majamba.org, a social venture incubator

It took me 10 months to get funding for a company that is focussed on doing good. Upon reflection, I realized that the main reason is that there is a gap in the market for financing start-ups that are untried, untested, very early stage and fragile especially if they are planning to do good for the society AND aim to make a profit.

Socialists do not invest in you because you are making a profit and Capitalists do not really understand why you have to do anything else but make money!

So I got rejection letters & calls saying - we love your resume, we like your idea but come back to us when you are successful. I thought, why will I need them when I am successful, however, there was one clear exception - The Swiss Government / Vaud State / SELT, who decided to partially fund majamba LLC.

Then came a simple insight - hey, why not document all my lessons learnt and provide consulting to other folks starting a venture. I looked around and there are quite a few people doing that already. Then I thought maybe I can package my consulting into a solution for entrepreneurs and take care of 5 to 10 ventures. There are quite a few people in California who do this type of thing quite well...kept on thinking and talking to my friends. And then the idea presented itself - how about building an incubator that can support 1,000 social ventures every year, all focussed on eradicating poverty.

Incubate like a fish.

That is the goal of www.majamba.org

To be continued...