The other highlight of the Investors Circle visit to Nairobi was the visit to the factory where BURN Manufacturing builds its cookstoves. Charcoal cookstoves, as charcoal is the most popular fuel used for cooking by urban and peri-urban Kenya. Factory, as in a fully-modern manufacturing facility, little different from those found in the U.S., Europe, Japan, or China. One large building filled...
Fledge has been importing African entrepreneurs to Seattle for the last two years. This week we finally got to visit a few in their home country, as part of an impact investing trip with Investors Circle. Unsurprisingly, there is no substitute to seeing their businesses first-hand vs. seeing pictures and movies while sitting in downtown Seattle at the Impact Hub. No amount of pictures can...
The Social Entrepreneur podcast is for aspiring and early-stage social entrepreneurs; and for those who want to make an impact on the world. Stories about the grand challenges in the world and the solutions that they are creating. Why does Fledge exists??? Listen to the interview on Stitcher or Soundcloud or download it on iTunes. Links to the talks and companies mentioned in the interview: 1st...
Yusuf Tura came to Seattle as a lone refugee from Ethiopia at age 16 to escape war and conflict in the country at the time. Today, the Seattle cab driver’s life has been transformed by a decision he made after returning home in 2007. When he got to his home town, he was shocked. All the trees had been killed off and stripped away by pollution from stoves that burn wood and dung. The dirty...
Forbes.com
Seattle-Based Fledge Hatches 39 ‘Fledglings’
CNBC’s Nightly Business Report
November 5th, 2015
Starts at 12:50
Plus a quick mention on CNBC.com
Emerald City start-ups seeing green
Investors and entrepreneurs in Africa increasingly find each other online. Zambia based startup company Zamgoat recently secured a 20K investment deal from the US based accelerator Fledge, who found them via the online VC4Africa platform. We had a chance to catch up with both the entrepreneur and the investor.
Read the story of entrepreneur Paul Nyambe.
And the story of how Fledge found Zamgoat.
Fledge6, as in the sixth session of Fledge, the conscious company accelerator. 170 applications from 45 countries arrived. We invite just seven to participate. And this seven are incredibly existing. For the first time ever, the invitees include not only no teams from Seattle, but no American teams at all. Seven startups hailing from five different countries: As always, seven impactful...
After hundreds upon hundreds of applications reviewed by Fledge, there are a series of common patterns that lead to rejections, no doubt frustrating the applicants, and similarly frustrating the screeners. 1. Team, lack thereof The number one criteria that Fledge seeks out is a strong team. If you’ve can’t even convince a friend to call themselves a member of your team, then you are...
It is application season here again at Fledge, and with it, dozens of repeats of a very common first-time entrepreneurial mistake. A grand vision with multiple components, which as a whole, all implemented, all popular, would solve some problem or simply make people’s lives better. To the ears of the entrepreneur, it sounds wonderful. To anyone who doesn’t review hundreds of business plans each...