Digital Partners India has launched an innovative partnership to tap technological and entrepreneurial expertise to achieve breakthroughs in the reduction of poverty in Africa. The objective is to engage the IT expertise involved in technology-based market building efforts, and link it to their philanthropic aims by creating a new model of a “venture capital fund” to trigger social change. Digital Partners for Africa (DAPA), centered at Accra, Ghana, has been greatly aided by adopting Digital Partners India's Initiatives.

Digital Partners for Africa links entrepreneurs from the IT sector in Africa and rest of the world to social entrepreneurs and start-ups that are experimenting with the use of digital technology for health care, literacy, and grassroots empowerment of the poor. Selected NGOs and start-ups gain the expertise and objectivity necessary to refine their visions, develop their business models, and build their teams, while efficiently moving them along the funding path. Social investors gain access to an expanding universe of exciting opportunities to trigger breakthroughs in Africa’s poverty reduction. In addition, social investors find funding partners within international foundations, intergovernmental and governmental agencies also working in Africa. All of the projects supported by this fund fit, to the greatest extent possible, our criteria for being scalable, catalytic, bottom-up, collaborative, and technology-driven.

The Africa Initiative drawn on the South Asia effort and will mobilize a cluster of stakeholders with a direct interest in Africa’s sustainable development — African and global business leaders, government and intergovernmental agencies, foundations, NGOs and academics. These leaders will form a “brain trust” that will help with the decision-making process, pinpointing ways that information technology can be tapped to trigger market-based solutions (and civil society action) to the region’s poverty. The initiative is a result of several informal conversations and meetings with African IT entrepreneurs who are interested in forming a network of entrepreneurs that serve Africa.

Several factors make Africa an important next step: It is quite clear that the African IT experience is considerably different from the South Asian experience. For example, there is not a significant concentration of corporate executives or entrepreneurs engaged in IT from Africa. Also, within Africa there does not exist a high level of IT use, nor is there a large skill base. However, there are several factors that do make Africa the next logical place to start. There are a number of African based IT services that have been launched. There are efforts within key sectors to increase the IT skill level in some countries in Africa; there are a number of Indian entrepreneurs who have African origins, are members of the Digital Partners India's South Asia Initiative and are very interested to connect with this effort; and finally there is a growing interest within entrepreneurs serving Africa and those with interest in Africa’s development — i.e., universities, foundations or bi-lateral agencies that are interested in exploring the formation of a network that could accelerate the pace of change

Objective:

This initiative will:

1.	Identify and form a network of African IT entrepreneurs — similar to what exists for South Asia - The Indus Entrepreneurs (TiE) — that is working towards helping each other succeed.
2.	Identify and form a “brain trust” of IT entrepreneurs, social entrepreneurs, development leaders, foundation executives, academics, and government officials that are working to help bring the benefits of IT to the poor.
3.	Undertake careful, initial research to better understand the nexus between information technology and poverty in Africa.
4.	Develop a database of NGOs and development agencies working on IT projects aimed at the poor and underserved.
5.	Develop a “social venture capital fund” that will incubate NGO’s or start-ups that develop content targeted to the needs faced by the poor and can become a catalyst for triggering change in Africa.
6.	Foster partnership arrangements linking the African IT leaders with corporate, foundation, and governmental partners also involved in poverty reduction in Africa.

Engagement and Outreach

DAPA will develop a Network of African Entrepreneurs learning from The Indus Entrepreneurs (TiE) experience. This network would bring together IT entrepreneurs and those interested in supporting entrepreneurial activity in Africa to form a mutually supportive group. The precise objectives and organizational structure would depend on the entrepreneurs themselves. Digital Partners India would act as a catalyst and mobilize the effort to identify key IT leaders of African origin around the globe and have them begin a dialogue. Sharing the experience of the TiE leadership in their effort to form a successful network organization would support this endeavor.

DAPA will develop a Brain Trust of African IT leaders around the globe. This will be an on-going effort and will involve: a) establishing a mechanism of effective communication and exchange of ideas among brain trust members; and b) reaching out to others in the African community around the globe through smaller meetings and the media.

DAPA will build partnerships and enter into strategic alliances with multinationals, foundations, NGOs, universities, and government agencies that have a direct interest in Africa or have an African employee base or are interested in promoting IT based solutions for poverty alleviation in Africa. These include: Microsoft, Citicorp, Ford Foundation, Kellogg Foundation, Rockefeller Foundation, Open Society Institute, MIT Media Lab, University of Michigan, the United Nations, University of Washington, and more.

Assessment and Research

DAPA will undertake a careful assessment of and research on current efforts in the field of IT and development. Conduct an assessment of the various ways that digital technologies are being integrated into current development strategies, such as: Who is doing what? How is it funded? What has/hasn’t worked? What are ideas for bottom-up scaling of initiatives? Who is initiating and supporting key initiatives? A database will be established showing a typology of the different types of initiatives. Michael Best, Prof. at MIT Media Lab will undertake the initial assessment and develop collaboration with others in this area. Simultaneously, careful research in the area of IT/poverty nexus will be undertaken.

Content Development

Develop new content that will serve the poor in the areas of literacy, healthcare, and grassroots empowerment. Through a “solutions laboratory”-like setting, we will bring together IT entrepreneurs, NGO leaders, academics and others to focus on developing specific, creative solutions.

Social Venture Fund

A key aspect of DAPA is to launch a “social venture fund” that will incubate NGOs and start-ups that are launching innovative IT based efforts in the area of literacy, health-care and grassroots empowerment aimed at the poor and disenfranchised. The fund provides the expertise and objectivity to develop their business models, build their teams, while efficiently moving them along the funding path. A Social Venture Fund for South Asia has already been launched and will serve as a model for such an effort for Africa. We are not expecting that such a fund will be launched initially but the building of the brain trust, the African Entrepreneurial Network and Research and Assessment will lead to the development of such a fund.