ABOUT US

Social Development - Social Innovation - Social Enterprise

Poverty is not just about income, it comes in many forms. We measure poverty using 50 different metrics which includes not only income but also areas such as access to clean water, access to affordable public transport, domestic violence, women’s rights, drug or alcohol abuse, education, healthcare, environmental waste and so on. 

Traditional Philanthropy does a very good job of lifting communities out of extreme poverty to just poverty. It generally only focuses on specific, major areas of poverty, leaving other areas of poverty families may be suffering from unresolved. 

Philanthropy through donations only goes so far and in most cases reaches an impact ceiling - where no matter how much more money you throw at the problem, it cannot be solved in the long term. This is primarily because the donation model is not sustainable, often spiraling families back into extreme poverty when there are funding shortages due to global economic slowdowns or shifts in priorities. 

There is a gap between this impact ceiling and a sustainable middle class which has yet to be charted and solved. Donations will never achieve this long term goal, only individuals themselves can lift their families out of poverty but need the opportunities to do so.

Lonsdale Social Innovation Capital seeks out social enterprises which are helping bridge this gap. Businesses which are providing solutions to solve poverty in a sustainable way and offer opportunities to families themselves to resolve generation-long issues created by nothing more than simply circumstance. 

They could be businesses which provide supplemental income for individuals with underutilized skills, technology platforms that give base of the pyramid markets direct access to more developed markets or market data taken for granted, or enterprises which help existing businesses grow and become more efficient, lifting margins and creating employment. 

At Lonsdale Social Innovation Capital, we fund social enterprises to bring them to the next level, scale and grow into new markets. We provide administrative support and mentoring for social entrepreneurs and their enterprises so they can achieve the most they can in the shortest amount of time, thereby accelerating their impact on the families who need it the most.

While our goal is to create sustainability through profitability within every social enterprise we support, we are committed to reinvesting the majority of any profits we may receive into supporting more and more social entrepreneurs and enterprises.