SF-based Green Start's demo day focuses on IT

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Mitch Lowe, founder of the Green Start accelerator, says cleantech is shifting to companies that work over the Internet or in information technology.

Mitch Lowe, founder of the Greenstart accelerator in San Francisco, is at the heart of a shift in the kind of companies getting funding to tackle problems like energy use and recycling.

Those areas were once the province of companies developing biofuels or new solar fuels. Now, the companies getting money in the space are as likely to involve software and the Internet as not. And those kinds of companies are just the sort presenting to a crowd of about 250 investors at Greenstart's demo day in its San Francisco offices this week.

That change, Lowe predicts, will pay off in the end. "The investors that stay with it are going to do really well," he said.

And, like anyone who runs and incubator and accelerator, he's pretty high on the companies strutting their stuff today. To check out the four companies at Greenstart's demo day, click here to see a photo gallery.