Terra.do, an online climate school aiming to solve climate change, has raised $1.4 million in a seed funding round to scale its initiatives.
The round was led by Singapore-based VC firm BEENEXT, Zerodha-backed Rainmatter Capital, Stanford Angels and Entrepreneurs (India) with participation from various angel investors including MakeMyTrip CEO Deep Kalra, Zomato CEO Deepinder Goyal, and Helion Venture Partners co-founder Ashish Gupta, according to a released statement.
Launched in April this year by Anshuman Bapna, Kamal Kapadia and Mayank Jain, Terra.do runs online learning programs and has a community that helps individuals across the globe transition their skills into working on tough climate change problems. It selects extremely motivated individuals who are already skilled in their field and takes them through an intensive 12-week bootcamp to learn all aspects of climate – science, policy, business, and social justice – to work on high-impact climate projects.
Terra.do provides a platform for individuals to become part of a global community of hundreds of climate changemakers. During the program, the platform allows selected individuals to form study groups, hang out in video calls with alumni and have lifetime access to the network. After graduating, the passed out individuals are exposed to dozens of projects from some of the top climate organizations in the world, allowing them to choose those that best leverage their skills. They can then team up with community and work directly on challenging problems to solve climate change.
Commenting on climate change and latest development, Anshuman Bapna, Co-founder of Terra.do, said,
“Climate change is such a wicked problem because both the problems and solutions are so deeply interconnected. That’s why we were keen to get investors on board that reflected that diversity of experience, geography, and mindset. And most importantly, we wanted partners in this journey that knew a thing or two about the ‘do’ part of Terra – operators with real-world experience building great companies and communities. We’re lucky to have these incredible individuals and institutions onboard.”
Teruhide Sato, Founder and Managing Partner, BEENEXT, said,
“Climate change and its grave effects impact us all. We believe startups can play a significant role in improving and accelerating climate change adaption. We are proud and happy to back startups like Terra.do, who are working on unique and innovative offerings to address climate change, and creating long-lasting solutions.”
Climate change is one of the defining problems of this generation, which needs urgent and coordinated effort across countries, governments, public and private sectors, and individuals. Terra.do aims to address this and hope this funding will enable them to scale its initiatives.
Nithin Kamath, Founder of Zerodha and Rainmatter Capital, also commented on the investment saying,
“Climate change is a very real threat we face as a species. At Rainmatter, we are deeply committed to climate action and would like to contribute to the ecosystem by collaborating with various technology partners who are looking to make a difference in the long run. We would encourage more entrepreneurs to solve climate issues with tech.”
Terra.do is said to have graduated its first cohort. It included a partner at the world’s largest technology accelerator, former Google employees, an investigative journalist in India, and several others.
