Julia Rebholz, founder and head of Ignite, the UK’s first energy-based corporate impact investment fund, has left to join a consultancy encouraging other companies to set up similar funds.
Rebholz has joined Corporate Impact-X (CIX), which published a report at the Global Corporate Venturing Symposium last month on practical ways for corporations to follow the Ignite fund set up by UK-based energy utility Centrica.
Rebholz will work with the other CIX founder, Charmian Love.
The move follows Ignite’s first exit coming in mid-2015, two years after it was set up in 2013.
This exit involved E-Car Club, a pay-per-use electric car club sold to rental firm Europcar in July 2015. It was the second business Ignite invested in. As well as a taking an initial £500,000 stake in 2014, Ignite worked with the company to define and quantify the social impact of its operations, and provided a non-executive director to offer strategic advice. An employee from Centrica subsidiary British Gas was seconded to help develop sales and customer insight capabilities.
The fund, which won GCV’s Corporate Impact Venturing award 2016 in January, has broader goals than just making quick exits. It had three clear goals. First, to create commercial benefits for the parent company, UK-listed energy utility Centrica, by working with new, disruptive and profitable business models and technologies.
Second, Ignite’s investments and partnerships would give Centrica’s employees the chance to broaden their experience and increase their skills by working as mentors or non-executive directors.
Finally, the fund was a way to support social enterprises, which deliver positive outcomes – from increased employment to reduced carbon use – to the communities in which Centrica operates.