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Temasek and the Grundfos Foundation joined the fund as it surpassed its final target, part of a broader push to channel institutional capital into water technology innovation.
Water scarcity is not a future problem. This is already the case today, limiting agriculture, industry and urban development on many continents.
What has historically lagged behind is the venture capital infrastructure to fund companies. Emerald Technology VenturesA Swiss firm that has been operating in the sector for two decades is trying to change that.
The Zurich-based firm announced this week that its Global Water Fund II has reached €100 million after the addition of two key investors: Singaporean state investment company Temasek, which already backed the cornerstone of Emerald’s first water fund, and Grundfos Foundation, the Danish owner of Grundfos, the world’s largest pump maker.
Previous investors in the fund include Veralto Corporation, Ecolab, SKion Water and Oxy Technology Ventures.
The fund made its first close 60 million euros at the end of 2025. Progress €100 million Although Emerald did not disclose a cap or timetable for the full closure, it is within two-thirds of the final target set.
Why water attracts institutional capital
Water technology has historically been an invisible corner of the venture landscape, critical but unsexy, with long development cycles and regulatory complexities hindering the fast-moving capital flowing into AI and consumer software.
What is changing is a combination of physical urgency and industry demand. The companies that support the Emerald Foundation are not philanthropists. They are industry players, Ecolab, Grundfos, Veralto, their own businesses depend on water availability and quality, and they have an economic incentive to see technology develop.
Temasek’s return to the background is particularly noteworthy. Singapore has spent decades making water security a national priority, importing a significant portion of the country’s water from Malaysia and investing heavily in desalination and recycling infrastructure. Investment in a global water technology fund through Temasek is in line with this strategic position.
Emerald itself was founded in 2000 and manages more than €1 billion in assets from offices in Zurich, Toronto and Singapore. The firm invests widely in startups tackling climate change and sustainability, but water has increasingly become a central focus.
Global Water Fund II’s portfolio companies are not disclosed in detail, but the firm’s investment thesis focuses on innovations in water treatment, efficiency and monitoring, categories where the gap between the technologically feasible and the commercially viable remains wide.
The broader message of the fund’s momentum may be as important as its specific portfolio: institutional capital is beginning to treat water technology as an infrastructure investment rather than a philanthropy.
Whether this change can happen quickly enough to keep up with the pace of water stress globally is a different question, and a €100m fund, however well placed, cannot answer on its own.
