Environmental, Social & Governance
Envirnmental
Scial
Gvernance
Diversity Stats
67
of portfolio company founders are minorities.
27
of portfolio company founders are underrepresented minorities.
64
of US & Canada based portfolio company founders are first generation immigrants.
Environmental, social, and governance principles are key pillars of Base10’s investment thesis of Automation for the Real Economy.
However, since Base10 is an early stage investor - we typically invest in companies with 10-30 employees, only one office, and less than three years of operating history - it is difficult to systematically measure ESG of our portfolio companies by traditional methods.
It is common that ESG measurement firms are focused on public or large private companies with hundreds or thousands of employees and multiple offices. These larger organizations have more readily available data for ESG measurement firms to analyze.
While still early, we believe this approach is working. We have even incorporated an ESG screen into Base11, our automated sourcing tool, which flags a company that may be at risk for negative ESG characteristics.
While still early, we believe this approach is working. We have even incorporated an ESG screen into Base11, our automated sourcing tool, which flags a company that may be at risk for negative ESG characteristics.
We are also working with two of the most respected professionals in the field of ESG and Impact investing, Rebeca Minguela and Miguel Nogales, to help shape and improve our ESG and Impact efforts.
Rebeca Minguela
Founder & CEO, Clarity.ai
Rebeca is the founder and CEO of Clarity.ai, which is revolutionizing the way investment firms evaluate ESG metrics of portfolio companies.
Clarity.ai looks past traditional metrics and analyzes the relevance of the products and services of companies for society to clarify the real impact of the companies on society.
Base10 is working with Rebeca and Clarity.ai to apply Clarity’s scoring framework to Base10 portfolio companies and incorporate its full scoring capabilities into Base11.
Miguel Nogales
Founding Partner & Co-CIO, Generation Investments
Miguel is a Founding Partner and Co-CIO of Generation Investments, former Vice President’s Al-Gore’s investment firm, which with $22B in AUM is the largest hedge fund in the world focused primarily on Impact investing.
Miguel is an LP in Base10 and coach to our founders, particularly around the areas of building a culture focused on impact investing, sustainability and responsibility.
We have researched how other early stage firms incorporate ESG into their investment process and worked with Rebeca and Miguel to strategically integrate ESG principles into Base10’s investment thesis. In the public launch announcement for Base10, Adeyemi Ajao, co-founder and Managing Partner, cited that Automation for the Real Economy only works when we combine it with responsible investing principles. Below are some of his notable points and principles about how responsible investing is core to our investment thesis. You can read his full note here.
- We believe that humans come first. We believe that automation is here, is real and can be a force for good.
- We need the right kind of automation, led by the right kind of founder.
- We are not seeking founders that only see the world through a technology-first lens. We are looking for those that have in-depth knowledge about the problems their industries are facing. We are seeking founders who are authentic about serving their industry and helping to move it forward.
- Solve problems that are actually important for 99% of people: Eating, going to work, moving around the city, finding a place to live or getting rid of trash are really big deals for most of us. The next deep-learning algorithm is a really cool thing...but unlikely to have an immediate effect on the things that matter every day, such as food delivery, transportation, real estate or waste management.
In other words, in order to help solve problems for the 99% we must focus our efforts on finding genuine founders whose companies operate in the Real Economy where they can actually impact the 99%.
We also strive for both our investment team and portfolio founders to have a diversity of backgrounds and experience. Our founding partner Adeyemi Ajao, exemplifies this as Hispanic, black, and both an entrepreneur and investor. His unique background provides a rare perspective and has benefited him while working in Silicon Valley.
We were honored to learn that Base10 was the first Black led VC fund to raise over $100 million for its debut fund. We take our role and influence seriously as we invest in ESG and Impact minded companies. Our investment processes and diversity of our team sets our portfolio companies on the path to be ESG and Impact leaders in the future.
Using the philosophy outlined above to evaluate founders and companies automatically eliminates those who would otherwise overlook the environmental, social, or governance characteristics expected of their organization. If a founder’s values do not align with the benefit of public good in regards to ESG principles then it is not a founder or company we are going to partner with.
Once we have vetted founders on their ideals and ensured their principles align with ours, we are able to dive into the details of how they are thinking about the ESG impact of their startups. Some of the topics we focus on include:
- How is your product beneficial to society? Do you benefit the environment or are you improving the lives for a certain demographic?
- We make sure each founder is working to build a diverse management team and we ask them how they plan to hire the right people to make this a reality. We then work with them to ensure they follow through on this by suggesting candidates we have already screened who would be a good fit.
- We ask each founder how they plan to build their organization to ensure strong HR controls and create an environment where every employee feels comfortable and can perform their best. If they need help, we work side by side to find the right HR person at an early stage who can implement these controls.
