Resource Type
Research

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"This piece distills critical lessons that cut across geographies and sectors and provides vital information for enterprises and funders trying to unlock impact at scale. Pivoting to Impact builds on in-depth Case Studies that share the scaling journeys of three organizations that have completed their IIA-funded work. Each organization has a unique story to tell about its strategies, pivots, successes, and failures on the road to scale."

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"We study the information-gathering role of a startup accelerator and consider the accelerator's incentives to choose a portfolio size and disclose information about participating ventures. We show that in a rational-expectations equilibrium, the resultant portfolio size is smaller than the first-best (efficient) level, consistent with some real-world observations. We further show that when some signals are uninformative and the portfolio consists of mostly high-quality ventures, the accelerator may choose to disclose only positive signals (and conceal negative signals) about its portfolio firms - a strategy we refer to as partial disclosure. Moreover, coupled with pursuing this strategy of partial disclosure, we demonstrate that the accelerator may possess incentives to exit its portfolio firms early."

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"The authors set out to document, understand and disseminate good practices in policies for social enterprises, and ultimately to contribute to the development of the sector in Latin America and globally. The book introduces a model of how to position the issue on the public agenda in a way that responds to the most urgent social needs of the country and the sector, building on existing local policies as well as those from other countries, and involving stakeholders in permanent dialogue. The Road to Travel, aimed at public policymakers and key sector players, includes 34 cases of best practices in public policy and a strategy to move faster to address our most intractable problems through a new economy."

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"Most impact investors see their primary goal as finding and investing in enterprises that yield strong financial and social returns-a goal we share and support. But we worry this singular focus may miss the forest for the trees. In this discussion paper, we argue for a shift in focus-toward the goal of scaling entire industry sectors, in addition to individual firms."

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"Micro, small and medium private and social enterprises (hereafter referred to as 'enterprise') are emerging as important players in enabling or delivering sustainable water, sanitation and hygiene (WASH) services. This area is highly dynamic, thus pointing to a need for recent consolidated evidence about the effectiveness, sustainability and quality of services provided by such enterprises. A synthesis of literature on small-scale sanitation entrepreneurs was conducted in 2008, and at that time reported that the "quality research was relatively scarce, and few good case studies were found" (Valfrey-Visser and Schaub-Jones 2008, p.4). This paper reviews literature over the five years since 2008, once again taking stock and examining the nature and quality of the evidence for private enterprise engagement across both sanitation and water sub-sectors. In particular, we review of the evidence concerning if and how poor households and communities are being supported."

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"With more than a quarter of the Philippines' 100 million-strong population living below the poverty line, efforts to tackle poverty and improve living, working and health conditions must be stepped up if the populous Southeast Asian nation is to achieve its Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) commitments by 2030.

This publication aims to demonstrate how Inclusive Business can be engaged in the Philippines to contribute to achieving national development priorities and the SDGs -and how governments and other stakeholders can create an environment in which such business models thrive and reach scale."

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"In search for new models to provide risk capital, mezzanine finance blends elements from traditional Private Equity (PE) and debt financing into a unique product. Its an additional offering in the SME finance ecosystem for missing middle entrepreneurs.

As a relatively young and rather complex segment in the impact investing space, this commissioned study provides an understanding of the specificities, diversity (and complexities) of Mezzanine Financing, critical to spurring innovative thinking on both the fund manager- and investor-sides, so products may be improved and models may be more scalable.

This study is the first of its kind and represents a first step into building small cap SME mezzanine finance as an asset class on its own."

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"The landscape for entrepreneurial finance has changed strongly over the last years. Many new players have entered the arena. This editorial introduces and describes the new players and compares them along the four dimensions: debt or equity, investment goal, investment approach, and investment target. Following this, we discuss the factors explaining the emergence of the new players and group them into supply- and demand-side factors. The editorial gives researchers and practitioners orientation about recent developments in entrepreneurial finance and provides avenues for relevant and fruitful further research."

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"Our main motivation in writing this guide has been our hope of unlocking IB partnerships' immense potential for helping to achieve the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) more effectively. To this end, our guide aims to give NGOs and companies guidance in conducting more productive IB partnerships as equal partners.

This guide is primarily aimed at internationally operating NGOs (INGOs). Our secondary audience includes companies of all sizes."

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"This dissertation explores the learning of social entrepreneurs in accelerators. Building on Jarvis' (2010) existential theory of learning, it conceptualises entrepreneurial learning as a process in which purposeful individuals encounter and transform experiences of disjuncture. These experiences are embedded in both human and material contexts. Learning processes and outcomes are portrayed as phenomena that are influenced by social entrepreneurs' interaction with these environments. Accelerators are depicted as non-formal contexts of learning, of relatively short duration - in which the structure and content of education is progressively adapted to the requirements of the individual."

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