The leaders of Leapfrog Investments are out to prove those who doubt that impact investing can scale and attract big dollar figures wrong. Last week, with a big commitment from the Overseas Private Investment Corp., it took a step in that direction as it became the first billion dollar equity impact investing firm.
Leapfrog, which invests primarily in African and emerging Asian countries, has always been “obsessed with scale,” according to CEO Andy Kuper. Since then the obsession has grown both because scale matters in financial markets but also because the scale of the need from the poor is immense. It’s a balance he describes as “scale for profit and purpose.”
Leapfrog’s strategy has been to have development finance institutions anchor each of their fund raises, but the bulk of the capital is coming from major private sector investors, including Zurich, Swiss Re, TIAA-CREF and AXA.
About the author
Adva Saldinger@AdvaSal
Adva Saldinger is a Senior Reporter at Devex where she covers development finance, as well as U.S. foreign aid policy. Adva explores the role the private sector and private capital play in development and authors the weekly Devex Invested newsletter bringing the latest news on the role of business and finance in addressing global challenges. A journalist with more than 10 years of experience, she has worked at several newspapers in the U.S. and lived in both Ghana and South Africa.
