NextBillion - An Initiative of the William Davidson Institute at the University of Michigan

Wednesday, September 17, 2014

September 15, 2014, will be remembered for the release of a seminal report on impact investing, care of an international taskforce backed by eight country advisory boards and four topical working groups. The taskforce was led by Sir Ronald Cohen, a venture capital pioneer in the UK, and engaged over 200 prominent global experts on impact investing.

Think of it as the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, but for impact investing – i.e., a very big deal.

The report calls for nothing less than a new 21st century capitalism, adding “impact” as the third, core element of investment, alongside risk and return. It makes critical findings about private and public sector actions required to accelerate impact investing and will stand as a definitive, visionary document charting a course to the next, 2.0 era in the field’s development.