Sam Smith-Eppsteiner

Partner

About Sam

Sam Smith-Eppsteiner is a partner at Innovation Endeavors. When it comes to investing, Sam gravitates toward ideas that leverage emerging technology, growing datasets and accelerating learning cycles to improve real-world infrastructure. She’s particularly interested in reversing climate change; opportunities to bring automation, computation, flexibility, and sustainability to industrial sectors; and how the intersection of biology and technology will change the food we eat, materials we use, and more.

Sam led the firm’s investments in and currently sits on the board of: Plotlogic, a company leveraging hyperspectral imaging and ML to optimize mine operations; Machina Labs, which is introducing unseen agility to the manufacturing industry by marrying industrial robotic arms with advanced modeling; and FutureProof, a next-generation insurer focused on climate-related risk.

Previously, Sam was a management consultant at Bain & Company in San Francisco, where she worked on strategy, cost assessment, and M&A for clients across tech, retail, food, and private equity. While at Bain, she led its nonprofit consulting group Inspire, Inc. in San Francisco, where she advised cleantech and education organizations in Nicaragua and Afghanistan. Sam also worked in product at an ag & food social enterprise in Rwanda and at startups in the autonomous vehicle and healthcare AI spaces.

Sam holds an MBA from the Stanford Graduate School of Business and a BA in Political Science from Stanford University, where she graduated Phi Beta Kappa.

Personal Interests

Backpacking

Hiking

Running

Yoga

Dance

Cooking

Reading

Bringing People Together

Reading and Listening

Insights

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Breakthrough advancements in understanding climate risk: our investment in First Street

Breakthrough advancements in understanding climate risk: our investment in First Street

July 25, 2024

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Building modern financial infrastructure for the changing energy sector: Our investment in ElectronX

Building modern financial infrastructure for the changing energy sector: Our investment in ElectronX

June 12, 2024

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Climate: Changing the narrative on “hard to abate” sectors

Climate: Changing the narrative on “hard to abate” sectors

July 14, 2023

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