Investor Profile: Third Sphere — Thesis, Cheque Size & How to Apply

Third Sphere is a New York based, climate focused venture fund that has spent more than a decade backing early stage climate companies. Originally known as Urban Us, the firm now describes a portfolio of nearly 100 companies. Its pitch is distinctive: it runs toward hardware, where most venture firms hesitate, and it treats climate as far more than carbon accounting.

Investment thesis

The firm's thesis starts from a simple observation: climate is about systems, not single metrics. Roughly two thirds of its portfolio targets mitigation, mostly through electrification, while about one third targets resilience and adaptation, helping cities, infrastructure and businesses withstand impacts that are already arriving. Around 80 percent of its bets are hardware enabled, usually paired with software that turns devices into data platforms. The test for any deal is whether the product can become better, faster and cheaper than the incumbent, because the firm believes the best climate solutions rarely look like climate solutions at all.

Sectors and stages

Third Sphere concentrates on pre-seed and seed, typically investing $250,000 to $1 million at the outset, with up to $2 million reserved for follow on rounds. It usually invests before a company has customers, and it says it has introduced the next lead investor in half of its portfolio companies' raises. Its current fund size is not publicly disclosed. Geographically it is primarily focused on the United States, but it has backed teams in Switzerland, Germany, Israel, the United Kingdom and South Africa, and it claims a playbook for helping teams from smaller markets scale in the US. For early rounds it prefers SAFEs.

Notable portfolio / track record

Among the names the firm highlights are Bowery Farming, the vertical farming company, and Cove Tool, which helps architects cut building energy demand before construction begins. Its earlier work includes running URBAN-X from 2017 to 2021, an accelerator programme that backed more than 50 startups, with the firm reporting that over 90 percent of those startups had raised follow on funding by the end of the programme. It has also built founder tools beyond capital, including the Sync platform for matching portfolio companies with investors, and creditdb.ai, an open database of more than 300 non-dilutive capital providers. More recently it co-led the seed round of Sonic Fire Tech, a fire technology startup building waterless fire suppression systems.

How to apply for funding

Third Sphere does not advertise a public application form or a rolling open call on its website, so founders should approach the team directly through the firm's site at thirdsphere.com. The strongest fit is a pre-seed or seed stage team building a hardware enabled climate solution, ideally one that can show a credible path to being better, faster and cheaper than existing options. Founders should be ready to discuss traction honestly, including the lack of it, since the firm says it usually invests pre-customer. Teams interested in its Seedstrapping approach should say so explicitly and explain how non-dilutive capital or early revenue fits their plan.