3p Contributor: Nick Aster
Recent Articles
Interview: Jeff Stewart, Lenddo
Omidyar Network is a philanthropic investment firm started in 2004 by eBay founder Pierre Omidyar. Since 2004, the firm has invested close to $500 million in both non-profit and for profit ventures, all of which have a stated mission to catalyze social, economic, and political change. We’ve written about many of the companies that Omidyar has helped start over the years – Ashoka, Mango, Kiva.org, CouchSurfing, and D.light just to name a few.
One of the major areas of interest for Omidyar is microlending and the provision of capital for basic needs and entrepreneurship. Capital is available but distribution can be tricky, and one of the biggest problems is validating the trustworthiness of the recipients.
A company called Lenddo has devised a way to leverage existing social networks – Facebook, LinkedIn and so on – to let people prove who they are and to prove their credibility. According to founder Jeff Stewart, social networks, particularly among middle class folks in the developing world are incredibly powerful and accurate ways to gauge the trustworthiness of a potential loan recipient.
The numbers speak for themselves. Lenddo has been growing at more than a percent a day in recent months and has impacted millions of people in the Philippines. There are big plans to scale the business elsewhere. I sat down with Jeff for a few minutes to find out more:
Interview: Ned Tozen, D.Light
Omidyar Network is a philanthropic investment firm started in 2004 by eBay founder Pierre Omidyar. Since 2004, the firm has invested close to $500 million in both non-profit and for profit ventures, all of which have a stated mission to catalyze social, economic, and political change. We’ve written about many of the companies that Omidyar has helped start over the years – Ashoka, Mango, Kiva.org, CouchSurfing, and D.light just to name a few.
D.Light is a company we’ve covered more than a few times here on 3p. In a nutshell, the company makes inexpensive, durable solar lighting designed for sale in poor off-grid communities around the world. Their product sounds like an easy sell. It lasts a long time, it’s clean, and most importantly pays for itself in a matter of months by eliminating much of the need to make monthly kerosene purchases.
For the most part, the products are indeed selling well – over 7 million so far. But education, fear of upfront costs and other challenges remain. I sat down with co-founder Ned Tozen for a few minutes to talk about these challenges and the way D.Light is succeeding from a financial and social perspective:
Interview: Chuck Slaughter, Living Goods
Omidyar Network is a philanthropic investment firm started in 2004 by eBay founder Pierre Omidyar. Since 2004, the firm has invested close to $500 million in both non-profit and for profit ventures, all of which have a stated mission to catalyze social, economic, and political change. We’ve written about many of the companies that Omidyar has helped start over the years – Ashoka, Mango, Kiva.org, CouchSurfing, and D.light just to name a few.
For the second time this week, I found myself presented with the “Avon model” of product distribution in Africa. This time, Living Goods‘ founder Chuck Slaughter did the talking. Living Goods mission is “Empowering micro-entrepreneurs to deliver life-saving and life-changing products to the doorsteps of the poor.” In a nutshell, this means they’re basically a wholesaler for goods that are currently hard to get a hold of in developing countries – and which also have the potential for “high impact” in terms of improving people’s lives.
Items such as nutritional supplements, medicines, basic consumer goods, and so called “pro poor” products like cookstoves are among the variety of items Living Goods offers. Interestingly, by being a wholesaler, Living Goods directly creates micro businesses in the form of people who willing to go door to door selling – the so-called “Avon ladies.” Finally, and perhaps most importantly, the Living Goods model is almost infinitely scaleable and can be applied to almost any good – thus making life easier for any enterprising company with a live changing product looking for a market.
I sat down with Chuck for a brief interview:
Interview: Matt Bannick, Managing Partner, Omidyar Network
Omidyar Network is a philanthropic investment firm started in 2004 by eBay founder Pierre Omidyar. Since 2004, the firm has invested close to $500 million in both non-profit and for profit ventures, all of which have a stated mission to catalyze social, economic, and political change. We’ve written about many of the companies that Omidyar has helped start over the years – Ashoka, Mango, Kiva.org, CouchSurfing, and D.light just to name a few.
Last week I had the pleasure of attending the Omidyar Network’s annual executive forum in Redwood City, CA. It’s an event designed to bring all of the Omidyar Network’s grantees and investments together under one roof for 3 days of brainstorming, inspiration, and learning. This year the vast majority of Omidyar’s 100+ companies had at least one representative present, some having traveled from as far as Zambia.
The network’s areas of investment are concentrated in two main areas: Access to Capital (focusing on microfinance, property rights & entrepreneurship) and Media, Markets & Transparency (focusing on technology and government/corruption).
