Al Gore's next act: Planet-saving VC

[swag]

Source: Fortune Magazine

The recovering politician, environmental activist, and Nobel laureate is adding another title to his résumé: venture capitalist. After "a conversation that's gone on for a year and a half," according to Gore, he has decided to join his old pal John Doerr as an active, hands-on partner at Kleiner Perkins, Silicon Valley's preeminent venture firm.

The move is more than another Colin Powell moment (the former Secretary of State signed on as a Kleiner "strategic limited partner" two years ago and has hardly been heard from since). Gore is joining the firm as Kleiner makes a risky move beyond information technology and health-care investing into the fast-growing and increasingly competitive arena of "clean technology."

According to Doerr, by 2009 more than a third of Kleiner's latest fund, which was raised in 2006 and totals $600 million, will be invested in technologies that aim to reduce emissions of carbon dioxide. Already Kleiner has invested more than $270 million from various funds in 26 companies that make everything from microbes that scrub old oil wells to electric cars to noncorn ethanol. Twelve of Kleiner's 22 partners now spend some or all of their time on green investments.

In turn, Doerr, the master networker whose greatest hits include initial investments in Netscape, Amazon (Charts, Fortune 500), and Google (Charts, Fortune 500), will join the exclusive advisory board of Generation Investment Management. That's the $1 billion investment company Gore started three years ago in London with David Blood, the former head of Goldman Sachs Asset Management, to analyze and invest in publicly traded "sustainable" companies. Over the past five weeks Gore, Doerr, and Blood agreed to give Fortune an exclusive look at their new alliance.



Read more: http://money.cnn.com/2007/11/11/news/newsmakers/gore_kleiner.fortune/index.htm

[Name removed]

1. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[Toots]

2. Gore know as well as any person on earth that "Money Talks" BS walks

Gore has proved time and time again he is dedicated to this cause...

[nitpicker]

3. Trying to close the trade gap?

With all the comments about China being a potential market for "green" technology, Gore may be positioning himself to be a pitchman to urge China to buy the technology.

Until China takes the initial equipment and copies it, that is.

[wordpix]

4. China NEEDS the technology. It's drowning in pollution of all kinds