OUR 2016 ROUND-UP

22 December 2016

2016 has been quite a year. From one electoral earthquake to the other, here at Venturesome towers we decided to keep ourselves busy doing what we do best, providing much needed risk capital to social organisations here in the UK to grow and manage their operations. We’ve also tried to make the most of every occasion to celebrate. And we’ve done a pretty good job at it!

One highlight of 2016 for us has been the celebration of our 500^th deal, for which we gathered our investors and investees for a very enjoyable evening!

We also got shortlisted for the Social Investment Award, hosted by the Cabinet Office and NatWest. Our social investment into the pioneering Totnes Community Development Society and our SE-Assist programme were shortlisted respectively in the Institutional Social Investment and Market Building categories.

OUR DEALS

We have worked with a wide range of exciting organisations that are delivering valuable services across all sectors. Here is a short selection of interesting deals we have done this year:

• We provided development finance to sustain and grow an NGO called PEAS, one of the leading providers of non-state secondary education in Africa;
• We worked with CAF Bank to help Cornwall CLT develop affordable homes in Saint Teath, Cornwall;
• An unsecured loan was offered Youth Inspired which supports young people with severe learning difficulties in Bedford;
• We were also delighted to have made a loan to the unique and long-standing charity Prisoners Abroad which supports British citizens held in foreign prisons;
• Books Beyond Words is a CIC that designs and publishes books for people with learning disabilities. Venturesome supported them with the next stage of their expansion.

OUR THOUGHTS

As well as deals we also contributed to the general reflection within the social investment sector and tried to explain what we do and how we do it as clearly as we could. We covered many topics this year, including:

• How charitable organisations can be eligible for social investment even when they have little or no trading revenue;
• Advice on what social organisations need in order to grow, and how  social investment and business support can help;
• The fundamental importance of governance and how Venturesome assesses it;
• How social investment helps donors get more from their giving;
• We concluded our “Fail again. Fail better” trilogy by presenting how we have changed our approach in order to minimise unnecessary financial failure.

OUR GROWTH

There have been some exciting developments for Venturesome in 2016, in all regards: more partners, more team members and great success across all our funds.

• One really exciting opportunity for our investees is that Venturesome is now a Reach Fund ‘Access Point’ for investment readiness grants;
• Earlier this year our award-winning SE-Assist scheme has been launched in Wales to support early stage social enterprises. Overall, the programme had a great success in all three locations of Wales, Sussex and Croydon;
• We looked at the success of the first CLT Fund…
• … and have been just as excited seeing that CLT Fund 2 is well ahead of its initial targets!
• In terms of internal developments, we have been delighted to welcome many new members in our growing team. Zoe, Lekan, Ben, Leo, Toyin and Jaishree joined Venturesome this year.

With a full team, we are now ready to face 2017, its opportunities and its challenges! There will be even more exciting research and developments coming from Venturesome towers so please keep your eyes peeled! As we roll into the New Year we just wanted to say a big thank you to all our supporters and to wish you all a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year!