Empowering global sustainable innovation
Vida Sustainable Ventures is an active venture builder in energy, renewables, infrastructure and software. We start companies from scratch, take an operating role inside them, and stay until they stand on their own.
Our story
It starts with Ignacio López Martín, an industrial engineer from Seville who decided that the energy transition would not be built from a spreadsheet.
In 2019 he co-founded Cable Energía with Jesús Nieto: an electric-vehicle fast-charging platform across Spain and Portugal — a network operator, not a hardware vendor. Grupo Cuerva came in with 51% in 2021. In July 2022 Shell acquired 100% of the company, and Ignacio stayed on as CEO through the integration until the end of 2023. In 2025 Acciona Energía bought the business from Shell.
One asset, three owners: founder, energy group, oil major — and then an infrastructure player. Very few platforms in Europe have passed that many industrial due diligences and kept running.
Vida Sustainable Ventures was built on what that journey taught us. Today it is the platform from which we start, operate and govern companies in energy, renewables, infrastructure and software.
We are open to external investors who want to back the portfolio, and to founders and industrial partners who want to co-found the next one with us. We also work as board advisors, private equity consultants, crisis-management consultants and entrepreneurs in house.
Portfolio
Exite-Mobility · Exit
Sustainable infrastructure platform for the design, development, construction and operation of one of the major electric-vehicle charging networks in Spain and Portugal.
Battery storage · BESS
Develops and sells stand-alone and hybrid battery energy storage (BESS) projects in Spain, for its own portfolio and for third parties under development agreements. Portfolio of 500 MW.
Wind O&M · Drones
Wind turbine blade cleaning and inspection with drones (RPAS) — no rope access, no scaffolding. One working day per turbine instead of four to five, recovering the energy production lost to blade soiling and surface damage.
Modular wellness
Modular outdoor gyms and wellness units, designed and manufactured in Spain. Direct sale to businesses — hotels, campsites, clubs, developers — and to private homes through Supercubo Home.
Nautical club
Boat-exchange club for owners: members swap their boats with each other instead of leaving them moored. Not charter, not rental. Founding phase.
Environmental
Serves the renewable energy industry from the environmental side: support to project developers and asset owners in fulfilling the environmental remedies of their projects, and building a viable business around it.
Consumer
A highchair insert that collects any food scraps the baby may throw away.
Ignacio López Martín
Founder & Managing Partner, Vida Sustainable Ventures
The founder
I build energy businesses in Spain and take them to the point where a strategic buyer wants them. I also sit on boards and advise investors in renewables, storage and infrastructure.
Industrial engineer, based in Seville — operations in Spain and Portugal, market across Europe. I co-founded Cable Energía in 2019 with Jesús Nieto and built it into an EV fast-charging platform that Shell acquired in 2022 and Acciona bought in 2025. I stayed on as CEO through the Shell integration until the end of 2023.
Today I chair the boards of Capflex Energía (battery storage) and Supercubo, and through Vida Sustainable Ventures I have co-founded Eolinet Renovables (wind O&M with drones) and The Seafolk (a boat-exchange club).
The step Spain finds hardest: turning permitted renewables and storage projects into operating assets, from grid access and construction to financing. That stretch is where most of the value in the energy transition is being created now, and where it helps to have someone who has already built a company, run it and sold it.
For funds that want their own energy platform in Spain or Portugal: we build the company, the team and the pipeline from scratch, to their specification, and run it until it stands on its own.
Independent director or chairman in energy, renewables, e-mobility, storage and infrastructure companies — Iberia and Europe. Particularly in fund-owned midcaps going through the phase I have already lived: growth, restructuring or sale.
Scoped, with a beginning and an end. M&A support in energy and infrastructure, founder to founder and board to board. Exit-readiness: getting a company in shape to be bought — I have done it with my own. Restructuring and growth: operations, team and governance for the next phase.
“I don't take mandates where I add no real edge. If the problem isn't one of mine, I say so on day one.”
Speaking
I speak at industry and investor events, in English and Spanish. Not a motivational talk — what actually happened, with the numbers I am allowed to give.
Founding Cable Energía, scaling it across Spain and Portugal, and passing three industrial due diligences: an energy group, an oil major and an infrastructure player.
What the pipeline numbers actually mean, why the private-equity models get merchant storage wrong, and what Europe can learn from the Spanish years.
Why a fund's six-year hold and an asset's twenty-year life need someone in the room who has built the thing, not just modelled it.
Starting companies from inside the industry instead of investing from outside it.
“Paid engagements. Tell me the audience and the outcome you want, and I'll tell you if I'm the right person.”
Writing & press
Write to us. We read everything and answer what makes sense — no forms, no funnels.