Sustainable Systems, Inc 300 Frank H. Ogawa Plaza Suite 210 Oakland, CA 94612 Phone: 510.836.8985 Fax: 510.836.8987

Sustainable Systems, Inc was founded in 1993 as a for-profit corporation addressing business development, economic development, sustainable development, and social entrepreneurship. Sustainable Systems offers market-based strategies for the achievement of a prosperous Economy, a quality Environment, and social Equity (the "three Es of sustainable development). Headquartered in the historic Rotunda Building in downtown Oakland, California, Sustainable Systems undertakes projects locally, regionally, nationally, and internationally – often in the form of collaborative private, public, and community partnerships. Business Development In the area of business development, Sustainable Systems is best known as the co-developer and manager of the Communications Technology Cluster (CTC) – a business center/incubator. CTC is an acceleration center housing businesses that offer: Technology solutions. Management and business development assistance. Access to capital. Social entrepreneurship. Founded in 1996, CTC is a public-private partnership between Sustainable Systems, Inc., the Oakland Business Development Corporation, a nonprofit community development finance institution, and the City of Oakland. CTC has graduated 25 companies that have raised more than $250 million in venture and angel investment and created more than 700 jobs within the City of Oakland. Inc. Magazine has ranked Tucker Technologies, a CTC graduate company, in the top ten for the last four years, in the Inner-city 100 list of the fastest growing companies with urban core locations. Other graduates from the Communication Technology Cluster include Digital Fountain, Q-Space (acquired by iPlace), TurboLinux, Volterra, Vitalz, Xpede (acquired by Alltel), and Zimba (acquired by Informatica). CTC hosts the annual ComTech Summit, which, in 2002, attracted 500 entrepreneurs and angel and venture investors, with more than $1 billion in investment capital represented. Additional Sustainable Systems business development projects include: Coordinating organization of the American Venture Resource Association, a non-profit association providing business acceleration services to entrepreneurs, small businesses, and investors, including, in association with AVRA Financial, insurance to reduce the downside risk of venture investments and securitization exit strategies as an alternative to IPOs. Serving as a technical advisor to a USAID funded information technology business incubator development project in the West Bank and Gaza Strip. Consulting with the East Bay Conversion and Reinvestment Commission to produce a feasibility study and recommendation for the recently established Economic Conversion Investment Fund. Economic Development In relation to economic development, Sustainable Systems is most widely recognized for its role in the Community Capital investment Initiative (CCII) and the Bay Area Family of Funds. Sustainable Systems is under contract to the Bay Area Council – the regional, business-sponsored, CEO-led public policy organization – serving as Initiative Building Consultant for CCII and the Family of Funds. CCII is mobilizing Bay Area business leadership, in partnership with community, environmental, and government leaders, to facilitate investment in Bay Area neighborhoods with persistently high levels of poverty. The Bay Area Family of Funds includes three funds: the Community Equity Fund to make equity investments in businesses; the Smart Growth Fund to invest in mixed use, mixed income, transit oriented real estate developments; and the California Environmental Redevelopment Fund (CERF) to invest in the restoration of environmentally problematic brownfield sites. To date, the three funds in the Family of Funds have raised more than $160 million in private equity capital. Sustainable Systems produced The Double Bottom Line: An Exploration of the Strategy for the Bay Area Council. This paper assesses the national evidence that a double bottom line strategy – market rate financial returns combined with substantial social and environmental returns – can effectively reduce poverty, build community wealth, and encourage smart growth. Sustainable Development Sustainable Systems has recently established a Sustainable Development Division in association with Indigo Development. Indigo applies industrial ecology principles to the design and development of ecologically sound industrial parks and community economic developments. Sustainable development projects include: Co-coordinating three “Building the Sustainable Economy” international conferences, two in New York City (1995 and 1996) and one in Havana, Cuba (1998). These conferences convened leaders of the sustainable development movement from around the world to discuss ways to guide the emergence of a sustainable economy regionally and internationally. Managing an Economic Development Administration funded contract (in association with Indigo Development) with the Mid Ohio Valley Regional Council to conduct an evaluation of the development concept for a proposed 53-acre eco-industrial park anchored by a biomass conversion plant. Participating in design and development of an eco-industrial park (in association with Indigo Development) in the Dalian Development Zone in Dalian, China as an aspect of the Liaoning Province's Recycling Economy Plan. The eco-industrial park will house companies supporting resource efficiency and resource recovery. Social Entrepreneurship Sustainable Systems has made a strong commitment to social entrepreneurship and, in special circumstances, constitutes the entrepreneurial team to launch businesses that combine a powerful business model with significant social and environmental benefits. Sustainable Systems social entrepreneurship ventures include: Aquillian Investment Technologies – licensing the Aquillian Eagle Eye® social screening system to on-line broker/dealers who want to offer their clients the opportunity to evaluate investments in relation to corporate responsibility and corporate governance. ThinkingAdvantage – designing and distributing proprietary products, procedures, and services that enhance brain function and mental performance. Capabilities Sustainable Systems and its associates and strategic allies have the capability to design and develop: