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Shape Up and Scale Up: The Value of Mentors for Guiding Impact Entrepreneurs (Part 2)
We interviewed several business accelerators – Unreasonable Institute, TechnoServe, New Ventures Mexico and New Ventures India to learn more about the structure of their programs and key lessons learned in providing mentor services. For part two, we spoke directly with mentors and entrepreneurs who have been involved in these programs to learn why they do it and what makes mentor programs successful.
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Rwanda: Tigo Unveils New Package for Social Entrepreneurs
Tigo and "Reach for Change", an international NGO, have launched a new campaign with an aim of supporting social entrepreneurs to enhance the lives of Rwandan youth.
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- Region
- Sub-Saharan Africa
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Going Beyond Remittances: Why SMEs Should be a Key Market Segment for Mobile Money Operators
Many expect that SMEs could benefit substantially from mobile money as a tool to manage payments and working capital, given that it offers an electronic cash substitute for sending payments and storing working capital along with rudimentary record keeping. However, while mobile money use by SMEs is widespread, it is not yet deep.
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In Just a Few Months, Sistema B (AKA: B Corp) Finds Fertile Ground for Social Enterprises in Latin America
The global community of B Corporations first started in the United States and beginning this year it has expanded throughout South America starting with Argentina, Brazil, Chile and Colombia through Sistema B (as B Corp is known in Latin America). In just a few months there are already 16 certified B Corporations (Empresas B in Spanish)
in the region and more than 90 businesses committed to being part of this new paradigm.- Categories
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Financing Business Skills Development for Impact Enterprises: Who Pays?
One of the main barriers preventing small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) from getting to scale in emerging economies is a lack of core business skills. To meet this need, a plethora of stand-alone business incubators and accelerators have emerged over recent years. All play a critical role in preparing companies for the market, but who ends up footing the bill?
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NexThought Monday: Are Managers Ready to Lose Control?: The bottom-up development perspective in base-of-the-pyramid ventures
Does inclusive business mean that the poor are only included in “our” businesses? Or should it also mean that they have their own flourishing enterprises and we become integrated in their activities? What if the poor want to play a bigger role than being just instruments included in a process that was defined by outsiders?
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Future Group to pitch Mother Earth chain against retailer Fab India
MUMBAI: Future Group, the country's largest retailer, will pitch its Mother Earth chain directly against ethnic products retailer Fabindia by expanding rapidly and borrowing its rival's social enterprise-style business model.
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- Region
- South Asia
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A Market for Preservation: Tropical-forest friendly products, entrepreneurship and consumer choice
CleanStar Energy, is social enterprise that focuses on bringing sustainable bioenergy solutions into developing markets while preserving delicate tropical forest communities. It’s the type of business being sought by the Tropical Forest Challenge, which aims to identify the best for-profit solution – an idea, start up, or company with a positive impact on tropical forest biodiversity.
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- Agriculture, Energy, Transportation