Europe has everything to succeed in the Climate Race with Christopher Burghardt (ex-MD Europe of ChargePoint)

Christopher Burghardt is the ex-Managing Director Europe of ChargePoint, a US company that built the world's largest network of electric vehicle (EV) charging stations.

They went public in March 2021 on the New York Stock Exchange (NYSE) and became the World’s First Publicly Traded EV Charging company.

Today Christopher is a Venture Partner at 2150, an advisor to Goldman Sachs and an active Business Angel investing in startups and Climate funds (including Climentum Capital).

We cover the role of Transportation in the Climate transition but most of all talk about Europe's key ingredients for success in this Climate race.

Listen and Learn

• Why Christopher decided to leave ChargePoint after their IPO (2:00)

• The place of hydrogen in transportation (3:00)

• The environmental profile of e-scooters and micro-mobility (4:30)

• The role of micro-mobility in cities (5:00)

• Should we chase more unicorns or regional leaders (10:00)

• Why Europe’s should create a market environment in which innovation meets capital more easily to scale globally (11:00) 

• The lessons we can derive from Silicon Valley as an ecosystem to replicate in Europe (13:00)

• The crucial role of successful entrepreneurs to recycle their profit and seed the entrepreneurs of tomorrow (15:00)

• It’s important to reward entrepreneurs for risk (18:00)

• Europe has been very good at setting up regulations but hasn’t been good at creating a business environment to scale (19:00)

• The 3 core elements that make Europe a fertile ground for Climate Tech success (19:30)

• Why we should create a more vibrant Venture Capital ecosystem to breed more success (20:00)

• Surrounding yourself with Tech talent is essential to accelerate your entrepreneurial journey (22:00)

• The 3 mini-revolutions happening all around us making the Climate transition possible: a talent hotbed, a proactive regulatory environment, and a liquid capital market (25:00)

• Why Christopher stepped out of his operational role to really understand those 3 ecosystem players (talent, regulators, investors) (25:30)

• Rapid fire round (26:00)

Show Links

• ChargePoint

• Christopher's LinkedIn