At the second edition of the IVCA Green Returns Summit, Prem Prabhakar, Managing Director & CEO of SBI Ventures, delivered a keynote address that underscored India’s entry into a “new climate economy”—one where climate action is inseparable from economic planning, financial stability, and industrial competitiveness.

Speaking to a packed room of asset managers, global investors, policymakers, and climate-tech founders, Prabhakar highlighted that climate is no longer a thematic vertical but the backbone of how nations will grow, allocate capital, and protect communities. With extreme heat, volatile monsoons, flooding, and supply-chain disruptions increasingly shaping macroeconomic outcomes, he noted that India’s climate journey has become both a national priority and a global necessity.

India’s Climate Capital Gap: The Case for New Financial Architecture

Prabhakar pointed to the estimated requirement of USD 170 billion annually to meet India’s climate goals—three times the current flow of funds. The largest financing deficits, he emphasized, are in adaptation and resilience sectors such as water security, climate-smart agriculture, and disaster-proof infrastructure.

He called for a multi-layered climate financing model that blends equity, concessional capital, philanthropic risk-taking, and innovative structures such as climate resilience bonds and carbon markets. “Climate finance cannot rely on equity alone,” he remarked, urging the ecosystem to scale blended finance, de-risk first-of-its-kind technologies, and build institutional capacity across the investment chain.

SBI’s Expanding Climate Commitment 

Reinforcing SBI’s role as India’s largest bank, Prabhakar shared that the bank has set a target to achieve a 7.5% green portfolio in domestic gross advances by 2030, with a parallel roadmap for achieving carbon neutrality in its internal operations by 2030.

Through SBI Ventures, the bank continues to build one of the country’s most meaningful climate-focused investment platforms. The Neev Funds, which have evolved from climate infrastructure investments (Fund I) to climate innovation and frontier climate technologies (Fund II), have already mobilised nearly 7x follow-on capital from domestic and global investors, demonstrating the attractiveness of sustainability-driven business models.

Investments from the Neev platform span several critical sectors:

• Emission-reduction technologies (Chakr Innovation)
• Bio-CNG infrastructure (GPS Renewables)
• Waste and circularity (Blue Planet)
• Industrial-scale green hydrogen (Hygenco)
• Controlled-environment agriculture (Nutrifresh)
• Water loss management and urban resilience (Solinas, Retas Enviro Solutions)
• Energy-efficiency innovations (Smart Joules) 

Also Read: Avaana Capital Makes First Drawdown of Green Climate Fund's $24.5M Commitment

Announcement of Climate Fund III

In a forward-looking announcement, Prabhakar confirmed that SBI Ventures will be launching its third climate-focused fund early next year, aimed at investing in early-stage and growth-stage climate startups—particularly in frontier climate technologies and AI-enabled climate innovations. The objective, he noted, is to unlock new channels of green growth and enable India to emerge as a climate-solutions hub for the Global South.

India as a Climate Innovation Launchpad

Referencing the steep rise in climate-tech entrepreneurship—120 climate startups raising 200+ funding rounds from 272 investors in the last five years—Prabhakar emphasized that India is evolving into a lab and launchpad for global climate innovation, especially in areas such as cooling technologies, low-carbon materials, nature-based solutions, waste, and circularity.

He concluded by underscoring the shared responsibility of asset managers, funds, banks, and policymakers: “Financing India’s climate future is not a solitary endeavor—it is a collective mission. When capital aligns with purpose, we don’t just fund projects, we fund possibilities.”

The keynote set a strong tone for Day 2 of the GreenReturns Summit, reinforcing India’s opportunity to lead the next decade of climate innovation and attract capital at scale for sustainable, long-term growth.