Strategic guidance at the intersection of innovation, policy, and capital — for the funders designing programs and the companies building the future.

Decades designing and running public innovation programs taught us how energy innovation actually gets funded, built, and scaled. We help funders design programs that work and help companies navigate the path from research to commercialization.

About

WHAT WE DO. We help organizations that fund energy and technology innovation design, run, and improve the programs that move ideas from research to deployment. We work with US and international government agencies, philanthropic foundations, and impact funders to design and run effective innovation programs. We also work directly with startups and established companies — evaluating technology readiness, navigating funding landscapes, and building the commercialization strategies that turn R&D into bankable projects.

OUR BACKGROUND. Our team spent decades at the U.S. Department of Energy and other federal agencies — standing up new offices, running billions of dollars in programs, and working across multiple administrations. We've seen what works, what doesn't, and why good ideas stall. That experience is the foundation of a repeatable process we now apply for clients in the US and abroad: clearly articulate a shared challenge, assemble the right problem-solvers and resources, and design the intervention or technical solution that solves it for everyone at once.

WHY IT MATTERS. Too often, great innovations stall because funders design programs that miss how industry actually works, or because innovators can't navigate complex public and philanthropic funding systems. We bridge that gap — helping funders at every level build programs that deliver results, and helping innovators access the support they need to scale.

Expertise and Services

We combine deep technology knowledge with hands-on program design and execution experience, earned across fifty combined years running innovation programs at the U.S. Department of Energy and now applied for governments, philanthropies, and funders worldwide and for the companies and entrepreneurs building the technologies those funders support.

Areas of expertise combination graphic
  • Solar — Photovoltaics and Thermal
  • Wind — Onshore and Offshore
  • Water — Hydroelectric and Marine
  • Geothermal
  • Nuclear — Fission and Fusion
  • Energy Storage — Electrochemical, Thermal, Mechanical
  • Distribution Grid
  • Virtual Power Plants
  • Microgrids
  • Energy Systems Integration
  • Iron and Steel; Green Metals
  • Cement and Concrete
  • Low‑Carbon Fuels
  • Process Heat and Electrification
  • Blue Economy (Maritime, Aquaculture, mCDR, Ocean Observations)
  • Commercial readiness evaluations
  • Competitive landscape mapping
  • Technology‑to‑market strategies
  • Demonstration planning
  • Project finance and risk management
  • Goal setting and success metrics
  • Opportunity and risk assessment
  • Lifecycle planning from ideation to deployment
  • Prize, challenge, and competitive program design
  • Programmatic change management
  • Office and program launch strategies
  • Innovation policy development
  • Government operations modernization
  • Funding mechanism optimization

We tackle challenges through a systems-based lens, aligning technical, financial, and policy levers in parallel to accelerate solutions. By combining rapid execution with rigorous measurement, we ensure every intervention delivers timely impact and creates a foundation for long-term success.

We offer a range of services to address critical client needs, provide actionable information and insights, and enable informed decision making.

PROGRAM DESIGN AND IMPLEMENTATION

We offer a full suite of services for organizations deploying capital to accelerate innovation, from national governments and state agencies to philanthropic foundations and multilateral funders. Our work spans strategic planning, portfolio design, and implementation support. We structure high-impact funding mechanisms, including grants, prizes, challenges, voucher programs, cooperative agreements, and large-scale incentive models, that de-risk technology pathways, mobilize private investment, and drive commercialization from ideation through deployment. We also build robust systems for proposal evaluations and investment decisions, portfolio management, metrics, and impact evaluation to ensure funders can track performance, communicate outcomes, and maximize the return on their innovation investments.

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Innovation and Investment Strategies

We offer strategic planning services that de-risk technology pathways and accelerate market entry. From commercialization strategies for startups to portfolio investment planning for billion-dollar programs, we help clients think creatively and pragmatically about advancing technologies.

Comprehensive Program Design and Execution

We specialize in structuring high-impact, agile incentive programs that unlock private capital, drive collaboration, and catalyze markets, covering the full lifecycle from ideation to deployment. Our team has designed billion-dollar federal initiatives, international government programs, diverse prizes and challenges, accelerator and incubator programs, and strategic partnerships to drive technology commercialization. From the DOE's American-Made Challenges to state innovation programs and international prize design, we build funding models that deliver strong returns.

For more detail: Explore Full Stack

Innovation Ecosystems & Regional Collaboration

Innovation doesn't happen in isolation. We help states, regions, and international partners build the ecosystems that connect entrepreneurs, funders, research institutions, and industry around shared challenges. Our work includes designing and running accelerator and incubator programs, coordinating multi-stakeholder innovation networks, and developing the operational infrastructure, from evaluation and vetting platforms to milestone-driven program management, that makes innovation ecosystems effective.

We bring particular expertise in connecting innovation efforts across boundaries: between states, between public and private sectors, and between national systems. The hardest problems in energy don't stop at jurisdictional lines.

INNOVATION POLICY

Leveraging our decades of experience, we provide insight into policy impacts and changes that affect practitioners inside government and other funding institutions. We develop recommendations for national and subnational efforts and translate lessons from the United States for governments and organizations internationally that are designing or reforming policies to incentivize innovation.

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Policy Development and Implementation

We craft actionable innovation policy that delivers results, not just theory. Experience includes standing up new government offices, developing risk frameworks, developing authorization and appropriations language for the U.S. federal government, and shaping national strategies for energy and technology sectors.

