James Hastwell is Co-Founder and CTO of CarbonFarm, a Paris-based climate tech startup using AI and satellite imagery to decarbonise rice farming and unlock carbon finance for farmers worldwide.

James graduated as Dux of his engineering faculty at the University of Western Australia and holds a Masters in Applied Mathematics from Ecole Polytechnique, before building his career in data science and AdTech.

Prior to CarbonFarm, James served as Head of Data Science at Solocal, leading a team of 15 engineers, and was a Founder in Residence at Entrepreneur First, honing his entrepreneurial edge.

James co-founded CarbonFarm in 2021 alongside CEO Vassily Carantino, and has championed the company through a Seed round and an oversubscribed $7.8M Series A led by Colam Impact, with backing from Proparco, Bpifrance, and Serena.

Under James's technical leadership, CarbonFarm has expanded to 19 countries, partnering with organisations including Mars Food, Diageo, the World Bank, and Google to advance high-integrity rice decarbonisation at scale.