If there is one sector in India that has witnessed visible, drastic change in the 21st century, it has to be that of sports. Consider this- at the turn of the century, India was considered as a one-sport nation, namely, a cricketing nation. Even in cricket, India was for most part, an “alsoran”. If you were to read any media coverage of India’s sports sector in the 90s and the early 2000s, you would notice an oft-repeated lament that Cricket in India grabbed all the eyeballs and investments, and all other sports were in a state of poverty. While much of the lament was true then, the narrative has been changing slowly, yet progressively over the last 25 years. 

This White Paper explores how such multi-stakeholder collaboration, matching and funding can happen. In answering the “how”, we have discussed various blended finance approaches case studies derived from their deployment in other social sectors, which could be adapted and deployed for raising funding within the sporting ecosystem, be it for building sporting infrastructure or for developing community sport or for achieving Olympic/Paralympic glory. Within the Indian context, the advent of the Social Stock Exchange provides for yet another exciting social financing mechanism to be explored in the days ahead. We also provide two recent example of Social Stock Exchange listings for readers to assess this platform’s potential.

This report is the result of a detailed study on ‘Regulatory Barriers and Levers for Deploying Foreign Catalytic Capital in Impact-Focused Enterprises, Funds & Facilities in India’ conducted by Desai & Associates (D&A) in partnership with Prime Coalition and with the support of the Lemelson Foundation. Overall, the study has the following key objectives:

1. Map the different financial pathways for aggregating US and European catalytic capital in India to support Indian social enterprises, defined as both for-profit and nonprofit enterprises with a social and/or environmental mission.
2. Assess the legal, structural, financial, and operational challenges of channeling capital via these pathways and identify potential solutions, including recommendations for possible intermediation to bring catalytic capital into India.
3. Develop a shared taxonomy for funders and recipients of catalytic capital, and create a public report useful to all stakeholders interested in bringing such capital into India. 

This landscape guide is intended to outline India’s current context in recycling and circularity, with a focus on the investment potential, opportunities and business models in the ten most significant waste streams in India. It provides a framework for how investment potential in a waste stream can be determined, which covers five areas that define that potential: market size and growth; investable start-up pipeline; product readiness; policy support; financing needs and gaps. The guide also includes a historical outline of investments and funding in each waste stream and outlines the roles and participation of various types of equity funders, along with the potential and participation of non-dilutive funding options.

India needs a significant capital injection to achieve the Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) target by 2030 and deal with climate change. Impact investing, catalysing philanthropic and commercial capital, offers promise in addressing critical social challenges. Initiatives like the Social Stock Exchange (SSE) and regulatory amendments aim to increase and broaden the pooled funds available to social enterprises and help them scale. Given this context, ANDE South Asia produced this explainer in collaboration with TrustLaw to provide focused guidance on how local and foreign impact investors can leverage the SSE to make investments in social enterprises in India.

"This report emphasizes the urgency to transition from the "Age of Innovation" to the "Age of Adoption" in response to climate change impacts by 2030. It identifies the critical need for the widespread implementation and scaling of existing climate technologies, and problematizes the gap between the availability of viable climate solutions and the slow pace of their adoption. It explores what will it take to deploy innovations at scale, aiming to understand the barriers hindering the widespread implementation of climate innovations. It identifies the pivotal role of climate finance in facilitating large-scale adoption, and underscores the necessity for collaborative efforts among various financial stakeholders, such as venture capital, private equity, foundations, and corporates, to devise innovative financial mechanisms. The report showcases how these financial innovations combine grants, equity, and debt to address climate challenges effectively. Finally, it stresses the need for specialized climate finance to bring innovations to the market swiftly, and emphasizes collaborative efforts among diverse capital allocators to develop creative and collaborative climate finance strategies."

"Decentralised Renewable Energy (DRE) technologies enable an equitable energy transition and ensure energy security for many emerging and developing economies. Unlocking finance for users and enterprises is critical to mainstreaming these technologies for a just energy transition. This policy brief, published by the T20 Taskforce, outlines the challenges with financing currently faced by the ecosystem stakeholders. It builds upon the policy framework released by the Ministry of New and Renewable Energy (MNRE), Government of India, for scaling the adoption of DRE livelihood technologies in India. It explores how DRE can be mainstreamed in the energy transition conversation and scale the adoption of these technologies leveraging the G20 network and resources."

"This report is an output of the ANDE Gender Action Lab. Authored by Villgro and LEAD At Krea University, this report publishes insights from a survey of over 800 SMEs on how women entrepreneurs access finance in the country. Combining insights from the desk research, demand-side survey and supply-side key informant interviews, the report suggests recommendations across three verticals: program, process and product, with government initiatives as anchors for scaling up."

"This report is an output of the ANDE Gender Action Lab. Authored by Villgro and LEAD At Krea University, this report publishes insights from a survey of over 800 SMEs on how women entrepreneurs access finance in the country. Combining insights from the desk research, demand-side survey and supply-side key informant interviews, the report suggests recommendations across three verticals: program, process and product, with government initiatives as anchors for scaling up."

"This report studies the opportunities and challenges in investing in India’s creative manufacturing and handmade (CMH) sector and the role of catalytic capital in supporting the same. This first-of-its-kind mapping finds that craft-led MSMEs operating in the CMH sector and broadly across the nation’s cultural economy face development and growth challenges that affect their ability to scale and grow. A primary challenge is the financing gap faced by MSMEs in the sector. We make the case for why these enterprises need the right financing, at the right time, in the right place, and offering the right conditions. Catalytic capital offers an untapped opportunity to build an entirely new ecosystem of financing that can catalyse and nurture new markets while driving much needed social change."

"The whitepaper discusses the problem of gender inequity in funding outcomes for women-founded startups, both globally and in India. The research aimed to understand the gender gaps in funding outcomes among investors and identify opportunities for improvement. The study utilized data from the Tracxn database, global benchmarks, and interviews with stakeholders in the investment ecosystem. Key findings include the concentration of funding in a few sectors and cities, the growth of women-founded companies in recent years, and the lack of gender diversity in investment teams. The report also highlights case studies of organizations that practice gender-smart funding and offers recommendations for fostering gender lens investment in India. It emphasizes the need for data tracking, a change in investment processes, and the promotion of gender diversity in firms to improve funding outcomes for women entrepreneurs. The report suggests a targeted approach with a dedicated team and industry-wide engagement to create a sustainable and robust platform for gender lens investment in India."