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Engineering Social Impact: Being a Hardware Entrepreneur is Hard … But Worth It
There's nothing fast or easy about hardware innovation. Hardware is, well, hard. But a growing number of stakeholders in the development space see the importance of hardware-led social ventures and the impact they make in emerging markets, and they'll be especially interested in ASME's upcoming Innovation Showcase, a competition with events in in India, Kenya and the United States.
- Categories
- Social Enterprise, Technology
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South Africa’s Energy Schizophrenia: Why Hasn’t the Country Achieved Affordable Power for the Poor?
There are vast extremes between the energy rich and poor in South Africa, despite the country's great potential to make energy universally available. A new report by Impact Amplifier examines the reasons behind the discrepancies and describes five energy access business models for low-income communities: biogas, solar home systems, mini/micro grids, solar kiosks and solar appliances.
- Categories
- Energy, Environment
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Social Business Roundup: SOCAP Aims for the Mainstream, Cambodia Caps Microcredit, Quali Health Simplifies Health Care
In announcing its new ownership, SOCAP mentioned the word “mainstream” six times – the popular social business and investing conference is clearly aiming to grow beyond its current niche. In Cambodia, the National Bank capped interest on microcredit to a maximum of 18 percent per year – about half of what some MFIs currently charge. And a visit to India inspired a South African doctor to launch a profitable health care clinic in a local shantytown. These stories and more in our weekly roundup.
- Categories
- Environment, Health Care, Investing
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Finding New Pathways to a More Inclusive and Humane Economy
Social entrepreneurs, in their pursuit of the common good, have taught us that solutions won't come from a single sector or organization. And that's been reinforced by recent collaborations that reflect a complete new way of envisioning social change and clear the path for a more inclusive and humane economy, where social innovation is also a source of economic performance and gradually infiltrates the DNA of every company.
- Categories
- Uncategorized
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Power, Individualism and Indulgence: How to Leverage Cultural Factors in Entrepreneurship Training
Cultural factors can influence just about every aspect of an entrepreneur’s journey. Using a cultural dimensions tool, the authors compared how cultural background influences entrepreneurs in the USA and the Philippines. After finding large differences across three dimensions of culture, they explored how these differences might affect entrepreneurs in the Philippines and how entrepreneurship training can be tailored accordingly.
- Categories
- Education
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First Global Competition for Hardware-Led Social Innovation Issues Call for Entries
The American Society of Mechanical Engineers (ASME), the world’s largest organization for the field of mechanical engineering, today announced a call for entries to the 2017 ASME Innovation Showcase (ISHOW).
- Categories
- Impact Assessment
- Region
- North America
- Tags
- innovation
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Telangana Launches India’s First Social Innovation Hub in Nizamabad
Telangana IT Secretary Jayesh Ranjan made this announcement at the one-day Development Dialogue, an international social entrepreneurship ecosystem conference hosted by Kakatiya Sandbox.
- Categories
- Uncategorized
- Region
- South Asia
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For refugee camps, a waterless toilet to improve health and safety
Now, an MIT spinout, change:WATER Labs (is) developing a compact, evaporative toilet for homes without power or plumbing. Because sewage is mostly water, it’s possible to rapidly vaporize it, eliminating up to 95 percent of daily sewage volumes.
- Categories
- Health Care
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