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BOP Conferences: Engaging Private Sector “the only option”
The BOP Conferences in Brazil and Mexico were a tremendous success. Brazil attracted over 550 attendees; Mexico over 300. WRI?s New Ventures project and our in-country partners (Fundacao Getulio Vargas and Fondo Mexicano para La Conservacion de la Naturaleza), with support from Ashoka and...
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BOP Database Launched
The Nextbillion.net Team is pleased to announce the launch of our new BOP Activity Database. The Database tracks innovative enterprises that offer products and services to underserved communities in developing countries, and is searchable either by keyword or through a variety of pre-defined...
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Creating Jobs at the BOP
This morning I read an article in the New York Times about a company that is providing English tutoring services to teenagers in California. What’s interesting is that the teachers all live in India, and communicate with their students using the Internet. Growing Stars pays its teachers a...
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Mobile telephony and pro-poor growth
Ethan Zuckerman of the WorldChanging blog writes eloquentlyabout the importance of mobile phones in low-income communities. He identifies three factors critical to thespread of mobile telephony: new versus replacement infrastructure,pay-as-you-go pricing, and used phones.Zuckerman...
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Live from the BOP workshops in Mexico and Brazil
Some 250 people packed a hotel conference center here in Mexico City to hear Professors Stu Hart and CK Prahalad and a host of Mexican government officials, corporate executives, and social entrepreneurs talk about the business and social opportunities represented by the base of the pyramid....
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New report highlights private sector role in Millennium Development Goals
WBCSD member companies have a combined annual turnover of more than 5 trillion USD, and their products and services touch the lives of about 2.5 billion people every day. Imagine the possibilities if even a portion of this business energy is harnessed to transform the lives of the world’s...
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African Microfinance Fails to Profit
An April 2005 report on the financial performance of Africanmicrofinance institutions (MFIs) finds that more than half of those surveyedfail to turn a profit. Conventionalwisdom (and much of the writing on this site) tends to say otherwise ? that microfinanceis profitable. Maybe...
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Kurt Hoffman Interview: Summing up the Shell Foundation Experience
This post is Part 5 of a 5 part series.A.H.: How does the Shell Company view your activities? How do they see them in a strategic sense?K.H.: What matters most inside a big company is performance. In the early stages, we got help, but no real interest. It was hard to get the business...
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