oil major Exxon was probably the largest CVC in the 1970s, having been founded the decade before. Exxon Enterprises’ subsequent fall and sale for $1m in the 1980s has proved an academic case study of CVC management techniques ever since.
Exxon’s closure has also allowed peer Shell to claim on its website: “Continuing Shell’s tradition as the first corporate venture fund in the oil and gas industry founded in 1998, we act as an investor and a partner in the commercialisation of innovation.”
And Geert van de Wouw, managing director of corporate venturing arm Shell Technology Ventures (STV), has capitalised on the opportunity by continuing to invest through the oil price dislocation over the past few years. He said it had made two fund investments and two direct investments this year.
STV provided an undisclosed amount for GRC SinoGreen Fund III, a China-based fund that invests in companies developing energy and resource efficiency, cleaner transportation, sustainability and climate change mitigation technology. Its limited partners include chemicals producer Evonik.
The other VC fund to receive capital was Netherlands-based Set Ventures, a growth-stage investor that funds smart energy and energy efficiency, energy storage and distributed renewable energy.
At their closures, Van de Wouw said: “Besides our direct investments in startup companies, investments in VC funds are an important element of Shell Technology Ventures’ activities. These limited partnerships give us better insights in the disruptive qualities of key venture ecosystems in North America, Europe and Greater China.”
STV’s previous fund investments include contributions to funds raised by private equity firm Energy Ventures, Norway-based, energy and maritime-focused VC firm ProVenture and alternative energy VC firm Chrysalix Energy Venture Capital.
Of its direct investments this year, STV has revealed one. Last month, US-based energy management software provider Growing Energy Labs disclosed it had raised $8.4m, according to a securities filing, from investors including Shell, van der Wouw disclosed.
Van de Wouw became managing director of Shell Technology Ventures in April 2012. He has previously worked across Shell since joining it in 2003. He led Shell’s supply chain response to economic turmoil in Europe during the winter of 2011-12 and the spring of 2013.