Expansion nears close on cleantech fund

Expansion Capital Partners, a late-stage venture firm, is closing in on its $80 million target for Clean Technology Fund II, a vehicle it started raising in January 2005. The firm has raised $76.5 million for the fund after more than two years in the market.

Expansion is not the only cleantech firm moving slowly on its fund-draising. Ira Ehrenpreis told PE Week last year that Technology Partners, which allocates half of its capital to cleantech startups, would start raising a $250 million eighth fund, but the firm has not filed any regulatory documents about fund-raising. Ehrenpreis was not immediately available for comment last week.

Noventi, a Menlo Park, Calif.-based cleantech firm, held a second close on its second fund in March and expects to hold a final close by the end of the summer. Noventi Managing Director James Horn declined to comment on the size of the second close. He says that fund-raising has been slow, “because a lot of cleantech firms out there are looking for money.”