October 2012

Marking the 10 year anniversary of Development Marketplace in 2011, the World Bank launched the Development Marketplace Investment Platform (DMIP) program.

The intent is to seek to help a pilot group of 30 selected social enterprises that have received prize money from DM, and that have been successful in their project, to attain a second or further round of financing from impact investors and foundations, in order to build up or replicate their project success.

A second purpose is to help respond to a familiar complaint of social enterprise funding organizations, that they do not see enough good projects to evaluate. In this context, the Asian Venture Philanthropy Network published the following article on its website highlighting the results achieved so far by DMIP and the prospects for the future of this program.

In 2011 the World Bank Institute marked the 10th anniversary of the Development Marketplace. The programme was set up to provide early-stage funding to innovative social enterprises through a range of annual global and national-level competitions. Over 300 global winners have won US$200,000 each in grant funding.

But what happens to the winners beyond the life of the award? How many go on to the next stage of development? The tenth anniversary furnished an occasion to ask these questions. The answers suggest a significant new direction for the programme.

The main motive for the review was, ‘to move away from the traditional “fund and forget” model,’ as the DM’s Virginia Ziulu explains.

Some of the supported ventures have found subsequent funders, but this was largely outside the programme’s mandate. In 2011, the program shifted its focus to engage with past winners and discover how the World Bank could provide follow-on assistance.