DMV Climate Innovation Fellowship (2025)
The program will bring together entrepreneurs from across DC, Maryland, and Virginia (DMV), empowering them to address climate mitigation, adaptation, and resilience. Founders will receive expert training, critical resources to accelerate their ventures, and two in-person residency weeks in the DMV.
Sectors
Solutions addressing climate mitigation, adaption, and resilience, including but not limited to:
- Renewable energy generation and storage
- Green building technologies
- Climate data and analytics
- Climate-smart agriculture and food systems
- WaterTech
- Blue economy
Program Structure
- The cohort is selected of up to 10 ventures based in/serving the DC, Maryland, and Virginia area
- Ventures receive training in Halcyon’s methodology on product-market fit, investment readiness, and leadership
- The program is delivered through:
- A virtual kickoff meeting
- Two in-person residency weeks in the DMV
- Monthly meetings
Timeline
- August 27, 2024: Applications open
- October 18, 2024: Applications close
- November/December 2024: Finalists invited to a virtual pitch
- December 2024: Selected fellows will be notified
- January 17, 2025: Virtual program kickoff
- January 27-31, 2025: First in-person residency week in the DMV
- March 7, March 28, and April 18, 2025: Monthly meeting dates
- May 12-16, 2025: Second in-person residency week in the DMV
Benefits
- $10K in Amazon Web Services (AWS) credits
- $5K stipend per venture
- Professional advisors
- Workshops with experts in leadership development, investment readiness, and product-market fit
- Networking with investors and varied stakeholders in climate
- Pro bono legal support
- Monthly meetings
- A global community of 500+ impact-driven entrepreneurs
- And more
Eligibility
We’re looking for (for-profit) startups that are building scalable solutions that are tackling challenges related to climate mitigation, adaptation, and resilience across the DC, Maryland, and Virginia area.
- Location: Must have your venture based in/serving the DC, Maryland, and Virginia area
- Stage: Must have a Minimum Viable Product (MVP) that has the potential to scale. Must be working on your venture full-time.
- Team:
- May apply with up to one co-founder
- Applicant must be the CEO and/or hold primary decision-making power
- Must be fluent in English
- Must be at least 21 years of age by the start of the program
- Program Engagement: Must be able to participate in all activities and programming sessions
- Impact: Must be developing a product and venture which contributes towards 1 or more of the UN’s 17 SDGs
In addition to eligibility, Halcyon scores each application based on 4 criteria: Impact, Scalability, Innovation, and Talent.
Selection Criteria
Impact
To what extent will the solution, if scaled, have a meaningful impact on society and/or the environment?
Scalability
Could this venture scale to reach hundreds of thousands or millions of users in a 5-10 year time horizon?
Innovation
Is the solution a novel approach to tackling the issue in their context?
Talent
Is the team uniquely qualified to tackle the challenges they’ve identified?