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I received an e-mail from Chris Coldeway, a Worldchanging colleague who recently moved to India to work for the strategy consulting firm Monitor Group. Chris is working with Monitor to build its consulting practice in Mumbai around "market-based strategies to create social change." He reports:

We have initiatives in housing, agriculture, and healthcare, and are expanding both the project base and the team itself. We are looking to hire people at the senior- to mid- level for positions here in Mumbai. Ideal candidates would be strategy consultants who are interested in applying their skills in a social sector arena.

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Map adjusted to reflect national populations in 2050


Investment in emerging economies is on the rise, following an increasing awareness of the improving business climate in these countries as well as burgeoning, high-growth green sectors. These were the thoughts of participants in a recent session on investment opportunities in emerging markets hosted by WRI's Enterprise and Innovation Program.

The discussion took place on November 9-10 at the Triple Bottom Line Investing (TBLI) Paris Conference, which convened 400 members of the socially-responsible investment (SRI) community to discuss the state and future of the SRI world. Luiz Maia of Rio Bravo Investimentos in Brazil, Pramod Shedde of BTS Investment Advisors Pvt., India and Michael Feldner of InSpire, South Africa were the featured speakers, representing three of the most important economies to watch in coming years. They drew on their experience as fund managers to analyze recent trends in developing country and sustainable investment.


Explaining Growing Interest in Emerging Economy Investing and SRI

The speakers attributed the attractiveness of emerging market investing to the low cost of failure and the high potential returns associated with countries like South Africa and Brazil. They also noted that venture capitalists getting involved in these countries early will have significant leverage in dictating the terms of investment since competition is currently low.

Feldner explained that based on his experience in Africa, investors would be wise to incorporate a sustainability component in their portfolios as well as focusing on bottom of the pyramid (BOP) companies. He used the example of micro loans in Africa to show how, much like the I-Pod in the US, business solutions that worked in one city or village were likely to work in most places, generating the kind of success experienced by the Grameen Bank and other micro-lenders.

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NextBillion has spoken with 50x15 project management, and has been told that the press report of the project's demise is not correct. AMD representatives claim that the report was generated due to a misrepresented SEC filing. AMD says that the PIC will continue, 50x15 is still a goal, and there are other products and projects in the pipeline. Perhaps AMD will put out its own press release to set the record straight.

The 2007 Social Capitalist Award winners were announced this morning by Fast Company business magazine and the Monitor Group. The Award recognizes non-profits that are generating both financial profit and social benefit. Winners that have a particularly strong emphasis on serving low-income markets include:

ACCION International--Trains banks on how to offer microfinance services, including insurance and savings (four-time winner: 2004, 2005, 2006, 2007)

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I've been busy lately, partly because I'm trying track a slew of recent BOP news stories appearing in the mainstream media.  (For readers who subscribe to the main NextBillion RSS feed, you may want to consider subscribing to the News Feed for daily updates).  Four stories set themselves apart from the group for the depth and breadth of coverage:

Acumen's New Model for Third-World Aid: BusinessWeek innovation editor Jessi Hempel profiles the New York-based investment fund and its founder, Jacqueline Novogratz.  There’s a special focus on Drishtee, an Acumen portfolio investment that's launching entrepreneur-owned and -run kiosks in rural India.  

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On the shameless self-promotion front, I want to mention that we're co-hosting a book launch and networking event with Worldchanging here at WRI on Friday.  Full details of the event are on the World Resources Institute web site; the basic gist is that we'll have presentations from WRI and Worldchanging staff, including one from Worldchanging co-founder Alex Steffen that's gotten good reviews elsewhere on their book tour.

NextBillion readers may or may not know that I also spend some time writing for Worldchanging, and that Al Hammond has been featured over there as well.  Our new book is a 608-page compendium of tools and ideas to change the world; one reviewer described it as "the Whole Earth Catalog for the digital generation."  Come by to meet the people behind the scenes at NextBillion.net and Worldchanging.com; we'll have plenty of beverages and an open space to facilitate networking.

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One World Projects was founded by Phil Smith, a pioneer in the Fair Trade world before it was hot. Originally conceived as a sustainable alternative for communities living in rainforest areas, Phil worked directly with communities to create crafts from renewable resources and then sold them to the US market.

The company has grown and changed over the years to become an established player in the Fair Trade crafts arena. Phil and his partner, Liz Wald, now work with more than 11,000 artisans in more 20 than developing countries. OWP has been working longer than most of its competitors, creating long-lasting relationships that truly transform communities.

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Guest blogger Darrell Owen is an international consultant specializing in Information Communication Technologies (ICTs) in developing countries. Prior to forming his own company, he worked for the U.S. Agency for International Development. This week, he will present some of his on-the-ground experiences at the Silicon Valley Challenge Summit.

Over this last year, a number of my colleagues and I have been engaged in on-the-ground pilots proving that the combination of wireless networks (WiFi, WiMax, new generation IP-based satellite services) and Voice over Internet Protocol (VOIP) can cost-effectively reach low-income, rural and even remote locations.  This brings the potential of the Internet telecommunications revolution to the billions who have been left behind.  Details of this work can be found in a collection of my working papers (pdf).

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Oxfam International has just published a report, "In the Public Interest: Health, Education and Water and Sanitation For All." One can hardly dispute some its assumptions - it's a scandal that people go without basic services, the money is theoretically there to solve problems, aid policies are often misguided, local governments have often proven incapable, incompetent, corrupt and uncommitted to their own citizens' welfare.  But one can argue with their solution set...it's like going back to the future.   

As I read this report, the private sector is seen as the enemy at worst and a wild beast to be caged at best, the profit motive as antithetical to welfare, and more aid as the solution.  The past and current failures of the public sector in the developing world to make headway in solving these problems for billions of people across all regions are acknowledged but then largely ignored.  The Oxfam doctor's prescription is to throw more money at these self-same entities - but more consistently and in larger amounts.  

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If you've ever wondered what it's like to be doing base of the pyramid work on the ground, you should talk to NextBillion friend and ally Patrick Donohue.  Patrick got his start in the BOP universe as a MBA student of Stuart Hart's, back when Stu was running the Center for Sustainable Enterprise out of the University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill Kenan-Flagler Business School.  Since graduation, Patrick has worked with the William Davidson Institute (of the University of Michigan) on their Base of the Pyramid work and is an active participant in the BOP Protocol process.  In short – he's part of the who's who of the Base of the Pyramid universe.

Naturally, Patrick is a blogger and a photographer.  Sadly, his BRINQ blog and photostream had been quiet for many months – until last week.  Evidently Patrick's been too busy with his work in Brazil and India to write it up and document with pictures, but he's caught up in style.  I strongly recommend his latest post, Belated Postcards from India and Brazil, to hear first-hand what it's like to work with multinational corporations, NGOs, universities, and others to put the BOP strategy to work.  An excerpt:

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