{"podcast":{"title":"(don't) Waste Water! | Water Tech to Solve the World","slug":"don-t-waste-water-water-tech-to-solve-the-world-429684","podcast_index_feed_id":429684,"rss_url":"https://feed.ausha.co/br23DCZ1GnG3","website_url":"https://dww.show","image_url":"https://image.ausha.co/aqeIcrBNGzFT8mIP6OvDO4mNiOTIvMgC4rdQTNqS_1400x1400.jpeg?t=1593422433","author":"Antoine Walter","episode_count":502,"summary":"❓ Ever wondered how the #WaterIndustry was reacting to our World's Water Challenges? Water Scarcity? #SDG6? PFAS? Climate Change? Circular Economy? Digitization and Smart Water? 💪 Get the Water Market pulse for free. In one hour per week, while you do the dishes! 📈 We talk water investment, water tech, water entrepreneurship and water market with entrepreneurs, thought leaders, book authors, scientists, investment funds, VCs, and C-Level experts from water majors. ➡️ Leverage their insights, advice & experience and ensure to stay on top of best practices 🗓️ Tune in every Wednesday (don't miss out! 😅) 🌐 Find all the detailed episode notes, interviews, infographics, and more at http://dww.show Currently in its 10th Season, the \"(don't) Waste Water\" podcast has already welcomed around 250 guests from Water Majors (SUEZ, Veolia, Jacobs, Xylem, Kemira, Evoqua, Aquatech, SKion Water...), Scale-Ups (Cambrian Innovation, Epic Cleantec, Gradiant, Liqtech, 374Water, Gingko Bioworks...), Start-Ups (Puraffinity, KETOS, 120Water, ZwitterCo, Membrion, Source...), Universities (Berkeley, the Columbia Water Center), Investment Funds (Sciens Water, Mazarine, Burnt Island Ventures...), Business Acc…","last_synced_at":null,"page_url":"https://stenobird.com/podcast/don-t-waste-water-water-tech-to-solve-the-world-429684"},"episode":{"title":"600 Private Water Bets - Zero Public Exits. Is This Sector About to Crack? (and will Gradiant IPO?)","slug":"600-private-water-bets-zero-public-exits-is-this-sector-about-to-crack-and-will-gradiant-ipo","published_at":"2026-05-28T16:53:41+00:00","page_url":"https://stenobird.com/podcast/don-t-waste-water-water-tech-to-solve-the-world-429684/600-private-water-bets-zero-public-exits-is-this-sector-about-to-crack-and-will-gradiant-ipo","show_page_url":"https://stenobird.com/podcast/don-t-waste-water-water-tech-to-solve-the-world-429684","url":"https://podcast.ausha.co/dont-waste-water/600-private-water-bets-zero-public-exits-is-this-sector-about-to-crack-and-will-gradiant-ipo","audio_url":"https://audio.ausha.co/bYYrmSj9xPej.mp3?t=1779986689","summary":"The First Water Sector Unicorn Wants to IPO. But Wall Street kinda forgot how to buy water... Early-stage water tech funding quadrupled in seven years. Private equity's share of water M&A doubled in a decade, with a record 165 PE-led acquisitions in a single year. The bench of PE-owned water platforms grew from 42 companies in 2015 to nearly 600 in 2025. And the sector just minted its first twice-unicorn - Gradiant - with a Series E at a $2 billion valuation on Day 1 of the Global Water Summit 2026! So, will Gradiant IPO? Four all-time highs at once... but the fifth dimension - the public market - went the other way. IPOs in the 2020s are a pale echo of the 2010. So I flew to Madrid to ask the people building the machine (the VCs, the PE platforms, the strategics, the bankers, the entrepreneurs) a single question: is this closed-loop water-capital machine a feature of a mature sector, or a $300 billion pressure cooker about to crack? 🌶️ KEY SPICES 🌶️ 💵 108 funding rounds in early-stage water tech in 2025 alone vs. 33 in 2018: 3.3× the count and roughly 5× the dollars 🏗️ 42 → ~600 PE-owned water platforms in a decade, with 165 PE acquisitions in 2025 (the most ever)... but 80 of them sub-$10M targets: high velocity, low ticket 🦄 Gradiant's Series E at $2B valuation announced Day 1 of GWS 2026. What Anurag Bajpayee told me: \"We have to be ready to go public because we want to control our destiny\" 💰 Four specialist water VC funds raising at the exact same time: a feature or a weakness? 🏢 Summa Equity (€10B+ Nordic thematic PE) entering water for the first time, targeting the missing middle 🥜 IN A NUTSHELL 🥜 Is water tech actually a good investment in 2026? Water-tech venture capital just hit an all-time high. Early-stage funding rounds quadrupled in seven years (from…","meta_description":"The First Water Sector Unicorn Wants to IPO. But Wall Street kinda forgot how to buy water... Early-stage water tech funding quadrupled in seven years. Pr…","key_points":[],"chapters":[],"topics":[],"duration_seconds":4621,"processing_state":"not_requested","actions":[{"name":"request_transcript","method":"POST","url":"https://stenobird.com/v1/public/podcasts/don-t-waste-water-water-tech-to-solve-the-world-429684/episodes/600-private-water-bets-zero-public-exits-is-this-sector-about-to-crack-and-will-gradiant-ipo/transcription-requests","description":"Idempotently request low-priority transcript generation for this episode."},{"name":"read_markdown","method":"GET","url":"https://stenobird.com/podcast/don-t-waste-water-water-tech-to-solve-the-world-429684/600-private-water-bets-zero-public-exits-is-this-sector-about-to-crack-and-will-gradiant-ipo.md","description":"Read the agent-friendly Markdown representation of this episode resource."}]}}