Vice President at Breakthrough Energy Discovery
Ashley has spent the entirety of her nearly two-decade career working at the intersection of finance and climate innovation. Prior to joining Breakthrough Energy as a Vice President to lead the Breakthrough Energy Discovery program, she spent 15 years at Wells Fargo as a thought leader working across several business units, supporting overall ESG, Cleantech Commercial Banking, and Sustainable Finance strategies. At Wells she pioneered a $100 million impact fund called the Innovation Incubator (IN2), focused on speeding up the path to market for early-stage clean technologies. IN2 program’s 74 portfolio companies have gone on to raise $2.6B in follow on funding from external sources.
Today, Ashley leads Breakthrough Energy Discovery, an early-stage global platform advancing climate technology innovation and research. Discovery focuses on pre-venture innovation—filling critical scientific gaps where new solutions can deliver outsized impact across five grand challenge areas: Agriculture, Manufacturing, Buildings, Electricity, and Transportation.
Through its three core programs—Fellows, Workshops, and Ecosystems—Discovery provides funding, tailored technical and company building support, and connections across a global network to help innovators turn bold ideas into scalable solutions. Since its launch in 2021, the program has supported 180 Fellows across 80 companies in 19 countries, catalyzing more than $475M in follow-on capital and creating over 550 jobs.
In this role, Ashley continues to build deep connections across the clean tech ecosystem—working with investors, entrepreneurs, universities, incubators, and national labs to drive transformative innovation.
Grosh earned a B.A. degree in Economics and a Business minor from the University of Colorado at Boulder, as a student athlete on the CU NCAA Division One women’s soccer team. She holds a Certified Financial Planning certificate from DePaul University and a Renewable Energy Certificate from Leeds School of Business at CU Boulder.
In 2017, Grosh was recognized as a ’40 Under 40’ winner in Colorado and also recognized that year as a ‘Top Women in Energy’ in the Denver Business Journal.
Ashley and her family reside in Chicago, Illinois. Outside of work, she enjoys playing racquet sports, cooking, and cheering on her children at their sporting events.