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Highlights

 

Welcome to another episode of Category Visionaries — the show that explores GTM stories from tech’s most innovative B2B founders. In today’s episode, we’re speaking with Josh Knauer, Co-Founder at Reseed, a carbon credits platform for farmers that has raised over $5 Million in funding.

Most interesting points from our conversation:

  • Early Online Innovation: Josh began his entrepreneurial journey by founding one of the first e-commerce sites for natural products in the mid-90s, long before the widespread acceptance and understanding of online shopping and natural products.
  • Pioneering Data Integration: After selling his first company, Josh founded a data integration platform that synthesized diverse data sets for enhanced decision-making in various sectors, demonstrating his foresight in the value of interconnected data long before it became a norm in tech.
  • Visionary Environmental Impact: With Reseed, Josh taps into the underutilized potential of agricultural carbon credits, aiming to transform how the world views and values the carbon sequestration potential of farming.
  • Empowering Farmers: Reseed’s model not only addresses climate change but also aims to improve the economic stability of farmers globally by providing them with additional revenue streams through carbon credits.
  • Challenging Conventional Investment Wisdom: Josh has taken a unique approach to funding by focusing on aligning with investors who share a mission-driven focus, challenging the conventional venture capital route that many startups take.
  • Future Aspirations: Looking forward, Josh envisions a future where investments in ecosystem services, supported by solid data and profitability, become a cornerstone of both environmental sustainability and financial portfolios globally.

 

Actionable
Takeaways

Leverage Past Innovations to Inform Future Ventures:

Josh's journey from creating an online marketplace for natural products to integrating data across sectors illustrates the value of using insights from past experiences to address current challenges innovatively.

Identify Underleveraged Markets for Impact:

By focusing on agricultural carbon credits, Josh highlights the importance of identifying gaps in existing markets—such as the low percentage of carbon credits from agriculture—and leveraging them for significant environmental and economic impact.

Build Business Models that Support Your Mission:

Reseed’s approach to stabilizing farmers' incomes through carbon credits underlines the effectiveness of creating business models that align closely with broader social and environmental goals, ensuring sustainability and impact.

Focus on Data Transparency and Integrity:

Emphasizing the need for auditable, transparent data in the carbon credit market, Josh points out the necessity for startups to adopt standards that ensure their innovations are both verifiable and impactful, building trust with consumers and investors.

Engage with Investors Who Share Your Vision:

Josh’s fundraising strategy—targeting family offices and individuals aligned with Reseed’s mission rather than traditional VC routes—serves as a model for founders to consider alternative funding sources that better match their company's ethos and objectives.

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