Scaling climate and bio-industrial innovation has become a systems problem rather than a science problem. From alternative ingredients to carbon-negative materials, founders are discovering that technical feasibility alone doesn’t unlock markets.

Infrastructure, regulation, industrial integration, and customer economics ultimately determine whether a breakthrough deploys, or stalls.

That reality has pushed corporate venture capital (CVC) into a central role across sectors including food, materials, and energy in a world where commercialisation depends on working alongside incumbents rather than around them.

To understand how these partnerships work in practice, we asked 12 CVC investors across Europe’s climate and hardtech ecosystem where they focus, what founders misunderstand, and how to build relationships that last.

⤵️ Scroll on down to reveal consistent patterns, sharp misconceptions and 10 top tips to collaborate with CVCs. Plus check out the full list of 80+ CVC investors in European Climate and HardTech.

Corporate investor mandates are rooted in real operational exposure, yet that doesn’t mean they’re closed-minded. What matters is that founders demonstrate a deep understanding of specific pain points rather than relying on generic promises:

Mads Hebbelstrup at Maersk Growth tells us: “Founders often approach with a broad ‘How can we help you?’ instead of showing they’ve done the work to understand Maersk’s specific pain points. Maersk is huge, and generic value propositions get lost immediately. What stands out is when a founder clearly maps their product to an actual operational or strategic need.”

At Henkel Ventures, Lena Ambrzy explains how relevance anchors their approach while leaving room for future optionality:

“At Henkel Ventures, we focus on ClimateTech areas that are strategically relevant to Henkel, such as sustainable packaging, recycling and waste technologies, and disassembly solutions enabling circularity. At the same time, we also invest in high-potential cases where product, process, or business model innovation can be relevant for the future of Henkel, even without an immediate partnership.”

Heavy industry shows similar pragmatism. Tom Croymans at Carmeuse Ventures frames their decarbonisation strategy around the physical realities of lime production and construction materials:

“Carmeuse Ventures invests in early-stage climate technologies that reduce CO₂ from lime production or use lime to lower CO₂ emissions. This includes technologies making kilns more efficient, capturing & storing carbon, ocean alkalinity enhancement, mineralization, creating green lime or artificial limestone, sustainable cement & concrete etc.”

Food system investors approach the thesis from ecosystem resilience. Rosemari Herrero from PINC describes a value-chain perspective that stretches from soil to ingredient innovation:

“PINC invests in innovations that support a sustainable, healthy and resilient food and ag system, by supporting solutions along the value chain, all the way from sustainable agriculture and healthy soils to innovative and healthy ingredients.”

Energy investors echo the infrastructure lens, as Tanja Reiter from VERBUND X Ventures highlights:

“VERBUND X Ventures targets early-stage startups across Europe that meaningfully speed up the energy transition. We prioritise sustainable energy, flexibility and energy transport and green mobility, looking for technologies and business models that can scale and integrate into existing energy systems.”

And Mascha Bonk from Hitachi Ventures adds: “We are ClimateTech generalists, with a strong focus on energy transition, industrial decarbonisation, and resource efficiency. We are particularly excited about solutions that tackle the hard, infrastructure level challenges and fundamentally change how energy and heavy industry operate.”

The diversity of focus areas masks a common logic: strategic adjacency to industrial reality is non-negotiable.

When founders approach Corporate Venture Capital, the biggest risks are often strategic and relational. Across industries, CVC leaders point to recurring blind spots: misaligned expectations, structural mismatches, weak commercial understanding, and insufficient preparation.

Knowing where startups most often go wrong, and how to avoid it will set you up for higher chance of success.

“The biggest challenge is a mismatch in expectations around timelines, decision processes, and ways of working. Pitches are strongest when founders understand both the startup and corporate context and proactively address how collaboration can work effectively across these two worlds,” says Lena Ambrzy.

Tom Croymans explains this in operational terms:

“You can’t expecting a corporate to have the same operational speed as a start-up. We do our best to deliver fast, but we are more like a cargo ship rather than a speed boat. If we move, it makes a vast impact but it will not be as speedy as some might expect.”

Frederico Bilelo Gonçalves from EDP Ventures points to relationship maturity:

“Founders underestimate how critical trust, transparency and long-term thinking are when engaging with large corporations. Being open about challenges and realistic about timelines strengthens the relationship rather than weakening it. The founders who succeed treat large corporations as true partners rather than transactional counterparties.”

Commercial empathy is another blind spot. Rosemari Herrero observes that many startups miss the buyer perspective entirely:

“What we many times see that the startups lack in initial discussions, is a good understanding of the situation of the buyer of their product or service: what is the saving/benefit compared to the current solution as well as to other available options.”

You can also underestimate how unforgiving downstream channels can be. Clement Tischer from REWE Group explains:

“The core mistake is equating retail access with product–market fit. A listing is distribution, not proof. If velocity, repeat, and pricing don’t scale, more shelf space won’t fix it. Retail doesn’t reward tech, it rewards reliability and performance.”

