ABSTRACT
India's impact investing sector has made significant advances in the last decade, and now has a number of ecosystem elements to support a thriving social enterprise sector. This chapter traces the evolution of this ecosystem, breaking it down into key building blocks and discussing their importance, and how they have developed over time to support social entrepreneurship in India. India's social enterprise and impact investing ecosystem provides financial and non-financial support to entrepreneurs as they navigate business and social impact challenges in their journey from the idea stage to scale and expansion. Social enterprise platforms, networks and forums play a significant role in identifying ideas and business models, in connecting entrepreneurs with mentors and investors and in increasing dialogue, discourse and debate about key challenges and innovations in the sector. The diaspora is playing a key role in the development in countries such as China, India, Ireland and Israel.
