SEED Practitioner Labs Climate Finance | Mumbai, India

Transition Lab: Scaling-up finance for climate-smart innovation

20 November 2018 | Waterstones Hotel Mumbai 

India is one of the hubs for climate finance in Asia. International and national public institutions, donors, banks and investors are already channelling significant amounts of money into climate finance, but challenges exist in the creation of a steady deal flow in the private sector. Well-designed climate finance products that reduce investors’ risks, enhance their expected returns or bridge existing infrastructure gaps can help to catalyse the deal flow in the private sector bridging the missing-middle gap in India.

The Practitioner Lab Climate Finance catalyses this process by drawing on experience and expertise from local champions to identify, prototype, and design the next generation of climate finance products. Those prototyped products will provide concrete solutions to challenges faced in climate finance, and can build new mechanisms, attract new investors, and help to increase the deal flow into projects and enterprises. The Practitioner Lab responds to the importance of the deal flow and missing middle challenge by prototyping project-ready solutions complementing existing processes and by moving quickly from idea to impact.

The Lab invites leaders from investors, banks, development finance institutions, foundations, governments, innovators and intermediaries. Invited participants comprise senior level financial experts, practitioners and business leaders. By drawing on the experience and expertise of local practitioners and experts the Lab will ensure that the prototyped financial products address real-life financing challenges. One of the main questions addressed during the Lab shall be: 

How do we scale early-stage climate financing products to trigger large-scale action towards a low-carbon economy in India?

Climate finance product developers, partners and potential investors are invited to participate in interactive sessions designed to refine and mobilise support for the innovative climate-smart finance products. During the Transition Labs throughout November, practitioners are invited to:

Showcase | Climate Finance Products

Product developers will share success stories and lessons on their work on innovative financing products, providing the following concrete examples of next-generation climate financing products:

• Product on Decentralised Renewable Energy Financing
• Product on Carbon Market Financing for Waste-SMEs
• Product on Mainstreaming Green Projects in Commercial Banking

Cultivate | Building India’s Climate Finance Ecosystem

Appropriate financing products are a key success factor for the uptake of earlystage climate-smart SMEs in India. Panelists will discuss the importance of creating an ecosystem and the conditions required to strengthen innovative financing products critical to unlock the potential of climate-smart SMEs, with a focus on the role of early-stage financing.

The SEED Transition Lab agenda for each country is available here:

Mumbai, India | 20 November 2018 at Waterstones Hotel Mumbai

The Practitioner Labs Climate Finance in is part of the implementation of “Financing and capacity building for micro and small climate-smart enterprises: Filling the gap of the missing middle”, a project supported by the German Federal Ministry for the Environment, Nature Conservation and Nuclear Safety.

If you are interested in attending an upcoming Transition Lab as a potential partner or investor please contact the relevant SEED Lab Team: This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.