General Information
The EDP Green Entrepreneurship Award will go to the mini-company that embodies the principles and spirit of green entrepreneurship to the highest extent. The mini-company should present a creative and innovative solution that takes into account the challenges of today’s society: fighting climate change, reducing CO2 emissions and promoting energy efficiency; still striving to reduce social inequalities. We are looking for highly-conscious young green entrepreneurs who started a mini-company designed to be green in its products and processes from the very moment it was set up.
The green entrepreneurs should be able to demonstrate that:
- They act as entrepreneurs, realizing ideas with a high level of risk.
- They have strong internal motivation related to a high sensitivity to environmental problems: climate change, increased CO2 emissions, waste production, rising of sea levels, water population, deforestation and population growth.
- They address an environmental/social problem/need consciously and this is at the core of their business activity.
- They have an innovative mindset with disruptive ideas. Their business activities have a net positive effect on the natural environment and at the same time they are financially sustainable.
- They consciously strive to contribute to a more sustainable future and to the decrease of social inequalities, contributing both with their social and environmental values.
- They have measurable goals for reducing their environmental footprint or regenerating natural systems and can prove their positive impact.
- They publicly disclose detailed information about the mini company’s production processes, the origin of the raw materials the product consists of, the stages of the product life cycle and their conscious choices for materials, processes and technologies that have the lowest environmental footprint possible.
The Criteria
Addressing a real sustainability problem (max. 20 points):
- The team has demonstrated that a real sustainability problem exists for their solution.
Innovation (max. 25 points):
- It can be an innovation in an existing product/service/process/technology or a completely new thing.
- The team is aware of how its solution is innovative and differs from the others available on the market.
Practical applicability and Scale (max. 25 points):
- There is a solid business model and financial plan behind the company’s product/service, it is thought out in considerable detail, it is not too general or too fantastic.
- The team is aware of all the elements needed for the business model, which are a part of the business model canvas.
- How many people the mini company has impacted or has the potential to impact.
Visualization and presentation skills during skills during the investor pitch video (max. 20 points):
- Did they use any visual materials and how well were they created; how skilled were the presenters.
Adequate answers to jury questions during the interview (max. 10 points):
- Did the team members understand the questions, did they defend their point of view in a convincing way?
- Did they understand their product/service in detail?
EDP Green Entrepreneurship Award Jury
Carla Pimenta Mendonça Tavares
Head of Start–up Engagement of EDP
Carla plays a key role in the continued development of start-up-corporate collaboration and strategic alliances with other utilities, strengthening global open-innovation initiatives in the increasingly demanding energy transition scene. Before being named for that role, Carla was a Senior Investment Manager at EDP Ventures and was responsible for sourcing, screening and investing in cleantech start-ups, globally.
Carla Barros
Responsible for EDP’s volunteering program
Carla Barros is responsible for EDP’s volunteering program, including Junior Achievement initiatives, and manages EDP’s work-family conciliation certification (Empresa Familiarmente Responsável). She was part of the emergency relief effort during the 2017 wildfire crisis in Portugal and is now commited to EDP’s volunteering effort to tackle the COVID crisis. Previously, she managed the social impact assessment program at Fundação EDP. Adding societal value drives her passion for helping others.
Mário Simões
Technology Expert in Energy Storage at EDP Innovation
He started his career in industry working in the energy sector for the Veolia Group in Portugal. He obtained his PhD degree in Chemistry from the University of Poitiers in France working in electrocatalysis for low temperature fuel cells. Since then, and always focusing on sustainable ways of generating and storing energy, he participated in innovation projects in Portugal and Switzerland. He is author of several peer-reviewed papers with more than 1000 citations and one patent.
João Campos
Sustainable Development Manager at EDP
After studying engineering (IST, Lisbon) and obtaining his master’s, João Campos started his career at the Águas de Portugal Group (Portuguese water company) where he conducted a study on the installed capacity of water treatment plants in Portugal. In 2016, he accepted a new challenge by joining the working group responsible for obtaining certification under the ISO 9001: 2015 Quality Standard for EDP’s commercial area in the free market.
Francisco Maria Santos
Technology Development Expert for EDP Inovação
Francisco joined EDP in 2015 and works as a Technology Development Expert for EDP Inovação, in the digital transformation team – Data Leap. His focus area is in R&D of emerging technologies that could potentially leverage all of EDP’s business units. He has consolidated experience in the big data domain, IoT, machine learning & AI solutions, chatbots and cloud architecture developments. He was the leading technical engineer of two virtual assistant projects currently in production and available to all EDP clients and he’s a certified associate cloud architecture for Amazon Web Services (AWS).
Eduardo Moura
Deputy Director of Sustainability at EDP
Eduardo Moura is the Deputy Director of Sustainability at EDP, was a member of the board of Junior Achievement Portugal for 10 years and currently belongs to its strategic council. At EDP, where he directs the company’s social investment strategy, he is responsible for the commitment to the United Nations’ Sustainable Development Goals. In this capacity, he works with several national and international business organizations. He is a member of the steering group of LBG – Business Investment for Societal Impact and collaborates voluntarily with social organizations helping startup projects through mentoring.
Lola Daroca
Business Analyst, EDP Innovation
Lola has been working at Beta-i, Portugal’s most important startup accelerator, supporting early-stage and mature startups in their development as well as big corporations seeking for opportunities to foster innovation internally for 3 years. Lola currently works as Business Analyst at EDP Innovation unlocking growth opportunities for startups in the Energy sector.
