The 2022 Australian Impact Investment Awards has named the Save the Children Australia Impact Investment Fund one of the top finalists in the Impact Asset Manager of the Year Award category.

In addition, Save the Children Impact Investment Fund Director and Save the Children Global Ventures Founder and CEO, Paul Ronalds, has received an Individual Outstanding Achievement Award.

The Australian Impact Investment Awards, a collaboration between the Impact Investment Summit Asia Pacific and the Impact Investing Hub, recognise organisations and individuals across five categories for expertise, commitment and outstanding activity in the Australian impact investing ecosystem.

The recognition for Save the Children Australia Impact Investment Fund as Impact Asset Manager of the Year Finalist acknowledges it as a leading Australian impact investment funds manager: raising funding from investors to provide loans and equity investments to social enterprises that are contributing solutions to improve the lives of vulnerable children and families, while offering an attractive return on investment.

To date, the Save the Children Australia Impact Investment Fund has invested in seven social enterprises, working in edtech, health tech, child protection and aligned sectors.

“We have ambitious goals – to ensure no child dies of a preventable cause, all children get a quality basic education, and no child is subject to violence,” Save the Children Australia CEO Mat Tinkler said. “To achieve these goals, we recognise that we cannot rely on traditional charity operating models alone and must embrace innovative approaches.

“We are proud to be recognised as an industry innovator in our quest to solve some of the world’s most pressing problems and thank our partners who are motivated to have a positive impact with their investment portfolios.”

Following the launch of the Save the Children Australia Impact Investment Fund in 2020, and recognising the urgency for greater capacity to unlock private sector capital to scale new models of impact, former Save the Children Australia CEO Paul Ronalds has led the establishment of Save the Children Global Ventures this year.

He has received the Individual Outstanding Achievement Award, which honours individuals who have made an outstanding achievement in the past year to support the growth of the Australian impact investment market. This Award recognises an innovation, vision and significant development driven by an individual that contributes greatly throughout the impact investing ecosystem.

“We will not solve the planets most pressing social and environmental challenges without unlocking significant new sources of funding – this is the great potential of impact investing,” Mr Ronalds said.

“My hope is that Save the Children’s leadership will encourage other Australian charities to become more involved in impact investing, as either an investor or fund manager.”

Mr Ronalds has worked within the government and not for profit sectors over more than 20 years. He was previously Deputy CEO of World Vision Australia and a senior bureaucrat in the Department of Prime Minister and Cabinet on policies designed to assist families and communities.

The winner of the 2022 Impact Asset Manager of the Year Award was Conscious Investment Management. The three additional recipients of the 2022 Individual Outstanding Achievement Award were Rosemary Addis, Giles Gunesekera and Alan Burrell

Notes:

The Save the Children Australia Impact Investment Fund has made investments in companies including:

• Inquisitive, established to democratise access for all students to high quality lessons and best learning content and outcomes. The Impact Investment Fund connected Inquisitive with a grant opportunity to provide access to approximately 1000 schools (including 800 in low SES areas) to support learning for 315,000 students.
• THINKMD, the clinical intelligence technology for health care workers in low-income contexts, assists health care workers to provide more accurate diagnosis, resulting in better treatment and outcomes. THINKMD works with NGOs, community health care workers, pharmacists and clinics in Kenya, Bangladesh, Indonesia and Cambodia.
• Zeraki, the Kenyan based education company providing tech-tools to maximise productivity and time that teachers spend in the classroom. Their tools replace manual administration tasks with technology solutions and provide rich content for students, particularly in rural and regional parts of Kenya.