Entrepreneurs apply tech expertise to social problems

If Raj Merchant has his way, the night of Friday, May 17, will bring the technoscenti of Portland to a Pearl District gallery to pledge their time, expertise and money to leveraging the digital economy for the benefit of poor people all over the world.

Merchant, the founder and principal of Strategy@work, a business consulting firm, is the president of the Portland chapter of Digital Partners, a nonprofit based in Seattle that is dedicated to bringing together IT (information technology) entrepreneurs and social entrepreneurs--that is, foundations and development organizations--to help alleviate poverty through market-based solutions.

"We can't solve world hunger," said Merchant, "but we have 10 projects ongoing, and we are aligned with universities and companies to implement these projects." And Digital Partners, given enough interest from the technology and business community, can do more. Merchant hopes that this month's fundraiser, along with a forum that Intel is holding to discuss "doing business across the so-called `Digital Divide,'" will help to raise not just money but awareness.

"We need people to contribute their time, resources, and hopefully, funds, so that the projects we've started can be successful in driving change," Merchant said.

The approach that Digital Partners advocates--using the tools of capitalism to help the poor create both personal and community benefit--is not unique. Other organizations have long worked with the world's poor to aid in the creation of small businesses and industrial groupings to enhance the general level of economic activity in backward economies.

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But Digital Partners' emphasis on using the tools of the digital economy has clearly struck a chord with some pretty significant players in the IT world. The nonprofit's launch and ongoing support have drawn a wide range of executives from tech companies, especially Microsoft and from many other business sectors, too. Digital Partners also has a number of politicians from different countries serving on its boards and its "brain trust."

In conjunction with the Digital Partners fundraiser on the 17th, Intel Research is presenting its forum, titled "Seeds," on the 16th and 17th at its Jones Farm campus in Hillsboro. Speakers will include the executive director of Digital Partners, Akhtar Badshah; Michael Best of MIT's Digital Nations program; Peter Bladin of the Grameen Technology Center; Gary Herman from Hewlett-Packard's E-Inclusion initiative; Jean Canavan from Motorola Corp., and others.

For information on the Digital Partners reception, which will feature an address by Executive Director Badshah, contact Raj Merchant at rmerchant@digitalpartners.org. For more information on Digital Partners, go to http://www.digitalpartners.org.

Contact Aliza Earnshaw at 503-219-3433 or by e-mail at aearnshaw@bizjournals.com.

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