Capture Co-founders Abdul Aziz and Josie Stoker
Josie Stoker’s previous job involved extensive business travel, mostly flights. As a champion of Climate Change, she was, however, concerned about the harms her flights/travels could do to the planet.
While searching for a solution to this pressing problem, she realised that it was difficult to keep track of the impact that each individual on this earth can make on Climate Change on a day-to-day basis.
“I decided to set out with a mission to build a tool that would make it as easy to track our carbon emissions as we track our footsteps,” Stoker tells e27.
Her relentless quest for a solution eventually paid off. She started Climate Technology Solutions out of Singapore. The startup has developed a mobile app, called Capture, which enables users to track, reduce and remove carbon emissions from everyday life.
The company has another founder Abdul Aziz, whom Stoker met during an Antler programme (Capture is part of Antler’s ongoing startup programme).
Stoker has worked across diverse countries and disciplines. In her last role, she was involved in bringing senior executives to spend time learning from remote nomadic tribes. Aziz’s background is in product development and project management.
Capturing lightning in a bottle
Capture mainly serves three functions — tracking, reducing and removing CO2 emissions from everyday life.
The app uses GPS information from your mobile to automatically detect your mode of transportation and keeps a running total of your emissions. It will then give you a clear picture of your environmental impact, your daily allowance guidelines, and your choices that cause the most significant climate impact.
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“The Capture app helps you remove the equivalent amount of CO2 that you’ve produced through a choice of certified offsets (such as forest conservation and renewable energy projects). We encourage users to subscribe to an ‘offset-as-you-go’ monthly payment through their choice of project,” she explains.
The startup initially targets higher earners. “A study by Oxfam showed the wealthiest 10 per cent are responsible for 50 per cent of carbon emissions, thanks to several factors such as transportation, consumption and diet,” she adds.
“We will start by targeting specific segments of potential users within this population. It will help us to be more ecologically-impactful. It will also help us target those who can currently afford to make personal improvements in carbon efficiency, and purchase carbon offsets,” she goes on.
As per an estimate, this segment of the population (aged between 15 and 64 years) would account for around 500 million people.
“We cautiously estimate that 5 per cent of this 500 million would care enough about the climate crisis and seek personal solutions. This would take us to an addressable market size of 25 million,” she hopes.
“This number is growing and we believe it will continue to grow at an increasingly higher rate, as climate change becomes more prevalent. We aim to reach 10 million users over the next five years,” says Stoker, who holds a Master’s Degree in Management from Singapore Management University.
As per an estimate, up to 100,000 people enter the search term ‘carbon footprint’ on Google each month. Over four million people left their jobs or schools for the global climate strike in September 2019.
“We’ve seen a huge surge in the success of sustainability-related brands across diverse groups of users — from hydro flasks to Teslas. Hundreds of millions are anxious about the climate crisis, so much so that ‘eco-anxiety’ is becoming a well-known term to describe the feeling of doom and panic that can be associated with climate change,” Stoker notes.
‘Building things people want’
Capture subscribes to the Y Combinator motto of ‘build things people want’. “We know people are searching for solutions to help them track and offset their carbon emissions. It’s also been interesting to watch the growth in other sustainability-related markets, for example, the reusable water bottle market, which is forecast with a CAGR of 4.2 per cent between 2016 and 2024 (Transparency Market Research),” she adds.
While Capture realises that personal carbon emissions tracking is not a mainstream issue yet, the perception is fast-changing.
The Capture team
As the company grows, Capture wants to add more features to the app and intends to provide a complete picture of one’s personal climate impact. This includes many categories of life, including mobility, food choices, purchases (clothing, technology, etc.), and home energy usage.
Stoker expects to add the ‘food choices tracking’ feature by the end of March 2020, which will be followed by ‘home energy tracker’ and ‘spending tracker’.
“We expect that in the coming years, many of the products and services we buy will already include carbon offsets, so we want to help people keep track of that too — all in one place,” she notes.
The app, which will hit the market this month, will be free to download — the ‘track’ and ‘reduce’ features will not be chargeable. “However, we encourage our users to engage in CO2 removal for their emissions, which could be something in the region of US$5-$8 per month, depending on their levels of CO2-producing activity and their choice of CO2 removal project. Capture charges a 10 per cent transaction fee on offsetting.”
Capture will also offer B2B services, including Capture for Events (where it will provide tracking and removal for conference travel emissions). For these, it will charge a fee from organisations.
“Over the coming months, our main challenges are around raising awareness. In the coming years, we will have to be incredibly agile and adaptable as the climate tech space is moving very fast,” Stoker concluded.
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