Written by Republished from Longrun Capital News
June 1st, 2025
IEven with rising interest rates and falling demand in the real estate sector, Johan Ljungberg is ramping up climate investments.
Johan Ljungberg’s family-owned venture capital firm, Longrun Capital, is now making its first foreign investment in the Norwegian company Hybridized, which develops environmentally friendly glass production for the construction industry.
“For us it’s important to be at the forefront of the green transition. We do that not just as a customer in our real estate and property operations, but also by financing companies with significant climate benefit,” says the real estate billionaire to Dagens Industri.
The environmental push comes at a time when the real estate industry is struggling with rising financing costs and weakening demand.
Several of Ljungberg’s other publicly listed real estate companies have recently taken cost-cutting measures, but environmental investments are continuing as planned.Headline within text
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The glass industry is highlighted as a sector with a significant climate footprint.
“Glass panels are one of the building elements with the greatest carbon emissions, and the glass industry is difficult to adapt to carbon constraints,” says Longrun Capital co-founder and partner Johan Frenckner to DI.
Hybridized, in which Longrun is now the largest investor in a SEK 45 million funding round, has developed a solution that both reduces material usage and enables reuse of glass.
The technology also improves insulation values, which reduces the climate impact over the full life cycle of a building.
The investment is part of Longrun Capital’s overall strategy to accelerate the transformation in the construction industry.
Since its founding in 2021, the fund has invested in a number of green innovation companies like Greeniron, Ekolution and most recently Hybridized.
In total Longrun has invested SEK 80 million in green companies, but manages SEK 300 million in total. According to Frenckner, all capital will gradually be steered toward climate-investments.
Ljungberg has for a long time kept a low public profile—despite having extensive influence in the real estate industry.
But now he’s begun appearing more publicly to push the climate issue.
Reading: “When you say that 30 percent of the world’s CO₂ emissions are linked to buildings or real estate, it’s not an exaggeration,” Ljungberg said to Dagens Industri last summer.
As chairman of Atrium Ljungberg, and part-owner in several other publicly listed real estate companies, Ljungberg controls operations with a combined market value of over SEK 32 billion.
In the funding round for Hybridized, other participants include Nordan, one of Europe’s leading manufacturers of window and door frames, and the automation company Cody.
This shows that interest in green building materials innovations is growing despite the current market climate.
Despite the economic uncertainty in the real estate sector, Johan Ljungberg describes his vision as both long-term and necessary for the industry’s future.
“Swedish property owners are already good at energy optimizing. But one could take steps, bold steps. I believe that is everyone’s task to do.”
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