Executive in Residence, Project Finance and M&A

Most cleantech companies stall between proof that the technology works and proof that the business does. Crossing that gap takes capital and a commercial model that can carry it. Aron Buchman has spent thirty years on both. Founders come to him about money. The answer is usually already in the business, a model they own and have not tried, or value they are giving away.

He has raised more than $400 million in non-dilutive and alternative financing, including a $300 million facility from a Tier-1 European bank that carried renewable power projects through to grid connection. He works on software as readily as steel, and at founder scale: an $8 million round for a data platform that closed at four times its previous valuation once the revenue model was rebuilt, and $36 million of non-dilutive capital for a roll-up.

Engagements start with something concrete; the five-year model, the data room, a cap table that will kill the round, an LOI that needs a second read, and move to the harder questions of pricing, model and what to build against what to buy.

He spent fourteen years as a private equity fund manager, closing 24 acquisitions and turnarounds. He has been the person across the table deciding whether to fund a company, and seen what happens when the answer is yes and the plan is wrong. He now works from the founder's side of that table.