Investment Cones

Our “investment cones” are based on proven company building principles: repeatability, scalability, predictable cash flow and project execution (no matter what).

Our Investment Philosophy

We are building companies that will generate long-term predictable cash flows.  We achieve this by taking a repeatable, manufacturing approach to project development – using standards and scalable design principles that win over the long-run. Our companies (and returns) get better with time. ​

We focus on being the best absolutely, not relatively. Example: We don’t compare project costs to competitors, we start with a blank sheet of paper and seek the best of what is possible. ​​

Integrity – doing what you say, on time and on budget – are core to Conifer companies.

How We Invest

  • We like industries where companies and project developers have historically taken a one-off, site specific approach to building things. We seek to develop a repeatable design based on standardization and scalable design principles (not technology risk). This approach leads to meaningful competitive advantages for our companies and better returns through reductions in time and costs.

  • We don’t want to do a project one time. We want to deploy a proven development approach to a growing list of attractive projects. We look for industries where we can do the same thing many times over, supported by favorable supply/ demand dynamics.

  • We don’t know the future. We don’t try to predict price. We don’t like cyclicality. We seek to underpin base case returns with long-term fixed price contracts with strong counterparties. ​

    We also care about predictable inputs. We are looking for knowable resources with minimal input variability (i.e. low flow variability hydro, low-decline helium reserves, appreciating landfill gas curves). This is the foundation of a predictable cash flow machine. ​

    ​We don’t know what will happen with government subsidies, environmental attributes and regulation. We work hard to remove these elements (and everything that is outside of our control) from our underwriting models. We have to make satisfactory returns without these features.

  • Nothing works without integrity. Our companies seek to build projects on time and on budget. We take a “burn the boats” mindset to execution. We will find a way to win. ​

    Winning has to be inclusive. Shareholders, customers, employees and the environment win together and win big.

How We Design + Build

  • We prioritize established technologies over emerging ones, leveraging already tested solutions from one sector and applying them to another. This approach enables more precise forecasting of project volumes and minimizes the risks often associated with untested technologies.

  • Our modular designs minimize the need for site-specific variability, reduce time to completion, and lower costs.

  • In every project we take on, we identify clear opportunities to transition from site-specific processes to manufacturing scale across energy transition projects. This approach allows us to replicate successful projects efficiently and scale operations without reinventing the wheel each time.

How We Operate

  • We take a hands-on, active role in the early stages of the companies we invest in, with the goal of empowering companies’ teams to act independently as we help them grow and mature.

  • Our significant investments enable us to maintain significant control over the companies we help build and invest in, playing an active role in their operations and project execution. This level of involvement helps ensure that companies are in a strong position to deliver value to shareholders.

  • As companies mature and deploy Conifer's expertise in corporate leadership, capital allocation and project management, our involvement becomes more strategic than operational. In the long term, the goal is to scale impact by successfully developing companies and projects and then stepping back to enable companies to thrive independently, while still having access to our engineering and investing expertise.

 “Through its adaptive strategy that has allowed it to survive over hundreds of millions of years, the patient and persistent conifer teaches us that it is far better to avoid direct, head-on competition for scarce resources and, instead, to pursue the roundabout path toward an intermediate step that leads to its eventual position of advantage.”

— Mark Spitznagel, The Dao of Capital: Austrian Investing in a Distorted World