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New Pathways to Results: Corporate Impact Venturing

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Building the Impact Economy

Abstract

This chapter presents a framework how companies can better harness the needs of society to drive value creation and achieve significant financial gains by addressing social and environmental issues through core business practices. Understanding the external factors that enable sustainable business opportunity and using the mechanics of venture capital, a firm can can create disruptive business innovations. These have the potential to result in positive social and financial returns. The chapter argues that CIV is the most effective way forward for companies who must increasingly reconcile financial, social and environmental objectives. It explains how CIV is different from VC and discusses how to approach setting financial profit expectations. The chapter discusses approaches including Grameen Danone, Hydra Ventures, Patagonia and Uniqlo. It outlines a seven-step process for building an innovation program to achieve business transformation, including topics such as defining the initial focus, getting talent on board, securing backing, partnerships, testing, evaluation, and communication.

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Correspondence to Maximilian Martin .

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Martin, M. (2016). New Pathways to Results: Corporate Impact Venturing. In: Building the Impact Economy. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-25604-7_3

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