social venture capital
Social enterprises play a valuable role in creating jobs, improving public services and combating social exclusion. But in order to reach their full potential, social enterprises need access to appropriate finance.
We have been investigating the finance needs of social enterprises and examining emerging practices amongst social enterprises and finance providers. Homeopathic Finance - Equitable Capital for Social Enterprises highlights that the barriers to growth include an 'unhealthy bids culture' and the need for more sophisticated forms of finance - including a more sophisticated use of grants and loans, and a need for 'patient' equity.
In order to address some of these needs we have developed, along with the Development Trust Association, the Local Investment Fund, and the Scarman Trust, the adventure capital fund.
The fund has been set up to provide investment for community enterprises, so that we can accelerate their growth and create sustainable institutions for long-term community renewal. We make 'adventure capital investments', which are made up of a variety of investment products, and are for asset development.
We also finance technical support services to build the organisational capacity of community enterprises and further strengthen their delivery capacity and long-term viability.
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