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Clean energy VCs team up for a new fund

Congruent Ventures is a new VC firm on the block, and it's targeting $50 million for its first fund, according to a new SEC filing. The Oakland-based firm also filed separately for a "follow-on" fund that also has $50 million target, although it's unclear is this is a separate vehicle or some sort of sidecar.

The partners: Abe Yokell, who spent the past 12 years with RockPort Capital Partners, where he focused on clean-tech and sustainability; and Joshua Posamentier, who joined Prelude Ventures in 2012 to focus on areas like energy, sustainability, and agriculture. They are the only ones listed.

The firm: Not much is publicly available about Congruent Ventures, although a sparse website describes the firm as " investing in sustainable technologies."

  • Clean-tech investments have gone in and out of fashion in the past decade. After a rush of interest from firms like Kleiner Perkins about 10 years ago, disappointing results caused many investors to retreat from the category. Launching a new fund now is particularly interesting: On the one hand, you have increasing interest in electric cars, alternative food production and global concerns about climate change. On the other, you have a White House that seems much more interested in fossil fuels than in clean technologies, let alone climate change.

Yokell declined to comment on the fund, citing regulatory restrictions.