Alex is the co-founder and General Partner of Zero Carbon. Before that, he spent 14 years at Google in technical leadership roles, such as Director of Product Management for Gmail and Google Calendar. He was the founder and Managing Partner of the internal innovation lab, Area 120, and held roles in ads, mobile and maps. Before Google, he held product, marketing and analysis roles at Barclays, HSBC and Capital One. Alex has a Masters degree in Astrophysics from the University of Cambridge.
“I was lucky in my first job to get a really good education in finance.”
At Capital One, HSBC and Barclays I got an incredible grounding in all the different ways to think about valuing investment opportunities and the health of a company. People who’d been doing it for years taught us so much. I have to remind myself occasionally that this is experience and knowledge that not everyone has.
“Execution beats everything else.”
It doesn't matter how clever you are or how good the idea is. If someone else can execute it better than you, they will win. If you want to convince someone you can do something, in almost every situation the best advice is to get on and do it.
“In my job and my life, I'm happiest when I'm learning.”
Whether it’s new science, or how a company works or how venture capital works, I love understanding something about the world I didn't previously understand.
Alex recommends

An excellent, climate tech-focussed podcast.

Because history.

A great popular science book about how cells work on a chemical level.


