About NovoHydrogen
We are led by the conviction that zero-carbon hydrogen is a key piece of the decarbonization puzzle.
Experience
We have the right networks, expertise, and project experience.
Leadership
We are early movers in the renewable hydrogen space.
Matt McMonagle, CEO & Founder
Matt brings a successful, diverse, and entrepreneurial background to NovoHydrogen with nearly a decade of experience in renewable energy. He founded NovoHydrogen to decarbonize industry, transportation, and power. Prior to founding NovoHydrogen, Matt was the first non-founder employee at Dimension Renewable Energy. He served as a Vice-President responsible for all aspects of the firm’s energy storage projects as well as supporting policy, origination, real estate, and corporate fundraising. These efforts contributed to a significant infusion of capital in spring 2021 from the Partners Group. Before Dimension, Matt was an integral part of the ForeFront Power leadership team, where his accomplishments included: driving energy storage strategy across the US, international expansion into Mexico and structuring tax equity for solar and energy storage assets. Prior to ForeFront Power, he was Chief of Staff for the Commercial & Industrial business unit of SunEdison reporting directly to the CEO of the group. Matt has dedicated his career to sustainable endeavors. He is passionate about deploying complex and innovative technologies that will decarbonize our society.
Matt completed a Master of Science in Sustainable Engineering from Villanova University in 2013. He holds a bachelor's degree in Physics from Cornell University, where he graduated cum laude while also excelling as a Division-1 athlete.
Manka Khanna, Chief Commercial Officer
Manka is the Chief Commercial Officer at NovoHydrogen, prior to which she worked for Shell for over a decade. She brings rich experience across strategy and competitive intelligence, business development and project development. As a business developer, she identified regional growth targets for Shell’s upstream business, and as a Strategic Relationship Manager, she was accountable for supporting Shell’s relationship with its high value partners and advising internal leadership on partner value proposition. She has led and actively contributed across a wide range of business and functional projects, including partner deep dives, new country entries, high capital project development and energy transition. She is passionate about sustainability, the scope for decarbonization, and the increasing role of renewable energy in our society.
Manka has an MBA in Sustainability from the Yale School of Management. She also holds a Bachelors of Technology in Petroleum Engineering from the University of Petroleum and Energy Studies, India
Lexi Zimmerman, Senior Director of Origination
Lexi Zimmerman is a passionate change agent who is most interested in how technology can enable companies to achieve ambitious sustainability goals. At NovoHydrogen her focus is on origination and developing target markets within industry, transportation, and power. She is solution oriented and seeks to collaboratively build long-term decarbonization plans based on the client’s sustainability priorities, budget, timeline, and manufacturing locations. Prior to assuming her current role at NovoHydrogen, Lexi served as a Business Development and Innovation Manager at UL. Her focus was on collaboratively discovering and prioritizing unmet industry needs within sustainability and launching novel solutions to meet those needs. UL is a global leader in applied safety science and is at the forefront of developing best practices in certification, testing, and inspection for the safe production, storage, distribution and use of hydrogen (e.g UL 2264A).
Lexi completed her Masters in Sustainability Leadership from the University of Cambridge in 2018. She also holds a bachelor's degree in Environmental Studies from the University of Michigan.
Kate Hopkins, Chief Development Officer
Kate brings over a decade of on-the-ground wind and solar energy development experience to NovoHydrogen, including 2+ GW of utility-scale projects developed and over 700 MW built. She serves as NovoHydrogen’s Chief Development Officer having worked throughout the United States in a variety of electricity markets across diverse communities. Kate is passionate about the convergence of community needs and decarbonizing the economy, ensuring broad stakeholder involvement in the projects she develops. At Tradewind Energy she was responsible for all aspects of project development including landowner outreach and site acquisition, permitting strategy, community engagement, coordination with engineering, energy resource, and transmission subject matter experts, and all critical path items to ensure project construction readiness. In addition to project development, Kate has experience in project M&A including due diligence and the de-risking of projects, optimizing performance, and structuring partnerships. Kate received a Master’s in Business Administration from the University of Missouri, Kansas City (UMKC) before joining the Business Development team at FlexGen, an industry-leading battery energy storage integrator and software provider. At FlexGen, she was responsible for the full sales cycle from market identification to customer origination and acquisition, including contract negotiation and handover to the execution team. She received recognition for executing over 1 GWh of battery equipment contracts including the company’s largest single order.
In addition to the MBA from UMKC received in 2018, Kate holds a Bachelor of Arts in Political Science from the University of California, San Diego where she graduated cum laude in 2008.
Board
Bruno Franco
- Partner at Pacífico Energia, a brazilian capital firm with activities in energy trading and investment funds
Managing Partner at PWR Capital, a private investment firm with assets in Brazil and US. - Former CFO of Latin America Power, a renewable portfolio company with operations in Chile and Peru.
- Former Associate Partner at BTG Pactual, managing several infrastructure funds in the Latam region.
Peyton Boswell
- Managing Partner at Woodfield Renewable Partners, a clean energy investment company focused on the acquisition, ownership and operations of distributed generation solar & storage assets.
- Managing Director at MaxSolar, an independent national provider of Operations & Maintenance (O&M), Technical and Asset Management Services for distributed energy assets.
- Former CEO and Co-Founder of EnterSolar, a leading provider of solar solutions to the C&I marketplace. Founded in 2010, EnterSolar was acquired by EDF Renewables in 2021 and rebranded as PowerFlex.
Joseph Malchow
Joseph Malchow is a partner at Hanover, a Silicon Valley venture capital investment fund that focuses on funding, building, and growing technology companies from the earliest stages. He focuses on emergent software, computing infrastructure, and energy technologies. Joe serves on the Board of Directors of Enphase (NASDAQ: ENPH), a global energy technology company pioneering microgrid, solar, and storage technology. Joe served on the board of Archaea (NYSE: LFG), the nation’s largest producer of renewable natural gas, until its acquisition by BP, p.l.c. in 2023. In 2021, he helped bring breakthrough pure-silicon Li-Ion battery company Enovix (NASDAQ: ENVX) to the public markets. Additional representative investments include Solugen, Sourcegraph, HopIn, Flatfile, Retool, RelateIQ, Carta, Material Security, and Mattermost. Joe holds a J.D. from Stanford University and an A.B. from Dartmouth College. He lives with his family in Portola Valley, California.
Arielle Ring
Arielle Ring is currently Chief Financial Officer and Treasurer of Ohmium, a green hydrogen company designing PEM electrolyzers. Arielle was previously Senior Vice President, Head of Capital Markets and Strategic Finance at BBAM, an alternative asset manager with $20 billion of AUM. Prior to joining BBAM in 2008, she worked at Citi Investment Banking in the Global Industrials Group. Arielle has raised $4.3 billion of public and private equity, structured and closed $10+ billion of debt, managed and sold a public company, and completed $11+ billion of M&A transactions. She also serves as a senior advisor to several funds and core infrastructure start-ups. She has 16 years of experience in the industrials sector.
Arielle graduated magna cum laude from Dartmouth College with an A.B. in Government. She lives with her husband and daughter, Suri, in San Francisco.
Values
We value being humble, diligent, and open to solving complex problems.
Our Promise
We prioritize transparency, straightforward communications, and sticking to the facts.
