NextBillion - A WDI Publication

Financial innovation and the Poor: A Place in Society

Many nodded when Lord Turner, the City of London’s chief regulator, said recently that the financial industry had grown "beyond its socially useful size". The idea that devices such as collateralised debt obligations and credit-default swaps have been a blessing, not least by allowing the less well-off to buy houses, is in tatters: lots of those new homeowners have lost their houses as well as their jobs. It is remarkable, then, that the crisis should have given fresh impetus to "social f...

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The Economist (link opens in a new window)

Making Profits for a Purpose

CAMBRIDGE - Backed by a $50 million gift from a self-made billionaire, a young MIT center is betting Third World development will come not from governments but from profit-driven entrepreneurs who use technology to create jobs. The center’s founder and director, Iqbal Z. Quadir, has set a powerful example for his students to follow. He built Grameenphone in his native Bangladesh from a cellphone start-up in the 1990s into a business serving more than 20 million subscribers. The comp...

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Boston Globe (link opens in a new window)

SKS at the Crossroads

By Shloka Nath On a rainy afternoon at a five-star hotel in suburban Mumbai, Vikram Akula is making a fervent pitch to a group of potential investors in the enterprise he founded, SKS Microfinance (SKS). Akula and SKS chief executive Suresh Gurumani take turns at the mike to impress on the rainmakers the advantages of investing in SKS, well on its way to becoming the world’s biggest microlender. While their purpose is the same, the two men present a study in contrast. Akula,...

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Forbes India (link opens in a new window)

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South Asia

IDE India Featured on PBS

NewsHour correspondent Fred de Sam Lazaro reports on how India is trying to feed its growing population while maintaining the environment. Watch the full video: ...

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PBS NewsHour with Jim Lehrer (link opens in a new window)

Region

South Asia

Innovation at the Bottom of the Pyramid

According to C. K. Prahalad, a professor of corporate strategy at the Ross School of Business of the University of Michigan, corporations seeking to create new markets addressing the needs of the billions of poor people living at the bottom of the economic pyramid can — and should — use that effort to drive sustainability and innovation within their own ranks. The primary lesson, said Mr. Prahalad in a recent telephone interview with Green Inc., is learning to “do...

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New York Times (link opens in a new window)

We Must See India As One – Prahalad

When Coimbatore Krishnarao Prahalad and his colleague Stuart Hart wrote an article on the bottom of the pyramid (BOP) in 1998, no management journal accepted it. Unconvincing, they said. In 2002, Strategy+Business agreed to publish it and that one idea changed the way multinationals thought. Suddenly, everyone was looking at poor people across the world as a lucrative market. Prahalad followed his idea up with the bestselling title The Fortune at the Bottom of the Pyramid. The fift...

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Forbes India (link opens in a new window)

Region

South Asia

A Paradigm Shift in Ayurveda

Imagine this: You are a budding and ambitious entrepreneur in your mid 30s and you are interested in healthcare or say Ayurveda, to be more precise. The best part is you are also sanctioned an appreciable fund to set-up a chain of Ayurveda centres across India. Sitting in your boardroom, you are thinking about the locations for your new centres. Which places are you likely to choose, keeping in mind that you have sufficient funds? Maybe a place where there are high-income gro...

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Express Healthcare Management (link opens in a new window)

Region

South Asia

Legatum Center Hosts 2nd Annual Conference

MIT Legatum Conference on Oct 2 The Legatum Center at MIT is holding its second annual conference on October 2nd, 2009 in Cambridge, MA. The Center’s annual conference provides a forum for discussion of issues relating to entrepreneurship and international development. In 2008, the conference featured an unprecedented gathering of 5 Nobel Laureates in Economics ,...

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Press Release (link opens in a new window)