Innovations in Healthcare Deputy Director Sarah Gelfand and Director of Investments at Calvert Foundation Beth Bafford have an article published this week on the Stanford Social Innovation Review blog about their research on the landscape of global health impact investors in India and East Africa. Over the course of six months they reviewed the activities of 85 organizations and interviewed 30 capital providers. Each conversation uncovered the challenges in the sector and also provided perspective on the larger trends that are leading to the increased interest in the private healthcare sector.
To address the challenges for investors, they developed a framework for evaluating health sector opportunities. The framework consists of a few key steps:
1) Assess and understand the typical market failures associated with the segment of the value chain and the consumer population targeted by the organization to determine if the capital can be flexible when faced with market challenges.
2) Investors should gauge the stage of the organization and its business model – is it equipped to face these challenges?
3) Once the true needs of the organization are established investors should determine the type of capital that is needed for growth and further development.
In short, to strengthen healthcare enterprises it is important for investors to evaluate and offer the proper capital that best fits the business instead of relying on businesses to reshape to serve the investor’s needs.
You can read the Stanford Social Innovation Review blog here.
To see the full research, go here:
Executive summary (pdf)
Presentation (slide deck)