Change Management and Government Operations Transformation

We advise on how to navigate and change complex institutional systems, including government agencies, foundations, and multilateral organizations, helping them move beyond bureaucratic barriers to achieve practical results.

COMMERCIALIZATION AND FUNDING ADVISORY

Companies face complex technical and funding milestones when navigating from research through deployment. We work alongside companies to identify key milestones and navigate the landscape of public and philanthropic funding. Drawing on our experience as reviewers and selectors of hundreds of projects across federal, state, and international programs, we conduct comprehensive landscape assessments and provide expert support for applications, helping innovators access capital from the right sources at the right times.

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Competitive Assessments and Technology Validation

We perform rigorous evaluations of technology readiness, commercialization potential, and competitive landscapes. Our approach combines systems-engineering depth with market understanding to guide funding and development decisions.

Funding Landscape and Submission Support

We conduct assessments of funding opportunities across federal, state, and international agencies, as well as philanthropic programs, to help clients navigate the full landscape. We provide expert support for grant applications, proposals, and prize submissions, including strategic guidance, refinement, mock reviews, and interview preparation, helping applicants strengthen weaknesses and stand out.

If you'd like to learn more about our perspectives and approach, please consider subscribing to our Substack. We write about funding mechanisms and models, innovation program design, commercialization strategies, and the systems, from state programs to international initiatives, that turn public and philanthropic investment into real-world technology outcomes. Our goal is to explore opportunities for change, elevate effective program design, and share lessons from decades of experience designing and running these programs.

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Founding Partners

Andrew Dawson

Andrew Dawson

Systems Strategist & Commercial Demonstrations Expert

Jennifer Garson

Jenn Garson

Innovation Program Designer & Policy Expert

Victor Kane

Victor Kane

Emerging Technology Commercialization Specialist

Garrett Nilsen

Garrett Nilsen

Scale-Up and Manufacturing Specialist

We work with organizations across the innovation funding landscape: US federal and state agencies, international governments, philanthropic foundations, and impact funders. Whether you are a government designing a national prize program, a philanthropy building an innovation portfolio, a state agency standing up new programs to focus on energy innovation, or a company considering commercialization strategies or navigating public funding, we bring the program design expertise and systems thinking to help you succeed.

Andrew Dawson

As Strategy Director at DOE's Office of Clean Energy Demonstrations (OCED), Andrew shaped a $25 billion portfolio that moves first-of-a-kind projects from concept to bankability. He led program design across eight major technology areas, from industrial demonstrations and long-duration energy storage to carbon capture and small modular reactors. Andrew also co-authored the Pathways to Commercial Liftoff reports and OCED 2030, aligning technical, policy, and finance milestones across agencies and investors. Over 9 years at DOE, he has established a proven track record in building large, integrated demonstrations that de-risk technology, address commercialization barriers, and crowd-in private capital.

Jennifer Garson

Jenn spent 15 years at the US Department of Energy in various executive roles. As Director of the Water Power Technologies Office, she directed the $200 million Water Power Technologies Office and launched programs that now anchor the blue-economy innovation landscape. She created the Powering the Blue Economy initiative which focused on power applications spanning ocean markets like aquaculture and microgrid power, and supported the design of an $800 incentive program to modernize the hydropower industry. She helped shape the creation of OCED and managed the launch of the $1B Energy Improvements in Rural and Remote Areas provision to address energy security and affordability in communities with less than 10,000 people. She led on the design of new funding mechanisms, created a new DOE-affiliated Foundation for Energy Security & Innovation (FESI), launched more than a dozen rapid prizes, supported new voucher programs for startups, and created new cooperative-agreement pathways that steered public and private dollars to hundreds of start-ups. Her hallmark is translating policy authority into user-friendly programs that grow durable innovation networks.

Victor Kane

Victor engineered DOE's most prolific commercialization program engines, channeling >$1 billion annually into the clean-energy ecosystem. He scaled DOE's American-Made Challenge prize programs from one solar pilot to 100+ department-wide competitions backed by a 500-member national network; introduced Partnership Intermediary Agreements, now 60+ active funding programs delivering multimillion-dollar projects at startup speed; and created the Energy Program for Innovation Clusters (EPIC) prize-to-grant model anchoring regional incubators. Victor reinvigorated Energy I-Corps, expanded the Technology Commercialization Fund, and launched the MAKE IT (Manufacture of Advanced Key Energy Infrastructure Technologies) Prize to on-shore critical-component production. He and his team were instrumental in launching FESI, DOE's new public-private foundation that channels philanthropic and private capital into commercialization and workforce programs.

Garrett Nilsen

As Deputy (and Acting) Director of DOE's Solar Energy Technologies Office (SETO), Garrett managed a $300+ million-per-year portfolio spanning photovoltaics, solar-thermal, grid integration, supply-chain resilience, and non-hardware solar costs (e.g. workforce development, siting, community acceptance, equitable access to solar). Under his leadership the office launched first of their kind programs to address technology commercialization, solar energy and load forecasting (solar and net load forecasting prizes), renewable energy siting (Renewable Energy Siting through Technical Engagement and Planning, Large Animal Solar System and Operations Prize), renewable energy grid interconnection (Interconnection Innovation Exchange), new uses of solar (Solar Desalination Prize) and more. Garrett spent over 13 years working in SETO aiding the industry's rise from a minor contributor to the US electricity sector to the nation's fastest growing energy source. His expertise lies in designing pipelines that swiftly translate research into commercially bankable solutions across energy technologies.