David Colon, founder and chairman

A graduate of the École Polytechnique and a civil engineer of the Génie Rural des Eaux et des Forêts, David spent the first part of his career in operations, managing water and wastewater services, industrial cleaning and public transport. As chief executive of subsidiaries of service groups classified as OIV (operators of vital importance), he led the economic turnaround of companies in very demanding social and commercial environments.

He then served as employment director of the Veolia group, before becoming its director of institutional relations for Water activities in France, bringing together technical expertise, CSR and the management of alerts and crises.

He structured and founded the water sector confederation ("La filière française de l'Eau") and held its first chairmanship, securing its recognition by the State as a strategic sector in 2018 and its entry into the Conseil National de l'Industrie (France's National Industry Council).

As permanent delegate of this strategic committee at the CNI, he coordinated the sector's priorities with State departments and with his counterparts in the other strategic sectors (aerospace, nuclear, mining and metallurgy, chemicals, health, food processing, and others).

A former auditor at the IHEDN, on the 65th national session "Defence policy" and the 49th session "Economic and strategic intelligence", David Colon is a colonel in the army operational reserve and supports the strategy of deeptech and innovative nuclear companies (ACWA Robotics, Naarea, EarthAlive).

A specialist in water issues, in 2017 David Colon set out with Jean Launay a mechanism for resilience and reinvestment in France's water infrastructure, in the book "L'eau potable en France : entre factures et fractures !" (Nuvis).

In 2023, David founded Verdeo with partners convinced that impact projects need more transparency and more evidence of quality, to encourage investors to fund them.

To that end, Verdeo has published a SaaS solution named CreoBoard which equips project owners, public or private, and shares their evidence of action with funders.

Why and how did you found Verdeo?

"Over a career devoted to public services delegated to private operators, I measured the structural limits of public action when it comes to making hard choices about the vital problems facing France: reshaping the country at forced pace to face climate shocks, renovating vital infrastructure (water, energy, networks, telecoms, roads), breaking out of extreme urban concentration, regulating farming practices to protect land and water from diffuse pollution, protecting and extending protected wild spaces to conserve biodiversity, creating the conditions for agriculture to refocus its production on local needs, rebuilding local social solidarity through community associations to help the poor, the old and the sick, ...

The challenges of the water sector, which I know in depth, made me realise one thing: collectively, we are not operating at the scale of reinvestment in the critical infrastructure and services that would let our country pull through (ageing water and road networks, hospitals, prisons, schools, police stations and so on). There is no longer enough public money available to fund them. Meanwhile, industrial farming carries on polluting our water and our soils, with health consequences that are already rising.

Read the rest of the founder's manifesto

A turnaround will only come through mass citizen mobilisation. That mobilisation will have to be backed by the great groups of French excellence, those I have served such as Veolia, and I am also thinking of EDF, Vinci, Eiffage, Sodexo and others. It will have to be supported by the local fabric of mission-driven companies and small businesses committed to local resilience; by charitable associations; by the commitment of citizens.

So I looked for the common denominator that would serve all of these players. The thing that would multiply their action and let them mobilise private or alternative funding.

The answer came down to one word: TRUST; a player whose job is to build trust.

The trust that makes it possible to prove to a funder, a corporate philanthropist, a foundation or a private investor that the funded project is solid, well managed, and that it produces real effects. And that it can be invested in.

I founded Verdeo in 2023 with partners in order to build that trust, by making it easy to collect field evidence from projects. For associations that play the transparency game. For local authorities and agencies that have to select the best projects and report to their citizens. For farmers and winegrowers moving away from pesticides who need their transition funded. To set the framework for water credits, as we did for carbon, and later for biodiversity.

In practice, Verdeo aims to bring the missing building block to committed players. We put the method in place, we structure the monitoring of your actions, we involve your partners, and we support you through to the steering or the funding of your projects.

CreoBoard, the suite we publish, becomes your “trusted third party”: a single tool that connects every stakeholder in your projects, from the field through to the funder.

You act for the common good. We give you the means to prove it.”

David Colon, founder and chairman

Why and how did you found Verdeo?

Project owners or funders: do you want to optimise the management and the impact of your commitments?