Determining which of the world’s problems can be solved with profit generating entrepreneurial ideas and which are more suited for traditional non-profits is a difficult decision. It’s one that Omidyar grapples with every day. I sat down with Matt Bannick, Managing Partner for Omidyar Network to look for some perspective:
GE’s Newest Jet Engine Beams in for Creative Week NYC
GE's GEnx engine: efficient, quiet, and virtually yours this week in New York.
Aviation has always been a personal favorite topic of mine. Despite the industry’s role as a leading CO2 emitter, airlines, aircraft manufacturers, fuel researchers, and the makers of engines have been bending over backwards to squeeze every drop of efficiency they can out of their respective areas of influence. From advanced algae biofuels to reductions in aircraft weight, these represent commendable and ultimately profitable efforts. Engine design is every bit as important as the rest, and GE’s new “GEnx” engine is generating some windy excitement this week in New York as part of “Creative Week.”
The engine – in the process of being deployed on Boeing’s new 787 & 747-8 aircraft—is said to be the “world’s most powerful jet engine.” It will offer a 15 percent reduction in CO2 emissions over comparable engines and significant weight reduction resulting in yet more fuel savings, as well as being the quietest engine GE has ever made. It’s also the best selling engine GE’s every built – a testament to the need for fuel savings among airlines. That’s easy to appreciate to an aviation fan like me (see technical specs after the jump), but what does it take to get the general public excited about jet engines?
Enter the Hologram.
Delta Air Lines Buys Oil Refinery… Can You Say Peak Oil?
Now here’s something I was never expecting: Delta Airlines has apparently agreed to buy a Pennsylvania oil refinery from ConocoPhillips for $150 million (plus $30 million in government assistance for job creation). Once you get your head around it, it all makes perfect sense. Fuel is the largest expense an airline has. It’s also tremendously volatile and on a permanent upward trajectory. Why not try to contain some of that volatility by simply getting directly involved in the refinery business? While you’re at it, why not optimize the refinery to produce mostly jet fuel?
In a nutshell, that’s what Delta plans to do – to the tune of a tremendous expected savings of $300Million a year, easily paying for their initial investment. But at the meta level, this transaction gets even more interesting – it secures a more predictable jet fuel source for Delta, but also represents a likely future trend as companies go to ever greater lengths to reduce fuel costs. More importantly, it’s a demonstration of the ever increasing pressures of peak oil. I should add that I’m making a big assumption – that Delta knows what they’re doing in terms of getting the right people to run an operation like a refinery!
Interview: Hunter Lovins at Fortune Brainstorm Green
At this week’s Fortune Brainstorm Green conference, I had a chance to talk briefly with a long time colleague and inspiration, Hunter Lovins.
Hunter and I reflected on the nature of the conference and how the business case for sustainability is finally hitting home.
Interview: Bart Alexander Chief Corporate Responsibility Officer at MolsonCoors
At this week’s Fortune Brainstorm Green conference, I had a chance to talk briefly with MolsonCoors Chief Corporate Responsibility Officer, Bart Alexander.
Among other things, MolsonCoors has come up with an interesting employee engagement platform called the “beer print”. It’s a simple metaphor based on the fact that when you place a beer on a table it inevitably leaves a ring – or “print”. The implication is that one ought to be conscious of exactly what impact one’s actions leave upon the world and that such consiousness should be extended to the corporate culture.
Take a look at the internal “beer print” messaging below:
Interview: Jeff Miller, Founder & CEO, Wheelz
At this week’s Fortune Brainstorm Green conference, I had a chance to talk briefly with Jeff Miller, Founder & CEO of Wheelz.com – a peer to peer car sharing startup based primarily on college campuses.
A classic access economy company, Wheelz took their primary funding from Zipcar and pride themselves on the ease of automobile access they are able to provide via advanced technology – as well as the comfort that comes with renting inside a known network – the college campus.
Interview: David Edmondson, CEO eRecyclingCorps
At this week’s Fortune Brainstorm Green conference, I had a chance to talk briefly with David Edmondson who is founder and CEO of a company called eRecyclingCorps.
It’s a company the average consumer may have never heard of, but it’s quite likely that if you’ve ever returned an old cell phone to your service provider, it’s eRecyclingCorps that’s actually managing the deal.
Simply put, eRecyclingCorps created a simple way for companies to reward customers at the point of sale for trading in their used devices, resulting in improved customer loyalty, reduction of wireless e-waste, and a path to distribute lower priced mobile technology to the developing world – all at a profit.
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