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Vianney Brandicourt

Climate Tech | Product | Founder | Previously: Spotify, Google

• Venture founder & builder with 15 years of experience in tech • Deep experience across product and analytics • Expertise in team building, product management, A/B test frameworks, go-to-market strategy, usability • ♥ for all things outdoors, trail running, cycling, photography, chess, go

Highlights

Apr 22 · linkedin

I recently had the pleasure of hearing Rohit Aggarwala share a practitioner's perspective on the unsolved challenges of urban climate progress at the Bezos Earth Fund convening around "AI for Climate and Nature".

His talk has lingered with me, and in the spirit of Earth Day, sharing some of his salient points:

  1. We know of Maslow's hammer, where "if one has a hammer one tends to look for nails." We need to curb this cognitive bias and ensure that our current AI toolkit is being used to solve real, impactful problems.

  2. Most of these real, important NYC problems are (arguably) "unsexy":

• construction has experienced a decline in productivity • environmental review process: protracted / byzantine • enforcement of building codes: checkered / lax culture • construction projects: delayed by limited understanding of what's underground • heterogeneity of buildings and lack of data: building improvements/retrofits are lengthy, "craft" tasks based on incomplete/inadequate documentation. • etc, etc

In Climate circles we often hear about "hard-to-abate" sectors, which tend to point to steel/cement production, aviation or other manufacturing that requires high energy input or chemical processes that emit greenhouse gases.

Rit's observations point to a class of hard-to-abate urban problems that can often be reframed as data, coordination and efficiency challenges. (Which ones are a good candidate for AI?)

I'd love to learn from / about anyone who is working on these "unsexy" problems 🤓 🙏

Mar 20 · linkedin

IKEA is intergenerational for my family: from the bunk-bed my parents bought my siblings to the couch my toddler now uses as a canvas for his "art".

During those same years, the world has seen CO2 ppm rise from 344 to 421 (+22%).

Thanks to Climate Drift, I had the pleasure of chatting with Daniel Haltia (Global Circular Strategy team at IKEA), who inspired me to have a deep think about their business in the context of circularity.

https://lnkd.in/eFXN9WzK

My key observations and recommendations as an outsider looking in:

1️⃣ IKEA's carbon footprint is 46% of New York City's and 37% of Sweden's.

2️⃣ The high modularity and substitutability of IKEA products are a massive opportunity for adaptive, demand-driven refurbishment.

3️⃣ IKEA's buyback program should take no more than 5 minutes online, with the help of advances in AI (computer vision for automated condition assessment) and significantly better UX.

4️⃣ Refurbished products should be discovered and sold alongside IKEA's new products online. It's the only way refurbishment and circularity will be truly adopted by consumers.

Feedback welcome, I'm here to learn 🤓

🙏 Thanks to Marco Morawec and Skander Garroum for facilitating insightful conversations with industry leaders at iconic brands.

#climate #climatetech #sustainability #circularity #circulareconomy #refurbishment #ai #refurbishment #decarbonization #carbonemissions #climateaction #climatechange #ikea

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Vianney Brandicourt
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Experience

Fellow @ Urban Tech Hub | Building Decarbonization x Climate at Cornell Tech
Founding Member at Climate Drift

Education

B.A., Economics, Political-Science, Columbia University
Masters, Economics, Sciences Po
Masters, Economics, Ecole normale supérieure
Learning for Action Program, Terra.do

Location

United States