- We ask each founder how they can help positively impact the environment. Will they encourage employees to take public transportation or carpool? Will they be a paperless office? If their products or services emit waste, what are they considering now to ensure they minimize and recycle this waste for positive environmental use? How can we help them accomplish this?
Even though we are investing at such an early stage, these are the questions that are vital to ask and implement. We have a unique opportunity to shape the mindset and values of companies as they grow and better prepare them for when they are properly scored by ESG firms. We are confident they will be in the 99% percentile of ESG scores when that time comes.
A handful of our investments are already benefiting the world in quantifiable ways through ESG principles and we are working with the rest to ensure they are putting the proper tools and protocols in place from an early stage to be leaders in ESG as they grow into mature companies.
Consumer Logistics
The Pill Club is a telemedicine company whose mission is to increase women’s access to reproductive health products by prescribing and delivering oral contraceptive, female condoms, and Plan B to women across the country.
~100K women (roughly half of The Pill Club’s subscribers) have limited or no access to adequate reproductive resources in their area.
Of the 66 million women of reproductive age living in the US, more than 20 million are in need of publicly funded contraception with 19.5 of those 20 million living in contraceptive deserts, or areas lacking reasonable access to a health center that offers the full range of contraceptive methods.
Transportation
A primary mission of Grow is to reduce congestion and pollution in Latin America’s most overcrowded cities including Sao Paulo, Mexico City, Rio de Janeiro, Bogota, Buenos Aires, and Lima, among several others.
81 million urban residents in Latin America are exposed to air pollutants exceeding WHO guidelines, but for every 10% reduction in traffic in these urban areas, millions of residents in Latin America are brought within these WHO guidelines. Grow can help accelerate this reduction.
Commercial Logistics
Wonolo’s mission is to increase employment opportunities for skilled and underpaid workers in sectors in and around commercial logistics, such as warehousing and commercial food preparation.
Over 300k workers who are often unemployed or struggling to find additional work depend on Wonolo for income.
2018 AAUW research shows that across the American economy, women are earning 80% of what men make. However, across Wonolo’s platform, the pay gap is only 2%; meaning women earn 98% of what men do.
Construction
Faber’s mission is to increase employment opportunities for skilled construction workers and training new workers to be construction employees.
Construction has the worst labor shortage of any physical labor dependent sector. For example, in the US and Canada, there are 400k job openings in the construction field.
~600 workers rely on Faber for income, Faber helps these workers access workers compensation and insurance services, and Faber trains them on safety requirements on-site.
Food Logistics
Calii is building a food network in Latin America that helps low income farmers and food producers make more money on their products and helps consumers save money on their food purchases. Today, middle men extract 90% of the value in Latin America’s food supply chain and Calii’s mission is to give this value back to producers and consumers.
40M residents in Latin America are considered hungry by the UN, WHO, and UNICEF, and today Calii helps reduce food prices and increase access to food supply for thousands of residents in Latin America.
Consumer Logistics
Mason is one of the largest and fastest growing suppliers of smart hardware primarily to pharmaceutical clinical trials, enabling these clinical trial firms to ensure compliant capture and use of highly sensitive information.
Through Mason, thousands of clinical trials, representing ~20k patients, have fundamentally better data protection (and stronger privacy protection) than they did previously.
Human Resources
Reflektive encourages employers to foster employee engagement through corporate social responsibility.
Reflektive also uses software and analytics to foster inclusion by narrowing the gender pay gap, standardardizing performance reviews and encouraging the multi-generational workplace.
Reflektive serves over 500 enterprise clients with over 300,000 employees and was ranked as the 13th Fastest Growing Company in North America on Deloitte’s 2018 Technology Fast 500.
Reflektive is the first people management platform that helps employees and managers work better together fostering employee relations.
Logistics
Shipwell is a Transportation Management System platform that automates workflows and drives efficiency in supply chains. By utilizing Shipwell, companies can utilize practices to make a positive impact on the environment.
The analytics provided by Shipwell unlock data to understand green initiatives. Each business can know the impact of their emissions and fuel usage to for environmental reporting.
Companies rely on Shipwells services for EPA certification because of Shipwell’s ability to provide critical data around emissions.
Significant carbon emissions in freight come from idling in a yard or dock. Shipwell helps solve this by bridging the gap between shippers, 3PLs, and carriers with in-app messaging.
Shipwell is one of the largest digitally connected fleets in the US connecting more than 2 million carriers, thousands of shippers, and hundreds of 3PLs.
Transportation
Today, WeTravel employs 15 Azerbaijani citizens and also helps administer the largest coding bootcamp in Azerbaijan, which teaches 150+ students per year how to code and helps find jobs at tech companies for all of them.
Additionally, 3,000 tour operators receive payments (and subsequently income) through the WeTravel platform.
Retail Trade
Maven’s platform helps direct sellers manage their business and keep in touch with their customers.
~41,000 sellers use Maven, often as their primary form of income.