2022 Expressions of Interest for Impact Collective Investment Now Open
Pictured (from left): Sven Stenvers, Founder & Director (Impact Seed); Justine Colyer, CEO (Rise); Hon. Michelle Roberts MLA; Dan Minchin, CEO (Chorus, via zoom); Simon Robbins, Director, Corporate Services (Rise); Ben Hawthorn, Executive Manager, Innovation (Ruah Community Services); Kylie Hansen, Founder & Director (Impact Seed)
4 April 2022
Impact Collective is excited to announce the 2022 Impact Collective round is now open.
Impact Collective was launched pre-Covid in 2019 as a not-for-profit led impact investment initiative for social enterprises. It was a first for WA with collaboration and investment to addressing social and sustainability challenges through impact investing into innovative enterprise models.
If you have a growth-stage, investable social enterprise creating impact in WA, up to $250K investment is available through this program.
Selected candidates will be required to present their venture and have a conversation with the Collective members.
EOI deadline is 8 May.
Impact Collective is working with Impact Seed, WA’s leading advisory for social enterprise and impact investment, to identify social entrepreneurs wishing to align their enterprise models with the impact areas of the collective. This EOI process is running alongside the Impact Seed’s Impact2 Innovate EOI process – and you can find the link to both of these EOIs here.
About Impact Collective:
Founding members Chorus, Rise and Ruah Community Services worked closely with social entrepreneurs in the first round, and a leveraged investment of $1.5M was made by Impact Collective together with Sefa and Impact Seed into Aboriginal social enterprise, Kardan Construction, to help scale their impact in creating employment pathways and jobs for people experiencing vulnerability and disadvantage into the construction sector.
Impact Collective received funding from Lotterywest in 2021 to continue its work with impact ventures, and to share tools, templates and lessons from its work more broadly across the WA community services sector, and we are thrilled to launch our second round Expressions of Interest for social enterprises seeking partnerships and investment.
The upheaval brought by COVID through 2020 has seen unprecedented demand for support services provided by the not for profit community services sector with many hundreds of thousands of West Australians experiencing vulnerability and disadvantage accessing these services last year. The sector, which employs over 120,000 West Australians in this vital work, is under immense pressure to explore innovative solutions to increased service demand amid funding constraints. The unfolding negative socioeconomic repercussions of COVID has catalysed community demand for a new approach to build back better.
As such, Impact Collective is focussing on supporting impact ventures tackling social issues for the WA community, all of which have been exacerbated by the global pandemic. Impact Collective’s current members include Chorus, Rise , Ruah Community Services, Alinea, Mercycare, Avivo, PeopleKind, Good Sammy and Housing Choices WA
Definitions:
A Social Enterprise is an enterprise that exists primarily to deliver a measurable social, cultural and environmental impact. It derives most of its revenue from trading and it reinvests a significant proportion of its profit in furthering its mission.
Impact Investment sees investors actively seek out funding opportunities that are focused on generating actively measured social, cultural and environmental impacts, alongside a sustainable financial return. The result allows investors to sustainability contribute to their communities while meeting their investment objectives. Types of impact investment include early or late stage funding for social enterprises, or equity/debt investment into investable impact projects in areas as diverse as housing, clean energy, regenerative agriculture, agroforestry; It can also be supported through instruments such as social procurement (mandating a target for purchasing through social enterprises, or pay for performance contracts such as social impact bonds.