BUSINESS: Sustainability consultant to launch 'social venture capital fund'

Michael Burnham, Greenwire senior reporter

Veteran corporate consultant and author John Elkington is preparing to launch a "social venture capital fund" to provide entrepreneurs with cash they need to solve environmental and health problems.

In a wide-ranging interview in Washington yesterday, Elkington said he would formally announce the launch of Volans Ventures next month at the Skoll World Forum on Social Entrepreneurship at Oxford University.

Volans, which would open offices April 1 in London and Singapore, would marshal financial and human-capital support from corporations, nongovernmental organizations and governments for early-stage entrepreneurs who are engaged in anything from mitigating climate change and biodiversity loss to improving access to clean water and energy.

"We will be slightly serendipitous and opportunistic as we go forward," explained Elkington, who founded the London-based corporate social responsibility consultant SustainAbility two decades ago.

Elkington will run Volans with Pamela Hartigan, formerly the managing director of the Geneva-based Schwab Foundation for Social Entreprenuership. Elkington and Hartigan are the co-authors of "The Power of Unreasonable People: How Social Entrepreneurs Create Markets that Change the World," published earlier this month by Harvard Business Press.

Hartigan is in the process of raising $3 million for Volans' "Connects" program, which would vet entrepreneurs and link them with veteran business executives and capital.

"The challenge for entrepreneurs is not just about access to [financial] capital," Hartigan said from her office in Geneva. "The piece that's been missing is human capital."

Hartigan said she plans to work with the Skoll Foundation, Acumen Fund, Echoing Green and other nonprofit groups to review entrepreneurs' projects. Elkington, meanwhile, is courting venture capitalists and corporate and NGO executives as potential partners.

Two current partners include Physic Ventures, a San Francisco-based venture capital firm for human-health and environmental sustainability projects, and the World Toilet Organization, a Singapore-based nonprofit that develops latrines and basic sanitation projects in the developing world.

"This isn't a complete split from SustainAbility," Elkington said. "Volans will address areas where there is market failure."

Indeed, Elkington will remain on SustainAbility's board of directors and will continue to contribute to its consulting and research activities.

The changes come as SustainAbility prepares to open a consulting office in India and a think tank in Washington, D.C. The SustainAbility Foundation will serve as a environmental research platform for corporations, policymakers and other parties, SustainAbility officials said.