SINGAPORE, 27 November 2018 – Freyr Energy (“Freyr”)—an India-based full-service solar solutions firm providing access to cleaner, safer, and cheaper energy—has closed a US$1.5M Series A round on Impact Partners—the world’s largest crowdfunding platform for impact investing. Operated by Singapore-based IIX, Impact Partners brought together a consortium of global investors including Netherlands-based C4D Partners and India-based angel investors. According to IIX’s impact assessment, funding will expand access to reliable and affordable solar energy to 2,275 households and 2,975 businesses, enable 675 off-grid rural villages to enjoy electricity for the first time through micro-grids, and avoid 167,270 metric tons of CO2 emissions by 2022.
Freyr Energy, an India-based full-service solar solutions firm providing access to cheap energy, has closed a US$1.5 million Series A round from Impact Partners, a crowdfunding platform for impact investing.
Operated by Singapore-based Impact Investment Exchange (IIX), Impact Partners brought together a consortium of global investors including Netherlands-based C4D Partners and India-based angel investors. According to IIX’s impact assessment, the funding will expand access to reliable and affordable solar energy to 2,275 households and 2,975 businesses, enable 675 off-grid rural villages to enjoy electricity for the first time through micro-grids, and avoid 167,270 metric tons of CO2 emissions by 2022. Read more.
Impact Partners is operated by Impact Investment Exchange (IIX), a Singapore-based organization that seeks to link investors with social and environmental projects.
Co-founder Saurabh Marda said Freyr will use the funds to “continue improving our technology platform, increase the strength of our sales and channel partner network, and support our marketing activities to fuel future growth.” Read more.
Having built the world’s first social stock exchange, particularly to benefit and empower women, Durreen Shahnaz now wants to take impact investing from the margins to the mainstream. Growing up in the throes of the Bangladesh Liberation War had a profound impact on Durreen Shahnaz from an early age. The experience of watching her country struggle to get back on its feet in its early days of independence stirred up in the former investment banker and founder of the Impact Investment Exchange (IIX) a defiance never to yield to others’ notions of what she could or could not do. Read more.
Our world’s top scientists spend billions of dollars every year on space exploration, searching the universe for one thing: water, considered a necessity for life. Yet on Earth, our primary source of water — the ocean — is perhaps one of the most undervalued resources on the planet. Read more.
The following speech was delivered by IIX Founder and CEO Professor Durreen Shahnaz on October 24th at Wharton San Francisco, for IIX and Knowledge@Wharton’s event “Women, Peace and Parity: Using Finance as a Tool For Progress.”
Ladies and Gentlemen, Welcome to Knowledge@Wharton and IIX’s joint event, ‘Women, Peace and Parity’. Thank you all for joining us today to celebrate the United Nations – so Happy United Nations Day. Today is a celebration of women — the Sustainable Development Goals #5 – Gender Equality, a celebration of Peace – SDG goal # 16, and a celebration of partnerships – SDG #17, because as we know, to undertake the mammoth task of creating a peaceful and equitable society – it takes women and it takes a village.
Leaders like BlackRock CEO Larry Fink have taken notice. In his annual letter to CEOs this year, Fink wrote: “Society is demanding that companies, both public and private, serve a social purpose. To prosper over time, every company must not only deliver financial performance, but also show how it makes a positive contribution to society.” Some on Wall Street say that Fink’s message sets a tipping point for the whole investment industry. Read More.
SINGAPORE, 28 September 2018 – IIX – a global organization dedicated to building a more inclusive world through innovative finance and support for high-impact enterprises – announced their first Bangladesh investment from the IIX Growth Fund, into off-grid solar energy firm SOLshare. IIX brought together a consortium of investors including innogy New Ventures LLC (the venture capital investment arm of the German utility firm innogy SE), and Portuguese utility firm EDP, to close a US$1.66 million Series A round. Funding will be used to increase access to clean energy for over 19,000 rural households and 14,000 micro-entrepreneurs, and address climate change by avoiding over 2,200 metric tons of carbon emissions by 2021.
Local lender DBS Bank has returned as official banking partner and sole placement agent for the second round of a debt security listing aimed at supporting women in Asia.
DBS and Singapore-based capital firm Impact Investment Exchange (IIX) will issue a series of bonds with a target of US$100 million under the newly launched Women’s Livelihood Bond scheme, they said in a media statement on Wednesday.
The scheme will fund and support South and South-east Asian enterprises tackling financial inclusion, clean energy access and sustainable agriculture, with the goal of benefiting one million vulnerable women.
Pricing details for the bonds, which will be released in several tranches, are not yet out. The plan is to list the issuances on a stock exchange and sell them to global investors. Read More.