build a new model that makes the existing model obsolete.” –R. Buckminster Fuller
Mission & Focus
- Bitcoin, decentralized finance, and the end to fiat
- The development of digital hard money offers a fundamentally new paradigm for humanity. Monetary inflation, government corruption enabled by it and the exclusive right to mint, and the cantillon effect’s preferencing of powered and moneyed classes in the distribution of new moneys, form the single largest regressive tax on the global poor. Though rife with volatility, scams, and regulatory headwinds, we firmly believe that the digital distributed financial system represents the greatest hope for individual empowerment, globally.
- Nuclear energy
- Existing technologies, not to mention the new generation reactors and fission technologies in development, continue to offer abundant, cheap, clean energy, despite their maligned reputation. A future with immensely larger production of cheap, consistent, baseload electrical energy will open the doors to a new era of innovation and betterment. Rather than focus on “unreliables”, it behooves impact investors to remove regulatory barriers and expand access to nuclear energy.
- Environmental detoxification
- Focus on global warming, climate change, and decarbonification has pulled critical attention away from the chemical toxification of our foods, air and water, and natural environments. Endocrine disruptors, hormone mimickers, and poisonous compounds are ever present in our agricultural and food system, built environment, and the natural environment. We believe these toxins represent a greater threat to humanity than their far more popular environmental concern: global warming and climate change.
Customized, Client-driven Advisory Services
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Program Formation & Design Impact Investing requires a complex mix of processes, systems and structures that marry the objectives and requirements of both philanthropy and traditional investment. Cirsia provides clear, un-biased guidance on policies, tools & technologies, and resourcing. |
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Market Landscape Mapping Context drives impact. The best philanthropists and investors are proactive, informed, and connected. An iterative process of desk research, outreach & interviews, and eventual synthesis produces a “map” that situates issues, actors, and stakeholders in a given industry or geography across an easily understood visual schema. |
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Pipeline Development Before launching an impact-driven program it’s critical to understand the scope of real-life opportunities for investment, partners and competitors, as well as gaps & clusters of innovation. Assembling a concrete pipeline of potential investees, co-investors, and expert partners is a critical input to developing market-based strategy and disciplined investment selection. |
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Strategic Frameworks Optimizing risk and tradeoffs is central to effective philanthropy and impact investing. The foundation for such an optimization is a sound set of priorities that produce clarity in decision-making and naturally bubble up both early wins and long-term goals. |
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Due diligence Smart investments are predicated on taking the time to understand the market, the model, stakeholders and the team. It’s absolutely critical to develop a real sense for the competitive landscape, purchasers and other funding streams, and relevant regulations and policies before dedicating capital. |
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Portfolio Management & Insights Successful investing continues beyond disbursal of capital through to supportive, accountable, and strategically valuable relationships with investees. Leveraging networks, tracking progress and challenges, measuring to KPIs including impact, and incorporating key learning and market intelligence into improved investment strategies for the future. |
Strategic, High-Impact Clients
Forward-thinking families, endowments and corporations are increasingly incorporating impact investing into their philanthropic toolkit and Theories of Change. Both at Imprint Capital Advisors and now through Cirsia Impact, Niko Klein has worked for many of the leading impact investors, spanning UHNW families, endowed foundations and universities, and their trusted advisors to implement and invest high-impact venture, debt and real asset portfolios that drive the specific, client-driven philanthropic objectives at the core of each initiative. Cirsia supports philanthropists at all stages of their process, from program design to research & strategy, sourcing & pipeline, investment diligence, negotiation, and portfolio management.
Niko Klein’s Past Advisory Work
Developed investment strategy and pro-forma for novel investment model targeting “misfit” entrepreneurs with early traction but limited track record.
Provided sector-focused research and pipeline development for a frontier- and emerging-markets focused Food and Agriculture investment strategy.
Led search and evaluation for best-in-class impact & ESG data sources, refined internal frameworks for impact and sustainability investing, oversaw global sourcing for institutional quality investment opportunities.
Led parallel Colorado- and Chile-focused research and opportunity mapping across Mental Health, Workforce Development and Community & Economic Development, used as basis for Theory of Change and investment theses.
Led analysis of optimal structure, systems & processes, and back-office solutions for de-novo impact investment and philanthropic fund in partnership with philanthropic consultancy.
Collaborated with impact investment consultancy to deliver analysis of global market-oriented investment strategies for $160M endowment high-impact carve-out, focusing in particular on education, community development, job creation and social institutions.
Helped launch $100M impact investment program; personally responsible for mapping US food, education and community development sectors, as well as diligencing investments in Wireless Generation (acquired by NewsCorp), Revolution Foods, and Acelero Learning, among many others.
Developed strategy, pipeline and program infrastructure for experimental impact investment initiative focused on activating athletes and expanding access to sport.
Led multi-sector global conservation landscaping co-sponsored by two environmentally focused foundations, exploring impact investments in water, forestry, ag, and built environment.
Developed research-based strategy for an early childhood innovation fund, leading anchor investment in the Granite District Social Impact Bond (“SIB”), the first education and early childhood impact bond in the US.
Led local living economy & food system market scan, strategy, and pipeline development, focused on strengthening the local foodshed in Hudson Valley, NY.
Developed and launched US impact investment program, including a K-12 ed-tech market landscape, and deal sourcing for initial pipeline of investments which included an anchor direct investment in Mastery Connect (acquired by Instructure).
What’s in a Name?
Cirsia comes from the Latinate name for the family of flowering plants commonly known as Thistles. Thistles have been admired for millennia for their beauty, resilience, and defiance. They grow in difficult terrain, thriving on the rocky, dry, limited soils where few other plants venture. They pioneer this unforgiving topography and root deep, bursting forth with brilliant verdant leaves, deep purple and magenta flower, and thousands of seeds for future growth. To the discerning cultivator, they offer incredible nutritional and medicinal value; to most others they seem a nuisance. The imagery brings to mind the attributes of impact investing when practiced at its best: pioneering frontier markets where others dare not go, proving out the potential as it transforms barren ground into lush landscapes. Valuable risk-taking is often contrarian, misunderstood, thorny. Progress is often driven by heretics. A sharp and persistent focus on proving value in unproven terrain is the driving mission of Cirsia Impact.
Niko Klein’s Background
Niko Klein leads Cirsia Impact‘s bespoke advisory services, and brings to this work a decade of experience in impact investment and philanthropy. Previously a Director and Head of Research at Imprint Capital Advisors (acquired by Goldman Sachs), Niko has also worked in community health, environmental conservation, tourism, real estate development, and technology — across the US, Mexico, Chile and Argentina (LinkedIn). Upon joining Imprint in 2008, Niko built the firm’s research division in close partnership with its foundation, family office & corporate clients. He subsequently took on management of Imprint’s portfolio of clients and investments focused on Education, Community & Food Systems in the US. Since leaving Imprint in 2014, Niko has worked as an independent consultant for philanthropic strategy firms, investment firms, family offices, and startup businesses. In 2021, Niko took on the role of Director of Business Operations at Moon Technologies, a Bitcoin-first cryptocurrency startup.