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ONergy’s Mission to Light 1 Million Lives by 2016
Before ONergy’s founders launched the renewable energy venture, they cycled over a 1,000 miles across India - travelling through the coal belt and meeting with communities directly impacted by mining. Partnered with Barefoot Power, ONergy is working with shop keepers and has developed several energy centers to build a rural solar customer base.
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Show Me Your Pricing Data: Transparency Helps Philippines Lead Global Microfinance
"The Philippines receives a perfect score...for the way it regulates the microcredit activities of established financial institutions." -- Economist Intelligence Unit,"Global Microscope on the Microfinance Business Environment" [1] The microfinance industry has taken a beating lately. In March, Nobel Prize winner Muhammad Yunnus was ousted from his position as managing director of the microcredit lender Grameen Bank in Bangladesh, which he founded in 1983, by the ...
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Man on Wire: A Social Entrepreneur?s Delicate Balancing Act
Question: What do a 24-year old French performance artist and a 35-year old Indian electrical engineer have in common? Answer: Each has mastered a delicate balancing act, integral to his survival. Social entrepreneurs must purposefully navigate the path to scale keeping in mind three directions: mission, margin and mandate.
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Friday Roundup ? 9/2/11: SOCAP11 and Getting the Poor on the Grid
It’s the calm before the (exciting) storm that is SOCAP11, which begins Tuesday. This week we’ve been highlighting just a few of the many professionals and issues sure to highlight World Cup of Impact Investing. Plus, India’s massive biometric program to bring millions into the formal economy. Should the poor be forced onto the grid?
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Innovative Financing
Besides looking for the most commercially viable, innovative enterprises to invest in, Geneva-based Bamboo Finance also looks for another trait - investment targets that bring a direct, positive benefit to low-income communities by providing access to health care, sanitation, clean water, housing and the like. Having a socially positive impact while making a profit can be a huge challenge for a private equity (PE) firm like Bamboo. But it looks like it has scored an early success throug...
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ViewChange Video of the Week: From Kenya, the Commercial, Ecological Life of a Flip Flop
As Americans get ready for the Labor Day holiday, many are preparing to don their flip-flops for the last time before tossing them in the trash. In Kenya, much-loved "pata-patas" are repaired, reused, and recycled-but never wasted. The film follows the long life cycle of this colorful footwear, a story full of resourcefulness and enterprise.
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Social,Inclusive Businesses in Brazil, A Progress Report
What is the state of the social/inclusive business field in Brazil? A recent mapping by Plano CDE, and coordinated by AVINA Potencia Ventures and The ANDE Brasil Chapter identified 140 social/inclusive businesses throughout the country and surprising data about the characteristics, progress, and challenges that these businesses still face.
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SOCAP11 Preview: Legal Catch-Up With Social Innovation
Law is typically condemned to play catch-up with social innovation. Ask Jenny Kassan, the managing director of Katovich Law Group and founder of the Sustainable Economies Law Center, a non-profit organization that helps social entrepreneurs and mission-oriented community groups wade through laws that were not originally designed with them in mind.
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