Investment Story Category: Audience's Choice

From challenging global inequality to fighting extreme poverty to protecting our planet, Agora Partnerships believes entrepreneurs are key to reaching the SDGs and building a better future for all. The World Economic Form estimates there is a $2.5 trillion gap in financing that must be filled in order to achieve the SDGs by 2030.

The primary program Agora has is the Agora Accelerator, a four-month program that provides social enterprises across Latin America and the Carribean with the knowledge, networks, and capital needed to grow and increase their positive impact on the world.

Since 2011, Agora has worked with 215 companies across 21 countries. Collectively, these companies have raised over $86MM in capital, created 3413 direct employees, and maintained a 94 percent survival rate.

Agora is currently looking for an investment of $5MM to increase the number of companies the Agora Accelerator can work with, and also to integrate more earned-revenue into its existing business model.

The $5MM investment will be used to support the following:

– DC-Based Staff: CEO, Director of Operations and Finance, Communications Manager, Communications Support Staff, Manager of Business Development
– Field Staff : Managing Director, Program Manager, Bootcamps Senior Coordinator, Senior Coordinator Impact Investment, Two Associates, Four Program Consultants.
– Other Areas: As some of the revenue-generating models being explored require over-time payback, philanthropy will be needed to fill in gaps while waiting for entrepreneur payments.

Below is breakdown of the revenue and impact Agora plans to generate through this model:
– 1 Year: Service 80 companies annually and generate $450,000 in revenues
– 5 Years: Service 200 companies annually and generate $1,125,000 in revenues
– 10 Years: Service 350 companies annually and generate $2,000,000 in revenues

The investment will allow for Agora to transition its accelerator model from one that is philanthropically dependent, to one that has more earned revenue built in to its model. By 2020, Agora expects to have achieved a 50/50 parity of earned revenue to philanthropy; a parity the company plans to maintain.

Helping social entrepreneurs unlock the capital they need to grow is extremely difficult. In fact, there are multiple “missing middles” where financing is just not reaching entrepreneurs. Filling those gaps is often difficult and expensive, but is one of the most important pieces of the impact puzzle.

GreenFi Systems provides the training and tools for companies and NGOs to extend financial inclusion to farming and fishing communities, while helping them to build resilience to climate change.

Over sixty percent of smallholder producers lack access to basic financial services like credit and insurance. This is because they are viewed as unprofitable and risky by banks and MFIs. These communities also lack the incentives and tools to manage their resources sustainably, often over exploiting them, which results in the collapse of entire ecosystems (and the various services which they provide).

We provide training materials for NGOs and companies to establish eco-funds with communities; a mobile application that allows communities to monitor their environmental compliance and track their financial activity; and an award winning eco-credit scoring system which means that borrowers can apply for formal financial services and banks will know that they’ve successfully engaged with an eco-fund and are less likely to default on future loans.

The project, called EO-li (Earth Observation based location identifier), is a web-based, global broker platform and market place. It has 4 components namely the (i) identification of a location to be restored, the (ii) selection of an area and the actors doing the restoration, the (iii) monitoring and reporting on the progress of the project using earth observation and geospatial data and (iiii) a learning platform providing guidance and capacity strengthening.

The project has just terminated the conceptual phase funded in a venture round by the European Space Agency (ESA) and is looking for funding to implement this innovative, comprehensive restoration platform.Specifically, we are looking for an investment of 1,975,000 USD for which a web-based platform will be developed that has a cloud based processing engine in the background that allows the automatic ingestion and processing of high resolution earth observation and big geospatial data. All stakeholders in landscape restoration can easily extract – at the push of a button – the information contained in this data regarding the project they invested in. Importantly, no background in geodata processing is required. Transparency is achieved through project transactions being recorded in a specially adapted blockchain. The funds will also be used to train stakeholders on all continents affected by land degradation.

After year 1, a working prototype will be on the market with a business model implemented. Revenue is projected to come from a diversity of investors who are interested in land restoration, food security and carbon sequestration. The profitability is projected to rise from 5% in the first year to 25% by year 5 and 45% after 10 years, since we are looking at a high level of automation and a global market.

The platform will objectify the land restoration process and facilitate monitoring and reporting on project progress which will help to reach the targets of the various SDGs. By combining the four components (i) identify, (ii) select, (iii) monitor and (iiii) learn the EO-li platform follows a more holistic approach than other platforms that concentrate on individual aspects of the above components.

The EO-li platform will exclusively be based on Free and Open Source Software and will come with free remote sensing data from the European Copernicus program and other free data sources. Since all code and all data is freely accessible, all stakeholders are invited to participate and create a sustainable land restoration case for their respective communities. By providing micro-credits to smallholder farmers an organization interested in land restoration and food security invests in the establishment of a sustainable livelihood for a smallholder farmer. Since the credit will be paid back over time the investor is highly motivated and can facilitate further investments in land restoration in the future.