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The Power to Produce: How Indian Energy Entrepreneurs are Approaching the Next Big Frontier
The Indian government says 99.99% of houses in India, a staggering 214 million of them, are now on the electrical grid. Even with errors and omissions, it’s an incredible number. So if nearly all dwellings in India are now grid-enabled, is this the end of energy access challenges in the country? Not exactly, writes Ananth Aravamudan at the social enterprise incubator Villgro, since the existing grid does not provide satisfactory service. He shares several mini case studies of innovative startups building energy solutions that create both value and social impact.
- Categories
- Energy, Social Enterprise
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Generation Closes $1b Growth Fund Targeting Sustainable Startups
Today, Generation is announcing that it has closed a $1 billion Sustainable Solutions Fund for growth investments. As the name implies, it plans to put the $1 billion to work backing later-stage startups that work on sustainability in at least one of three areas.
- Categories
- Environment, Investing
- Region
- North America
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Rockefeller Foundation Aims to Make Tax Perk Work for Poor
The Rockefeller Foundation is set to announce Tuesday that it will hand out $5.5 million to help six U.S. cities promote “responsible” investment in areas designated as opportunity zones.
- Categories
- Investing
- Region
- North America
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Companies Trying to Do Good Face Stiff Competition – From Each Other
With more than 8,000 applicants to Chivas Ventures from around the world, it was fiercely competitive to win a place, said Michal Matus - whose Slovakian social enterprise, Save the Bees, sells technology to beekeepers so they can monitor their hives
- Categories
- Uncategorized
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Chipper Cash Convinces Joe Montana to Invest in African Fintech
Chipper Cash went live in October 2018, joining a growing field of fintech startups aiming to scale digital finance applications across Africa’s billion-plus population.
- Categories
- Finance
- Region
- Sub-Saharan Africa
- Tags
- digital finance, fintech, startups
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Unshackled Ventures Has $20m to Invest Exclusively in Immigrant Founders
Immigrants looking to start their own businesses face a huge barrier. Take Jyoti Bansal for example. He famously waited seven years before launching AppDynamics, a business that later sold to Cisco for $3.7 billion days before its initial public offering. Why? Because as an Indian immigrant with H-1B visa status, he could work for startups but wasn’t legally allowed to start his own.
- Categories
- Investing
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South African Insurtech Startup Nobuntu Raises Funding From Crossfin
South African fintech startup Nobuntu, which builds innovative insurance products for lower-income segments, has raised an undisclosed amount of funding from fintech holding company Crossfin to help it scale.
- Categories
- Finance, Technology
- Region
- Sub-Saharan Africa
- Tags
- fintech, startups, venture capital
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Building an Ecosystem to Save an Ecosystem: How Facilitating Climate Finance for MSMEs Can Fight Global Climate Change
Climate finance has become a buzzword for micro, small and medium enterprises (MSMEs) working on climate solutions. But with the unique challenges these enterprises face, it has become increasingly clear that the global development community will need to reimagine the entire ecosystem in order to get them the funding they need. Santosh Kumar Singh and Ankit Gupta at Intellecap discuss the obstacles to climate finance for MSMEs, and how best to overcome them.
- Categories
- Environment, Investing
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