Succession star Alexander Skarsgård delves into start-ups saving the planet in his recent podcast

It is subsequently no surprise that he’s now portrayed as the right counterpart to the conflict-ridden world of investing, where the needs of the investor often collide with the needs of the planet. Skarsgård launches How we fix the issuea brand new podcast that goals to spotlight among the most enjoyable efforts to avoid wasting the planet and provides listeners recent insights into role models within the fight against climate change.

‘A complete, deep feeling of emptiness‘

Skarsgård hosts and narrates the brand new podcast series, which was developed along with impact-focused enterprise capital fund Norrsken and launched in 2019 by Klarna co-founder Niklas Adalberth.

Adalberth founded Klarna in 2005 along with Victor Jacobsson and current CEO Sebastian Siemiatkowski, but eventually realized that his dreams of economic independence weren’t what he had imagined.

“I went to Las Vegas to celebrate, ordered champagne and chicken, a big suite with marble floors, shopped like crazy, but felt nothing. There was a complete, deep feeling of emptiness.”

This forced Adalberth to go to therapy and ask himself whether he was making the world a greater place by running Klarna, an organization that encouraged consumption and placed additional demands on the world’s resources.

He left the corporate in 2015, steadily selling his shares and missing his probability to change into a billionaire.

What followed was Norrsken, a enterprise capital fund that focuses on impact startups or corporations addressing one or two of the 17 UN goals. Sustainable Development Goals (SDG). The Norrsken fund manages $50 million in assets and backs startups tackling the whole lot from the demand for sustainable batteries for electric vehicles to burping, polluting cows.

According to Adalberth, the podcast is meant to expand the pool of “role models” for college students and graduates who’re able to help change the world.

Klarna’s co-founder believes that the abundance of national role models, including Northvolt co-founder Peter Carlsson, is certainly one of the explanations Sweden has been so successful in attracting impact funding.

To raise awareness of impact-driven corporations, Adalberth needed a well-known face to convey his message. Naturally, he turned to fellow countryman Skarsgård.

The Swedish-American actor caught Adalberth’s attention last 12 months when he lent his voice to a brief documentary concerning the financial value of nature.

The actor gave a Playful voiceover peppered with swear words to spotlight Oxford University’s research on the trade-off between GDP and environmental damage. Skarsgård played dumb, telling his audience on the time that he would water down the research “to a level that even a Hollywood actor could understand.”

Once again, Skarsgård’s role is to be the accessible voice that brings Norrsken’s stories to life.

“This movement needs to happen, it’s not just about capital. There needs to be a cultural enlightenment as well. And I think Alexander is using his platform and his ability to tell stories to do the most with this initiative,” says Adalberth.

Sweden – world leader in impact

Skarsgård and Adalberth are teaming up with one other Swedish tech giant, Spotify, to exclusively release their podcast.

Swedes have an extended history of making globally successful corporations corresponding to Spotify, Klarna and clothing retailer H&M. This entrepreneurial spirit is maybe paradoxical to Swedish culture and the “law of Jante” that usually prevents people from boasting about their successes.

Skarsgård understands why this could possibly be a drawback within the business world.

“My observation as a Swedish American, and I’m generalizing here of course, is that Americans have a real talent for storytelling and big ideas. Swedes tend to be more drawn to modesty and restraint that borders on self-deprecation,” said Skarsgård Assets.

But Adalberth and Daniel Goldberg, CCO of Norrsken, imagine that modesty about personal success often is the reason why Sweden is up to now ahead of its competitors in impact investing.

Sweden consumes a big portion of sustainable investment and, in keeping with Adalberth, has eight times as many impact startups because the world average. Where the country may lack self-promotion, it could gain in social conscience.

“How we define success and what that means for the general standards and systems is something I think is being discussed more, perhaps in Europe and especially in Sweden. I think that’s where we’re seeing the next generation of startups, perhaps more than in the US.”

“Whether it’s humility or not, the key is probably having conviction and great confidence in yourself and what you want to sell,” says Skarsgård.

Stranger than fiction

Skarsgård has taken on many roles in his time on screen, most of them along with his physicality, corresponding to Tarzan and the Viking prince Amleth in The Northman or as a violent husband in Big little lies.

But it’s Lukas Matsson, the antagonistic GoJo CEO from HBO’s Emmy-winning series Successionfor which he will probably be best remembered. It is difficult for any Succession Fan who doesn’t get caught up within the parallels as Skarsgård ventures into the enterprise capital space.

Despite playing Matsson for 2 years, Skarsgård still doesn’t know what drives the character, who seemingly knew no bounds when he attempted a hostile takeover of the media group Waystar Royco.

He sees Matsson as an adrenaline junkie motivated by challenges, slightly than someone driven solely by greed. When asked if he compares Matsson to the “impact-driven” founders in his podcast series, Skarsgård gave a nuanced answer.

“The world would probably be a greater place with fewer people like Lukas Matsson and more people just like the founders of How we fix the issue,” he says.

“But on the other hand, you tell a man like Lukas Matsson that he cannot possibly restore all the coral reefs in our oceans.”