Business acceleration centers and incubators. Regional initiatives, including financing infrastructures, for regional sustainable development and social ventures. Hard and soft infrastructure creation to support sustainable economic development as a basis for regional strategic advantage. Eco-industrial development, including eco-industrial park planning and implementation. Sustainable master planning and design of built infrastructure. Mass and energy integration to optimize resource utilization in energy-intensive, process-based industries – refining, petrochemical, pulp and paper, food processing – and in institutions such as universities and hospitals. (Through a strategic alliance with LightRidge Resources) Sustainable Systems integrates the capabilities to plan and implement initiatives in a full regional context, producing strategic advantage through improved financial, social, and environmental performance for clients, related companies and organizations, and the regional economy as a whole. Sustainable Systems Principals Joseph J. Gross: Joseph Gross is President and CEO of Sustainable Systems, Inc and Co-Founder and President of Communications Technology Cluster, LLC. Mr. Gross is also President of the Board of Directors of the American Venture Resource Association, a newly formed national, non-profit 501 (c) 6 membership association established with the mission of promoting innovation, supporting entrepreneurship, encouraging successful investment transactions, and furthering economic development. Mr. Gross serves as co-leader of Sustainable Systems entrepreneurial team developing socially responsible businesses and enterprises including Aquillian Investment Technologies and Thinking Advantage. Prior to Sustainable Systems, Mr. Gross was Co-Founder and Principal of the Double Bottom Line Team, a socially responsible business consultation group, General Manager of the Berkeley Distribution Cooperative, a regional trucking firm serving the natural foods market, and Board President, Berkeley Unified School District. In addition to serving as President of the American Venture Resource Association, Mr. Gross is Board member and Co-Chair of Investment Screening Committee, Alliance for Community Development – co sponsor of the Bay Area Community Equity Fund, Board member of the Oakland Workforce Investment Board, Aquillian Investment Technologies, Natural Logic, and the California Foundation for the Economy and the Environment. He is a member of the Advisory Board of Oakland Advisors, and EastBayTech.net, as well as serving as a member of the Economic Development Alliance for Business and the City of Oakland Socially Responsible Business Task Force. jgross@ctcluster.com James Hurd Nixon: James Nixon is Chair of the Board of Sustainable Systems, Inc. He also serves as Chair and CEO of Aquillian Investment Technologies, a start-up on-line investment brokerage focused on socially responsible investment, and Chair and CEO of ThinkingAdvantage, a company that designs and distributes products and procedures that enhance brain function and mental performance under stress. He is Vice President of the Board of Directors of the American Venture Resource Association. Prior to assuming these roles, Mr. Nixon served as Senior Vice President for Social Research and Network Services with Progressive Asset Management, Inc. – the first full service socially responsible investment brokerage – coordinating social screening, services to registered representatives, shareholder advocacy, and community investments. Mr. Nixon is author of Community Investing: An Exploration of the Strategy, included as a chapter in The SRI Advantage: Why Socially Responsible Investing Has Outperformed Financially. Mr. Nixon drafted Building the Sustainable Economy: An Opportunity for Oakland, a policy framework unanimously adopted by the Oakland City Council. He chaired Oakland’s Sustainable Community Development Working Group, which produced Oakland’s Sustainable Community Development Initiative, also adopted unanimously by the City Council. He currently serves on the City of Oakland's Socially Responsible Business Task Force. Mr. Nixon is Vice President of the Alliance for Community Development, community sponsor for the Bay Area Community Equity Fund, a member of the Advisory Board of Oakland Advisors, the Oakland affiliate of the Initiative for a Competitive Inner City, and co-founder of Café de la Paz, a restaurant and community center in Berkeley, California. jnixon@ctcluster.com Ernest A. Lowe: Ernest Lowe is Director of Indigo Development (now a center in the Sustainable Development Division of Sustainable Systems Inc.) Mr. Lowe has played a key role in partnering with the Dalian University of Technology in a number of Chinese eco-industrial projects, including working with the Dalian Development Zone in an eco-planning process for a 430-km2 economic and technological development zone in Northeast China. He has consulted on eco-industrial park and broader eco-industrial development projects in South Africa, the Philippines, Thailand, Sri Lanka, and Vietnam as well as the US. Mr. Lowe has also served as: Chief Scientist of the Center for Eco-Planning and Development at Dalian University of Technology. Industrial Ecologist working on an Asian Development Bank cleaner production project in Sri Lanka. Planning Associate for an eco-industrial park development in Northern California for the Economic Development Alliance for Business Strategic Planner with Sandia National Laboratory and Science Applications International Corporation on developing their industrial ecology research agendas and consulting practices. Publications include: Eco-Industrial Handbook for Asian Developing Countries (2001). Prepared for the Environment Department, Asian Development Bank. Industrial Ecosystems: Methods for Creating By-product Exchanges Among Companies (1999). A manual developed for the Philippine Board of Investments to support creation of an exchange among five industrial estates in Laguna Province. Fieldbook for the Development of Eco-Industrial Parks (1995), prepared for U.S. EPA under a cooperative agreement with Research Triangle Institute. The Source of Value: an Executive Briefing and Sourcebook on Industrial Ecology (1997). Prepared for U.S. EPA Futures Group under a cooperative agreement with Pacific Northwest Laboratory. ernielowe@indigodev.com