Renat Heuberger
Renat Heuberger is a Swiss serial entrepreneur, impact investor and board member who has been active in climate and nature tech since 1999. He is co-founder and CEO of Terra Impact Ventures, advising and building companies that advance sustainability.
He had launched the myclimate foundation, one of the first voluntary carbon offset organizations, in 2003 before co-founding South Pole, growing it from a startup to one of the world’s leading climate finance companies.
Heuberger’s work has helped channel significant investment into nearly 1,000 climate projects across more than 50 countries, reducing over a billion tons of CO₂. He has been recognized as a “Social Entrepreneur” by the World Economic Forum’s Schwab Foundation, serves on numerous boards, chairs solar company MPower, and advises the Swiss government as an elected member of its Innovation Council.
Raised in proximity to the Swiss Alps, he discovered his passion for nature early and deepened it during a school exchange and NGO work in Jakarta. In 2024, he co-founded the Carbon Paradox initiative to spark open, constructive debate on the challenges of climate finance. He lives in Zurich with his Indonesian wife and their four daughters.
Steve Zwick
Steve Zwick is an environmental consultant, analyst, and journalist with more than 30 years’ experience translating complex environmental issues into clear, engaging stories.
For over a decade, he served as Managing Editor of Ecosystem Marketplace, building it into a globally respected source on climate policy and carbon markets. He later became Senior Manager for Special Projects at Verra, the leading carbon credit standards body. Today, he contributes analysis to Quantum Commodity Intelligence and advises the ESG consultancy Responsible Alpha.
He first developed a passion for breaking down information asymmetries while trading commodities in Chicago—an interest that led him into journalism and later shaped his work in climate finance.
Before pivoting to climate, Zwick left finance to cover European business for TIME and Fortune, earning two shortlistings for Business Journalist of the Year. He also produced and hosted Deutsche Welle’s Money Talks and founded Bionic Planet, a climate advisory and knowledge hub best known for its widely praised podcast demystifying environmental finance.
A native of Chicago, he and his wife divide their time between Chicago, Rotterdam, and her hometown, Nairobi.
Marco Hirsbrunner
Marco Hirsbrunner is a climate finance entrepreneur and co-founder of Terra Impact Ventures, where he oversees operations. He supports the growth of sustainability-focused startups and companies such as the Icelandic geospatial and nature data company Svarmi, where he acts as co-CEO.
Previously, he was co-founder and COO of South Pole, where he played a key role in scaling the company into a global leader in climate finance by establishing and leading offices in East and South East Asia. In parallel, his focus on operational excellence and digital solutions helped South Pole scale its work and manage one of the world’s largest and most complex carbon project portfolios.
Fluent in multiple languages, he holds an M.A. in Media and Communication Studies and Chinese Studies from the University of Zurich, where he developed a deep fascination for ancient Chinese philosophical concepts.
A lifelong enthusiast of logical puzzles and scientific paradoxes, he was especially captivated by unsolved mysteries like the Fermi Paradox—the central enigma of astrobiology. Its sobering implication? Perhaps the reason we haven’t been contacted by alien civilizations is that none survive long enough to reach that stage.
