Five pitches. One winner. You decide.

Welcome to Climate Tech Startups to Watch, Trellis’s fast-pitch competition featuring the most promising early-stage startups in climate tech this year. 

This virtual session will feature pitches from five entrepreneurs developing cutting-edge climate adaptation solutions — from climate-resilient food systems and built environment adaptation to AI-powered risk intelligence, precision agriculture, and aquatic biosurveillance.

Each founder will field questions from leading industry experts, setting the stage for a live conversation about where climate adaptation is headed and what it takes to scale.

You can help choose the winner. Cast your vote and send one startup to the in-person finals at Trellis Impact 26 on June 24 in San Francisco, where it will compete for the title of Trellis’s 2026 Climate Tech Startup of the Year.

Entrepreneurs:

• Extreme heat HVAC: Rawand Rasheed, Co-Founder & CEO, Helix Earth
• Cell-cultured cacao: Alan, Perlstein, CEO, California Cultured
• Biosurveillance of aquatic ecosystems: Edgar Rudberg, CEO, Nucleic Sensing Systems
• AI-powered climate risk platform: Adriel Lubarsky, CEO, Beehive
• Turns soil data into actionable insights: Lalit Gautam, CEO, Sensegrass

Industry Experts:

• Darren Clifford, Investor, Adapt [us] Capital
• Emilie Mazzacurati, Investor, Tailwind Futures

Moderator:

• Jake Mitchell, Director of Climate Tech Innovation, Trellis Group