Notes & Thoughts, Oren Gavriely, CEO - Feb 2023.
This year's conference demonstrated a real change in the climate of the “climate tech” sector. It was about triple the number of people in Cleantech Forum 2020 which was in downtown San Francisco. The choice of outdoor Palm Springs made us feel the power of climate, desert cold in the evening, sunny days and a sand storm coming in made us all come into the mood of climate. Another pearl landing into PSP, a tiny airport showcasing the use of wind turbines, proof that efforts toward climate change are real from all directions - sun, cold, wind & infrastructure.
The attendees came serious about doing business, people suggesting deals on the spot, looking to expand their portfolio or connect with more people. Unlike 2020, company representatives came knowing what they are looking for, capable of communicating clearly with authority to make decisions on the spot. Green energy happens to be a logical business decision, to support technology driven societies at reasonable costs.
During the 2-day conference NanoScent took 25 meetings, mostly pre-planned after the business development team researched hundreds of attendees. The conference’s networking system proved to be effective in providing participants names, but far less effective in scheduling meetings because most participants ignored the SwapCard app for networking offered by the organizers and the scheduling system contributed to confusion. NanoScent’s team resorted to LinkedIn & then collecting names into CRM tables. Swapcard was too chaotic for this show.
Pitching & presentations were well organized, information was generally informative not too extensive. NanoScent had an opportunity to pitch 6 minutes at the innovation showcase, just enough to get the message across about the importance of hydrogen quality monitoring with VOCID® H2Confirm to our attentive audience, that joined in for a selfie🤳 🙂.
Beside great business meetings, experiencing climate, and fund pitching, Palm Springs offers a unique proximity to nature. Joshua Tree National Park is less than a 50 min drive, providing an amazing get away for jet lagged people, or any people. The pictures below were taken on the sunrise of the last day, arriving at the park at dusk, leaving enough time to climb a small rock, see the sunrise and be back in time for a 9am meeting.
Disclaimer- these thoughts were derived without ChatGPT, yet, now the machine is training me how to tell jokes, here’s for ending on a funny note directly from ChatGPT:
