NextBillion - An Initiative of the William Davidson Institute at the University of Michigan

Getting Microfinance Right

Forty percent of the world’s population lives on less than $2 per day, according to the World Bank. Yet even in the midst of the current economic meltdown, there is reason for new optimism in the fight to reduce global poverty. The optimism starts with the evolution of microfinance, which has proved not only that the poor are credit-worthy, but that banking institutions serving the poor are investment-worthy. In addition, microfinance is tapping into a technological revolution that ...

Source

Forbes (link opens in a new window)

Region

Latin America

MicroPlace Offers 6 Percent Return on Microfinance Investment

MicroPlace (www.microplace.com), a website that enables everyday people to invest in the world’s working poor, announced today the launch of the first microfinance investment opportunity that offers a 6 percent annual return for everyday investors. This investment offering comes at a time when Americans are examining the best ways to use their tax refunds in a tough economy. According to a recent poll by Taxsoftware.com, 58 percent of Americans planned to either save or invest ...

Source

Press Release (link opens in a new window)

Region

Latin America

Root Capital Launches 5-Year, $63M Growth Capital Campaign

Root Capital announced today that it has launched a comprehensive Growth Capital Campaign that will significantly increase its capacity to serve rural grassroots businesses in developing countries by establishing a sustainable social enterprise and fully self-sufficient lending program by 2013. The five-year $63 million campaign includes a unique combination of Philanthropic Equity and Debt Capital and will accelerate the organization’s ability to impact global poverty by linking rural ...

Source

Press Release (link opens in a new window)

Categories

Education

Region

Latin America

Tags

academia

Qualcomm Backs Game Console for the “Next Billion”

A startup called Zeebo Inc. is betting that people in emerging markets want to play good video games just as much as people in the U.S., Western Europe and Japan do. Zeebo plans to launch its "video game console for the next billion" in Brazil next month for $199 and in other countries later this year for $179. It was developed using the cell phone technology of Qualcomm Inc., the San Diego company best known for its mobile phone chips. The Zeebo unit is light, and a lit...

Source

Associated Press (link opens in a new window)

Region

Latin America

Unveiling Latin America’s economic success

A lot of attention has been focused on the remarkable economic success of China, India and other Asian countries. So much so that the rise of Latin American companies as major players on the international economic scene has almost gone unnoticed. “Latin American companies have fallen through the cracks,” says Lourdes Casanova, a lecturer in strategy at INSEAD and author of Global Latinas: Latin America’s emerging multinationals. “While other emerging m...

Source

Knowledge@INSEAD (link opens in a new window)

Region

Latin America

Root Capital Director Explains His Company?s Lending Role

Financing typically comes in two sizes for businesses: very large or very small. Large-scale financing caters to the needs of large businesses, while small-scale financing answers the needs of tiny enterprises. In a manner reminiscent of Goldilocks’ perfect fit, Root Capital - a nonprofit social investment fund based in Cambridge, Mass. - aims to provide much-needed capital to help such medium-sized businesses grow. Last night, students and faculty alike gathered in the Plant Scienc...

Source

The Cornell Daily Sun (link opens in a new window)

Region

Latin America

IGNIA Completes Second Closing, Bringing Fund I to $34M

GARZA GARCIA, Mexico, November 25, 2008-- IGNIA Fund I, L.P., Latin America’s first social venture fund, announced today it has reached a total of US$34 million in equity commitments by completing its second closing. Investors include the Multilateral Investment Fund (MIF) of the Inter-American Development Bank (IDB), a US family foundation, and European and Latin American individuals. This round of US$13.6 million builds on IGNIA’s initial closing of $20.6 million announced in early Jun...

Source

Venture Capital News (link opens in a new window)

Region

Latin America

Retailer at Home in the Favelas

The live music is by Exaltasamba and, as it pounds out of stacks of loudspeakers, the singer gets -the several hundred people in front of the store dancing, jumping and waving their arms as if there is no -tomorrow. It is 9.30 am and the show has been put on for the opening of a new S?o Paulo outlet of Casas Bahia, a Brazilian retailer of furniture and electrical goods. The store is one of the chain’s 550 in Brazil and its first to open in a favela - one of the sprawl...

Source

Financial Times (link opens in a new window)

Region

Latin America