Revolutions
The recent 4th of July holiday served as a reminder that revolutions can be healthy. I don’t just mean revolution against an oppressive monarchy, as our nation’s forefathers did 231 years ago. Today, revolutions in politics, business, and technology are changing the way we protect the environment and fight for causes we care about.
Economic Revolution. I just returned from twelve days in China where I spoke to clean tech leaders and met with the top venture capitalists in Beijing and Shanghai. The Shanghai Daily News covered the visit and the investments we are preparing to make in Chinese tech companies. Visiting China is like visiting the future. There are 300 skyscrapers in New York, but over 3,000 in Shanghai alone. China presents a stunning paradox, as a nation with the third largest economy in the world – yet is about to surpass the United States as the world’s biggest polluter.
Why should we care? New research has shown that 25% of the pollution over Los Angeles comes directly from China, and that number is only going to increase. That is why it’s important for China and California to be working closely together to find solutions to global warming – and why I was in China. You may also be relieved to hear that China has some progressive leaders like Pan Yue, the Deputy Minister of the Environment, who are trying to take revolutionary steps to reduce China’s dependence on coal.
Environmental Revolution. I was honored that the California League of Conservation Voters selected me as one of four “business leaders who are greening the marketplace,” along with Khosla Ventures and Kleiner Perkins Caufield and Byers. Perhaps more than any one venture capitalist, Vinod Khosla is leading the clean tech revolution by personally investing over $100 million in companies that could dramatically reduce the world’s carbon footprint. Vinod closed the evening by reminding us that “We need to declare a war in this country, but the war has to be on oil, and the war has to be on coal…I am almost certain we will win this war.”
Political Revolution. As a co-founder of Facebook, one of the most successful online start-ups of the past five years, Chris Hughes didn’t need to go looking for a job, especially in the high-stress world of presidential campaign politics. But, when Barack Obama offered him the chance to apply his expertise in online social networking to political outreach, Chris seized the opportunity. The result is a website that has changed the way campaigns interact with supporters by placing the power of grassroots organization directly in their hands. The attention grabbing headlines showing that Senator Obama has received contributions from over 250,000 donors, many of who gave online, shocked the political establishment. For a guy who helped create an online community with over 29 million members, it is only the beginning. It’s good to see a new generation not only making a difference – but changing the rules of the game as well.
Clean Tech Revolution. Last month I delivered a keynote address at the 6th annual UC Santa Cruz Foundation Forum. The forum was a university effort to bring together faculty, business and community leaders to tackle the problem of climate change using a comprehensive approach. Forums like this one provide a great opportunity for those conducting groundbreaking research on climate change to meet investors who can help bring clean tech products to market.
As we celebrate our independence, we shouldn’t forget that we still have revolutionaries like Vinod Khosla, Pan Yue, and Chris Hughes who are making this world a better place, and that a little revolution can be a good thing.
