Montreal, February 5, 2024 – Cycle Capital, a leading ClimateTech venture capital investment platform, is pleased to announce the addition of three new members to its Industrial Expert Advisory Committee (IEAC). Dr. Murthy Renduchintala, former Chief Engineering Officer at Intel and Executive Vice President at Qualcomm Inc; Raj Singh, former Executive Vice President of Compute Strategy and Business Development at Marvell Technology and Jim Whitham, Senior Vice President & Strategic Advisor at Infineon. They join Bertrand Gautier, Founding Partner at Schroders Greencoat Capital, already a member of Cycle Capital Fund IV advisory committee, along with current representatives from Cycle Capital’s Limited Partners (LPs), to support Cycle Capital’s team in its mission to scale deep tech companies developing enabling technologies in the transition to net zero.

 

“We are delighted that Murthy, Raj, Jim and Bertrand have joined the IEAC. Their technical insights and experience in microelectronics and growing businesses will be extremely valuable and complement Cycle Capital’s growing investment team to evaluate climatetech startups more thoroughly,” said Andrée-Lise Méthot, Founder and Managing Partner of Cycle Capital. “Murthy will support Cycle Capital and its portfolio companies with his commercial and engineering insights, as well as product design. Raj and Jim will help Cycle Capital reinforce its expertise in semiconductors and industrial scaling up in microelectronics, a key component of Cycle Capital’s Fund V’s investment thesis. These additions support Cycle Capital’s expansion in the US and in Europe, where Jim and Bertrand are located.

 

Dr Murthy Renduchintala currently serves as a Member of the Board of Directors at Accenture plc. The former Group President and Chief Engineering Officer of Intel Inc. also served as Executive Vice President and Co-President, Qualcomm CDMA Technologies during his 12 years at Qualcomm Inc. and worked at Philips Electronics for 17 years, ending his tenure there as the Vice President of Engineering. He sits on Advisory Boards at the University of California, San Diego – Jacobs School of Engineering and the University of California, Berkeley – Fung Institute of Engineering Leadership.   Dr Renduchintala holds a bachelor’s degree in electrical engineering, a master’s degree in business administration and a Ph.D. in digital communications from the University of Bradford in England. His alma mater subsequently awarded him the honorary degree of Doctor of Technology for his contributions to Science and Technology.

Raj Singh was previously executive vice president of the processors business group at Marvell Semiconductor and joins the Cycle Capital team from San Francisco, California. He has over four decades of executive experience in technology, specializing in the semiconductor industry, including as CEO of Wavesat, a semiconductor manufacturing company that Cavium Networks acquired. Alongside his current role, Raj is the founder of Banchory LLC – an advisory tech consultancy firm –  and a member of the board of directors at Kandou in Switzerland.

 

Jim Witham was recently named Senior Vice President & Strategic Advisor at Infineon. He is the former CEO of GaN Systems, a Cycle Capital portfolio company acquired by Infineon for US$830 million this past Fall. Jim joined GaN Systems from Neoconix, a manufacturer of high-density miniature connectors. As CEO of Neoconix, he successfully implemented strategic changes which dramatically increased revenue and resulted in the company’s acquisition by Unimicron Technology. Prior to Neoconix, Jim was CEO of Fultec Semiconductor, where his team designed and manufactured circuit protection devices using high-voltage silicon, silicon carbide and gallium nitride (GaN) transistors. Jim holds an MBA from Harvard and both M.S. and B.S. with distinction in Mechanical Engineering from Stanford.

Bertrand Gautier is the Founding Partner at Greencoat Capital, a leading asset manager in the energy transition space in Europe. He was previously the Director at Terra Firma Capital Partners in their London office and Vice President at Merrill Lynch. Bertrand holds a Master’s in General Engineering from ICAM (France) and an MBA from Harvard Business School.  

 

About Cycle Capital

 

Cycle Capital is a leading ClimateTech venture capital platform scaling impactful, sustainable innovation. Founded in 2009, Cycle Capital invests across North America, Europe and Asia in growing companies commercializing solutions to the major ecological challenges and contributing to a net-zero transition. Cycle Capital is the founder of Cycle Momentum Accelerator + Innovation Engine. Cycle Capital has developed an ESG and impact assessment methodology integrated into the investment workflow from the pre-investment phase to the exit of the portfolio company. For more information on Cycle Capital, visit cyclecapital.com.

 

Catherine Bérubé +1 514 629-1022  / [email protected]