Conservation Matrix: Investing Made Easy
Pilot project kicks off at YESS Conference
This weekend amongst the crowds and high profile names at the Yale Environmental Sustainability Summit, you’ll find Conservation Matrix – an innovative crowdfunding platform started by two current joint degree students, Thomas Selby (MEM/MBA ’16) and Sumit Kadakia (MF/MBA ’16).
Supported through a grant from the Yale Center for Business and the Environment, Conservation Matrix enables high net worth investors and investment firms to place capital directly into high-quality conservation projects.
In short, Conservation Matrix acts as the intermediary between projects and smaller investors. Similar to Fundrise for real estate, Conservation Matrix aggregates key details about projects and enables investors and project developers to discover one another, share information and close a deal.
“We started Conservation Matrix after feeling powerless about our ability to invest in local environmentally beneficial projects,” says Selby. “Unless if you have a few million dollars sitting aside, it’s nearly impossible to put your money into saving a specific ecosystem. We want to change that.”
Selby and Kadakia will be at the YESS conference this weekend sharing information about this venture and promoting their pilot project - raising $5,000 for the New Haven Land Trust (coincidentally, the New Haven Land Trust is run by a SOM/FES joint degree graduate, Justin Elicker).
“Our hope is to raise a majority of the $5,000 goal over this weekend from alums who care about New Haven, says Kadakia. “We’re confident that this community will help us achieve that goal.”
You can support this initiative and donate to the New Haven Land Trust by clicking here.