Startup accelerator programs are running rampant around the world, but it remains unclear how effective they are, especially in emerging markets. Anne Field writes about the new $2.3 million three-year partnership that ANDE and Emory University, supported by the U.S. Global Development Lab at USAID, Omidyar Network, The Lemelson Foundation, and the Argidius Foundation, that will explore the impact and effectiveness of accelerators.

"Hundreds of these support programs for entrepreneurs have emerged over the past few years, and little is known about what’s working and what isn’t,” adds Sean Peters, who leads the Impact of Entrepreneurship Database at the Goizueta Business School, to this launch announcement for the Global Accelerator Learning Initiative (GALI).

In this interview, Yvette Torres-Rahman and Genevieve Edens discuss how SGBs are making a dent in global poverty.

Having qualified management teams is essential to receiving capital that can grow a business. But assembling highly qualified leadership teams is not easy. In the State of the Sector report, we cite talent development as one of the major obstacles holding entrepreneurs in emerging markets back. ANDE Executive Director, Randall Kempner, explores this issue more in the Financial Times.

International donors are turning to the private sector to achieve development goals, but as discussed in the State of the Sector report, a disproportionately small amount of funding goes to support small and medium enterprises and entrepreneurship. Yet returns on small and growing businesses have some of the greatest potential to benefit whole communities. Randall Kempner and Kate McElligott discuss this further in the Stanford Social Innovation Review.

Social enterprises the world over are bursting at the seams with innovations to tackle poverty and promote social good, but precisely how to measure the impact of their initiatives remains a recurring question. Naki B. Mendoza explores this issue in the context of ANDE's annual conference on metrics and impact measurement in Washington, DC.

There's a lot of talk about making the Sustainable Development Goals local. But what does that look like in practice? In this article in the Guardian, ANDE Executive Director Randall Kempner discusses how local entrepreneurs can hold the key to truly sustainable development, and how we cannot forget about them.

What are the three biggest challenges facing small and growing businesses in emerging markets over the next three years? ANDE Executive Director, Randall Kempner, posed this question to fifteen international development leaders in February of this year. These were the top issues that emerged.

Plenty of people have opinions about accelerator programs, but where's the data? Kempner and Roberts discuss why we're in the dark on whether or not accelerators work and in what context, and what ANDE and Emory University's Social Enterprise @ Goizueta are doing about it in this Wall Street Journal article.

ANDE is featured in an article by Alice Korngold about the potential for business to solve poverty. The article recaps some of the great points made during the expert panel at ANDE's Annual Conference. The panel featured Jacqueline Novgratz, Paul Polak, and Paul Basil.