Announcing The Inaugural "Simmons Green 140"

In order to identify the “Simmons Green 140” I took multiple steps in to find out what the best green companies would be to work for, invest with, and partner with in the upcoming years. If you sell paper, computers, tickets, or even interns this is a lead list is for you. Also, the top tier is a perfect list for your broker to "call me when they IPO". The green landscape is tough to navigate. It is tough to find much information on green companies. Plus, it's very challenging to find one that has what I call the big three: a great idea, well funded, and proper business know-how. Most companies are challenged in one area which makes it tough for them to succeed. In order to compile the list I went first to 3 major green lists that have been put out in late 2009.

• BusinessWeek and GreenBiz.com 25 Best Clean Energy Companies
• The Guardian and Cleantech Group LLC Global Cleantech 100
• Always On Going Green 100

From there I added in a handful of companies who have been funded by the most respected venture capital firms of Kleiner Perkins, Seqouia Capital, and Warburg Pincus. Additionally, I added Khosla Ventures and Draper Fisher Jurveston in the funding sources column as they fund the most green startups. I have included detailed information about the company, headquarters location, funding, mission, CEO, and when necessary government grants.

Once the list of 140 was compiled I broke the list into 3 separate parts:

• Most Likely To Succeed: A123 Systems to Verdiem (31 Companies)
• Made BusinessWeek List or Greater than $100 million in funding
• Likely To Succeed: Aptera to ZeaChem (40 Companies)
• Funding is between $20-99 million or appeared on two lists
• Potential To Succeed: Abound Solar to ZeGen (69 companies)
• Funding is less than $20 million and appeared on one of the 6 lists

Notes about the list:

1. I only included United States based companies so Clean Current Power Systems of Vancouver which made the BusinessWeek List or Iberdola (Spain) and Nordic Windpower (Sweden) both of whom received large United States Department of Energy government funding are not on the list
2. 71 out of 140 are California based companies including 20 out of top 31 most likely to succeed
   
3. Out the 71 California based companies 59 are NoCal and a mere 12 are in SoCal
4. Massachusetts based companies represents 4 of most likely to succeed and 10% of the list
5. Colorado based companies each represent 10% of the list
6. 20 companies have raised over 100 million dollars without going public
7. A123, Fisker, Solyndra, and Tesla all have guaranteed over a quarter billion from the US government
8. Khosla Ventures and Draper Fisher Jurveston fund a large quantity of green startups
9. Only 21 companies on the list have been around for more than a decade
10. For Los Angeles area: we have eSolar (Pasadena), Fisker (Irvine), Pentadyne Power (Chatsworth), Coda Automotive (Santa Monica), Ceres (Thousand Oaks) and Clean Water Technology
    

I will release my findings over the rest of the week. Part 1 on Wednesday will be most likely to succeed, Part 2 on Thursday likely to succeed, and Friday with the potential to succeed. This list will serve as company biographies for the next 4-5 months as well.

Catching Up For 2010

I'm 5 weeks late, but here are the highlights from the beginning of the tens:

• Solyndra files for IPO (12/18/09, I cheated a bit here)
• Minnesota Twins-PentAir Sponsorship Deal
• JinkoSolar files for IPO
• Fisker closes new round of funding
• Tesla Motors files for IPO
• Barack gives love to the green community in new budget

WIP: Work-In-Progress

It's a work in progress on the infrastructure front. Sprucing up this page then I'll start blogging really soon.

Coming in 2010!

Be sure to check back here in 2010 for the newest green business blog....