New alliance with U.S. Global Development Lab to help address the needs of India’s BoP though activation of impact entrepreneurial businesses
September 
4, 2014: San Francisco. Today at SOCAP14, Unitus Ventures announced that it has entered into a Global Development Alliance with the U.S. Global Development Lab, a new entity within USAID that seeks to increase the application of science, technology, innovation and partnerships to achieve, sustain and extend USAID’s development impact to help hundreds of millions of people lift themselves out of extreme poverty.
The agreement provides substantial support for Unitus’ new India Impact Acceleration Program which aims to help improve and accelerate the early-stage impact startup ecosystem across India in three ways: by increasing entrepreneurial connections facilitated through “startup scouts” operating across India, by working with leading incubators to help create more “venture capital-ready” startups that target low-income populations, and by offering financial assistance to startups that make use of Unitus’ existing Venture Advisor and Catapult Partner networks.
“We’re pleased to be working so closely with the U.S. Global Development Lab,” said Will Poole, Co-founder and Managing Partner at Unitus Ventures. “Our interests and approaches to activating entrepreneurial businesses that address needs of India’s low-income population could not be better aligned. We plan to help the Lab prove the efficacy of ecosystem interventions in India and then apply those learnings more broadly in South Asia.”
About U.S. Global Development Lab & USAID
The U.S. Global Development Lab seeks to discover, test, and scale breakthrough development innovations to solve development challenges faster and cheaper in support of U.S. foreign policy and development goals and to accelerate the transformation of USAID as the world’s premier development agency. USAID partners to end extreme poverty and to promote resilient, democratic societies while advancing security and prosperity.