Claudio Colombo at NextSTEP sees a similar pattern at pre-seed:

“Many founders have strong technology but lack a clear plan for how they will reach the market, acquire customers and scale adoption.”

Understanding a corporate investor’s underlying motives can prevent surprises. Loïc Raynal from EDF Pulse Ventures offers his perspective:

“CVCs can have different motives. For example, some corporates aim at acquiring companies or technologies, which can lead to proposing unusual terms for VC deals. We're pure VC investors, doing minority investment and seeking financial and strategic returns. Our ideal outcome: invest a reasonable ticket, facilitate cooperation with EDF business units to help build and scale the solution, then exit while the business relationship continues thriving.”

This diversity across corporate investors is often underestimated by founders. Julien Fredonie from Honda Innovations highlights how assumptions based on one CVC can create friction with another:

“We often hear founders pointing to what another corporate VC has done, for example: “Your CVC competitor invested in my competitor, so we should talk.”
Each CVC has their own focus, thesis and approach and each corporate has different roadmaps and strategies. Founders should engage in candid exploratory conversations to understand customers priorities, decision cycles and potential fit. It is more valuable to try building relationships with the CVCs rather than doing a one-time only pitch: this is the best way to keep options open and to identify future opportunities.”

And Edy Chavassieu from InMotion Ventures points to a simpler failure, not doing homework:

“We’re very vocal about our focus areas, but continue to receive decks that are sadly no longer relevant.”

Despite growing founder experience with CVCs, misconceptions persist.

Control fears remain widespread. “A common assumption is that working with a CVC automatically comes with heavy constraints or exclusivity… many offer hands-on support while preserving founders’ flexibility and independence,” says Lena.

Tom reinforces this from Carmeuse’s perspective: “Founders often think CVCs want to control their startup, we support independence and aim for partnerships that benefit both sides.”

Rosemari adds: “There is sometimes worry about sub-optimising commercial decisions, but for a CVC to be successful, it must always support commercially and financially sound decisions.”

Another myth concerns speed and commitment. Frederico challenges the narrative directly: “CVCs are perceived as slow because they are less committed. Often it’s the opposite - they evaluate long-term collaboration across business units, and when alignment exists it results in deep commitment and strong internal sponsorship.”

“Many founders expect multiple layers of approval, but VERBUND X Ventures moves with startup-appropriate speed and authority to execute investments quickly,” adds Tanja.

Mascha goes one step further “A common assumption is that all CVCs are slow. It’s not a category issue, it’s a structure issue. Hitachi Ventures is set up independently, with our own IC. We operate at startup speed, not corporate speed.”

Perhaps most consequential is the expectation of commercial shortcuts. Loïc cautions:

“A common misconception is thinking that having EDF as shareholder will automatically unlock contracts and revenues from EDF. We invest because we share the founders' vision and believe they can execute it, and some EDF business units share this conviction. That's a valuable foundation, but our portfolio companies must still prove they're competitive and deliver superior value to win business with EDF. There are no shortcuts.”

Edy similarly warns against over-interpreting strategic links:

“In our case, the biggest myth is that our capital is synonymous with a commercial relationship with JLR. If we do our job correctly, you’d hope to see a level of collaboration between our portfolio and JLR, and it’s something we facilitate with success, but there are no guarantees. On the other hand, time-sensitive founders may avoid us based on this assumption. This is a missed opportunity for all parties, as our ability to separate investments from commercial terms allows the team to deploy capital at speed.”

That expectation is especially common in consumer-facing sectors. Clement addresses it directly:

“Founders assume a CVC can force the business internally. We can’t and won’t. The organisation follows consumer demand and economics, not cap tables. If the product works, the system moves. If not, no investor can fix that.”

The pattern is unmistakable: CVC partnerships expand possibilities, but they don’t replace market validation.

Approaching a CVC isn’t the same as pitching a traditional VC. In a world where strategy matters as much as traction, here are 10 expert tips to help you get it right.

Across sectors like chemicals, materials, energy, food, infrastructure a coherent picture of corporate climate investing emerges:

This is especially relevant in domains like food biotech and industrial climate tech, where scaling depends on infrastructure partnerships and market access rather than pure software-style growth.

Collaboration with multinationals is already helping startups accelerate commercialisation and reduce costs as they build bio-based manufacturing capacity and expand novel ingredient supply chains.

The message from investors is clear:

Corporate venture capital isn’t just funding, it’s an interface between emerging technologies and the systems capable of deploying them globally.

And founders who approach that interface thoughtfully aren’t just raising capital.

They’re building pathways to scale.

We scoured the continent to track the most renowned and active CVCs in European Climate and HardTech.

Have we missed a CVC? Add them here.