SharedImpact Communication Innovation Fund
Sector Fund
Investing in solutions to empower organisations to communicate clearly and effectively.
Summary
Charities and social enterprises need more than financial support.
Often their ability to succeed is constrained by their ability to communicate – to donors, employees and to other key stakeholders.
The SharedImpact Communication Innovation Fund aims to address this, by investing in solutions to empower organisations to communicate clearly and effectively.
How the fund works
The fund is supported by donations from keystone donors. Once we have sufficient support for a ‘first close’ we will make our first investments. These have already been identified – and are outlined below.
Returns from this investment will return to the fund, and it will then be able to ‘recycle’ the funds into further investments to support this cause. The original donors will be kept informed of the success of the fund, and may suggest projects to be considered for investment.
Proposed Investments
ORB - Online Radio Broadcasting
Communication takes many forms, but the oldest, and clearest, way to communicate is by voice. Unfortunately despite the emergence of the Internet and platforms such as YouTube, originating and distributing professional quality audio is difficult and expensive.
Online Radio Broadcasting aims to solve this by providing tools and support to enable charities and social enterprises to have a voice. Covering both the technology – from software-only through portable and static studios – and the broadcast capability to stream live and on-demand, they will provide a full-service to meet the needs of organisations worldwide.
They have extensive experience in online radio broadcasting, working with Microsoft, O2, Nokia, Oxford University and many more.
We have agreed in principle to provide funding of $500,000 over 5 years under charitable terms.
In addition to the funding element, ORB and SharedImpact are partnering to provide these services to SharedImpact’s portfolio of charities and social enterprises.
Kalibrr
Based in Southeast Asia, Kalibrr provide a unique technology-driven approach to recruitment, and is recognised as being at the forefront of the social impact scene in the region. Not only do they provide a gateway to employment, but they have also piloted the provision of training to give potential recruits the skills they need.
They have already received funding from Y Combinator and Omidyar Network amongst others, and are now seeking further funding to scale their activity.
We are looking to invest up to $500,000, in the form of a convertible note with a 3 year maturity.
