Why Congruent turned down over $300M from LPs for its third climate tech fund

Joshua Posamentier and Abe Yokell have spent the last seven years on the LP circuit, tirelessly pitching LPs on the financial and ESG (environmental, social, and governance) benefits of investing in climate tech.

“We’ve had hundreds — I don’t even want to fess to how many — but hundreds of conversations over the years,” Yokell, a managing partner at Congruent Ventures, told TechCrunch+. Some of those conversations ended with the limited partners investing in one of Congruent’s funds, but for the most part, they didn’t. “We’re used to getting rejected. That’s part of our life.”

Well, the shoe is on the other foot now. When raising Congruent’s third fund, the hard part wasn’t finding limited partners but figuring out who to turn down. The firm had originally hoped to raise $200 million, a small step up from its second $175 million fund. Investors thought that was far too modest, and instead offered $600 million, a threefold oversubscription.

Congruent turned down $350 million of that, ultimately raising $250 million, TechCrunch+ exclusively reported in November. “This is really the first time we have seen this complete abundance of interest,” Yokell said.

The decision wasn’t easy, but the team felt that they didn’t want to expand too quickly.