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How Can I Start My Own Business?

Strategy Driven

Whether your idea for your small business is one you have fleshed out on your own, or one you’ve developed with the help of family and friends, make sure it’s a solid one. For more information on market research and competitive analysis, utilize this guide from the SBA. Develop a Clear Business Plan.

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How to Raise Money as a Business

Strategy Driven

They must be informed of your progress and any challenges you may be facing. Some alternative sources of funding for businesses include: Grants from government agencies or private foundations Microfinance organisations that provide small loans to entrepreneurs in developing countries.

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Making Microfinance More Effective

Harvard Business Review

A major challenge for international development efforts is determining which financial tools provide durable buffers against such setbacks. The Grameen model of microfinance gained a great deal of attention in the international development field after early data showed that it was associated with high repayment and low default.

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The Microfinance Contagion Scenario

Harvard Business Review

So far, the Andhra Pradesh (AP) microfinance crisis has largely been viewed as a local issue, with relatively little impact beyond AP or India's borders. Other microfinance crises, in Bolivia, Nicaragua, Nigeria, and Bosnia, have not spread beyond the borders of a particular country. That could likely have consequences.

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Can Technology End Poverty?

Harvard Business Review

Berkeley researcher Kentaro Toyama has a blog dedicated to calling out naïve or inappropriate uses of information and communication technologies (ICT). Calling himself the ICT4D jester (using the development jargon for "information and communication technologies for development"), he has no shortage of material.

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How One Startup Developed a Sales Model That Works in Emerging Markets

Harvard Business Review

Experiment #5: Microfinance Institutions. In emerging markets, microfinance has been a key economic engine in helping low-income households fund businesses and other important purchases in daily life. If our customers are liquidity constrained and risk averse to purchasing a pricey item, was there a model to solve for that?

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Global Entrepreneurs Need New Funding Models

Harvard Business Review

For me, it has been a problem of finance until LEDFC," he says, referring to the Liberian Enterprise Development Finance Corporation that offers Liberian-owned firms desperately needed small business loans. The goal is "to develop sustainable banking products which are more accessible for qualified candidates and women in general."