Jigar Shah

Jigar Shah
Born Jigar Hasmukh Shah
(1974-08-30) August 30, 1974
Modasa, India
Citizenship USA
Alma mater University of Illinois
Occupation Clean energy entrepreneur
Known for Founder, SunEdison
CEO, Carbon War Room
Spouse(s) Khushali Shah
Children Dhilan Shah (2015)
Website http://creatingclimatewealth.co/

Jigar Shah is a clean energy entrepreneur in creating market-driven solutions and eliminating market barriers to address climate change. Shah has recognized this as “Creating Climate Wealth.”

Shah maintains that Climate Wealth is created when mainstream investors team up with entrepreneurs, corporations, mainstream capital, and governments at scale to solve the big problems of our time while generating compelling financial returns – not concessionary returns.[1]

Current business initiatives

Shah is the co-founder and President of Generate Capital. .[2] Shah is author of Creating Climate Wealth: Unlocking the Impact Economy, 2013 Icosa Publishing. The book talks about the prominent role of business model innovation, more than new technology, in attracting mainstream capital and unlocking transformational change. In the book, the author pictures reaching our 2020 climate change goals as means to create the next economy with the equivalent of 100,000 companies worldwide, each generating $100 million in sales. Shah argues that, while new technical innovation is valuable, deployment of existing technologies are the key to reaching our near-term climate targets.

In addition, Shah is President of Generate Capital.[3] Lastly, Shah serves as a board member of the Carbon War Room, a global organization he previously served as CEO.[4]

Shah has also become an outspoken advocate to end all energy subsidies, including those for renewable energy, to "create a level playing field." [5]

In 2013, Jigar served as a mentor for Unreasonable at Sea, a technology business accelerator for social entrepreneurs seeking to scale their ventures in international markets. Founded by Unreasonable Group, Semester at Sea, and Stanford’s Hasso Plattner Institute of Design.[6] Shah writes for Unreasonable Group’s venture UNREASONABLE.is, a hub for social entrepreneurs.[7]

Past business initiatives

From 2009 to March 2012, Shah served as the first CEO of the Carbon War Room, the global organization founded by Richard Branson and Virgin United that works to harness the power of entrepreneurship to deploy solution technologies at scale.

Prior to his tenure as Carbon War Room CEO, Shah's founded SunEdison in 2003. The company simplified solar as a service through the implementation of the power purchase agreement (PPA) business model. That model changed the status quo, allowing organizations to purchase solar energy services under long-term predictably priced contracts and avoid the significant capital costs of ownership and operation of solar energy systems. The SunEdison business model is a recognized catalyst that helped turn solar PV into a multi-billion dollar industry worldwide.

Shah previously worked in strategy for BP Solar and as a contractor for the Department of Energy on alternative vehicles and fuel cell programs.[8]

Early life

Born in India, Shah moved to the United States with his family when he was one year old. Shah moved to Sterling, Illinois when he was eight years old.[9]

Education

Shah holds a B.S. in Mechanical Engineering from the University of Illinois, Champaign-Urbana,[10] and an MBA from the University of Maryland.[11][12]

References

External links

This article is issued from Wikipedia - version of the 9/20/2016. The text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution/Share Alike but additional terms may apply for the media files.