A Practical Guide to Planning and Executing and Impactful Exit

The first objective of this manual is to provide Venture Philanthropy/Social Investment practitioners with an important tool to assist them in their daily activities and thus enhance the effectiveness of their work. The second objective is to increase the transparency and accountability of the Venture Philanthropy/Social Investment sector. This manual should be useful for both experienced Venture Philanthropy Organisations that want to reflect on how to exit their investments while maximising and sustaining the impact achieved, and for organisations approaching VP, which can learn from the experience of VP/SI practitioners

Metabolic cost of nitrogen incorporation by N<SUB>2</SUB>-fixing <i>Azotobacter vinelandii</i> is affected by the culture pH

N2-fixing continuous cultures of Azotobacter vinellandii ATCC 9046 were carried out under various dissolved oxygen tensions (2, 25 and 50% air saturation) and, for each of these oxygen concentrations, the culture pH was controlled at 6.2 and 7.4. The culture pH exerted a profound influence on the specific consumption rates of glucose and oxygen and on the growth yields. Parallely, the total metabolic cost for N-incorporation was affected: for incorporating a given amount of N an extra glucose consumption of more than 70% took place when the culture pH was changed from 7.4 to 6.2. This effect was observed when the dissolved oxygen tension in the cultures was 25 or 50% but was less pronounced when it was 2% air saturation.Centro de Investigación y Desarrollo en Fermentaciones Industriale

Learning from Failures in Venture Philanthropy and Social Investment

EVPA (European Venture Philanthropy Association) has collected the experiences and lessons from twelve of its member organisations with a view to sharing their learnings from failure with other practitioners. The report looks at strategies and investments that failed and the reasons they did so. Outlining risk mitigation strategies, the report focuses on overcoming risk in the strategy of the venture philanthropy and/or social investment organisation and in the execution of specific investments

Financing for Social Impact The Key Role of Tailored Financing and Hybrid Finance

How can venture philanthropy organisations, social investors and impact investors, improve the way they allocate resources to their investees?To answer this question the EVPA Knowledge Centre embarked on a nine-month journey with a group of over 30 experts. The result is the new EVPA report "Financing for Social Impact – The Key Role of Tailored Financing and Hybrid Finance", launched at the EVPA Annual Conference in Oslo on 9 November 2017. This new piece of research looks at how funding can be shaped in a way that meets the financial needs of the social purpose organisation (SPO) and at how different actors can collaborate in the VP/SI space to bring more resources to SPOs. EVPA has developed a three-step process to help VP/SI organisations find the most suitable financial instrument to support a SPO. The process is known as tailored financing and it is addressed in the first part of the report.The report also focuses on hybrid finance, which is defined as the allocation of financial resources to impact-oriented investments, combining different types of financial instruments and different types of risk/return/impact profiles of capital providers.One of the main conclusions of the report is that tailored financing and hybrid finance promote a more efficient and effective deployment of resources in the VP/SI space. They can represent a way to solve the existing funding gap that prevents SPOs from gaining access to the capital needed for achieving self-sustainability and for scaling

The State of Venture Philanthropy and Social Investment (VP/SI) in Europe: The EVPA Survey 2015/2016

Five years of data has allowed us to analyse interesting trends and evolutions in the VP/SI sector. Below we highlight the most striking ones:* Overall growth for the sector, 108 organisations allocated 6.5 billion between them since they began their operations, a 30% increase compared to Fiscal Year (FY) 2013. * Budgets remained stable. * The surveyed organisations invested an average of 7.8 million through VP/SI activities.* There is a sharp rise in co-investment between peers since FY 2013. 63% of respondents have co-invested in the past and 19% said they are interested in doing so, even if they have not co-invested yet. Of the respondents that answered both this and the last survey, the organisations that have co-invested increased from 69% to 80%. * Over FY 2015 a number of smaller players (with budgets under 2.5million) have entered the space. * VP/SI organisations have no shortage in investment opportunities and are improving their deal screening process. Over FY 2015, respondents screened 7,520 potential opportunities. On average, each VPO screened 86 organisations, did further due diligence on 17 of them, and selected 9 investees.

A Practical Guide to Adding Value Through Non-financial Support

This guide is targeted specifically at venture philanthropy (VP) and social investment (SI) practitioners, and more broadly at other social sector funders such as foundations, grantmaking organisations and impact investors who may benefit from understanding the value of the highly engaged approach of venture philanthropy. We use the term venture philanthropy organisations ("VPOs") or "investors" to refer to such social sector funders. Venture Philanthropy works to build stronger social purpose organisations (SPOs) by providing both tailored financing (using the whole spectrum of financing instruments, from grants to debt, equity and hybrid financing) and non-financial support. This manual focuses specifically on non-financial support, which we define as the support services VPOs offer to investees (SPOs) to increase their societal impact, organisational resilience and financial sustainability, i.e. the three core areas of development of the SPO.Social impactThe social change on the target population resulting from an SPO's actions.Financial sustainability The assessment that an SPO will have sufficient resources to continue pursuing its social mission, whether they come from other funders or from own revenue-generating activities.Organisational resilience The assessment of the degree of maturity of an SPO, in terms of the degree of development of the management team and organisation (governance, fund-raising capacity etc.)

Levans production by Gluconacetobacter diazotrophicus

Background: Growth of Gluconacetobacter diazotrophicus with glucose as carbon an energy source has been extensively studied. However, there are no reports in the literature describing growth of G. diazotrophicus in cultures containing sucrose as carbon source. The first step in sucrose pathway and production of levans was investigated. Biomass, levans, gluconic acid and keto gluconic acids production and levansucrase activity were determined in cultures with different sucrose concentration and nitrogen sources. Results: The biomass production was maximal in cultures containing 100 g x L-1 sucrose and inorganic nitrogen. Gluconic acid production was observed under all conditions tested, at levels up to 9 g x L-1 in cultures with sucrose excess and biological N2-fixation (BNF). Keto gluconic acids were detectable only in cultures with sucrose excess and supplemented with organic nitrogen sources. Levans production, although observed in all cultures, was maximal in batch culture with 100 g x L-1 of sucrose and BNF, concomitant with a significant expression of extracellular levansucrase. Conclusions: Ours results not only describe some unknown aspects of G. diazotrophicus physiology, but open up the possibility of developing a technology of levans production by this organism using culture media with sucrose (or some cheaper substitute, like molasses) and without the addition of any N-source because of its ability of fixing atmospheric N2.Facultad de Ciencias ExactasCentro de Investigación y Desarrollo en Fermentaciones Industriale