FAQ's

Who does Bamboo Finance advise?
We advise investors and investment funds. Our first client is the Oasis Fund, which has raised capital from private individual and institutional investors in both Europe and the US. Oasis Fund investors have dedicated capital to be invested on a commercial basis and appreciate the value of delivering a blended return (financial, social and environmental). The Oasis Fund cannot accept grants, but does work with innovative foundations and trusts wishing to invest their endowments in the Fund.

Why work with us?  How do we differ from others?
This is an opportunity to be a pioneer. Something exciting is happening in that the world is changing the way it thinks about value. With a team that has a strong track record in understanding social and financial value creation, there is huge potential to prove that commercial investment in social and environmental enterprises can change the world.

We are not an SME fund. We are not a grantmaker. We are not a microfinance fund. We are not a development agency. We are fundamentally different in that our strategy is based in diversification of investments globally and strong fund management.

The founder of Bamboo Finance, Jean-Philippe de Schrevel, has proven a similar model when he built Blue Orchard Finance in 2001. Blue Orchard is an asset management company specializing in investments within microfinance institutions in developing countries. He believed that microfinance was a powerful way to address poverty and has since proven that commercial investment in microfinance institutions has a place in portfolio allocation and can produce significant growth which allows products and services to reach even more low income consumers. As a result, Blue Orchard has attracted over USD700 Million directly to microfinance institutions from private investors and has inspired major commercial banks to serve microfinance institutions.

How do you find enterprises to invest in?
We source possible investments through a variety of methods. First, we have assembled a Social Advisory board which is nominating organizations and suggesting partners. Additionally, we have an experienced and highly mobile team which is building networks of partners supporting social ventures globally. If you would like to suggest a possible partner or investment, please email us at info @bamboofinance.com.

How to express interest or apply for finance?
If you are interested in obtaining funding, please send us a brief email summary (no more than 2 pages) of the following information about your venture: business overview; description of social impact; organizational history; description of financing needs; brief bios of team, and contact information.    If available, then also attach a business plan and key management biographies (not required).  Please submit all your information via email to info@bamboofinance.com.  It may take up to two weeks for us to get back to you because we review all submissions that we receive.   If we believe there is a fit, we will commence with our formal due diligence process.

How long does the entire process take from due diligence to disbursement?
Once the due diligence process commences, it can take from six to twelve weeks for a decision to be made by the Fund regarding the investment. This depends on the nature of the business and the quality of the information available to make a decision. A local visit from a Bamboo Finance team member is required as a part of the due diligence process. The money is paid out by the Fund as soon as all legal requirements contained in the term sheet are in place.

How do you monitor and support portfolio companies?
We take seriously the role of monitoring and helping to strengthen the capacities of the organizations in the portfolio of the Funds we advise. We believe in a partnership to ensure their success and realize the financial and social targets.  We acknowledge the limitations of being based in Geneva, and until we have enough scale to build regional offices, we have assembled a highly mobile team that can travel regularly to regions where the portfolio investments are operating.

We continue to build our internal capacities to provide post-investment support, which will remain limited, so we are building strategic partnerships with other entities globally to do so.   We have begun this through our Social Advisory Board, which is composed of leaders from institutions such as Ashoka, Schwab Foundation for Social Entrepreneurs and others.   We may deploy part of our management fee to specific entities for specialized operational support of portfolio companies.

We may also take part in supporting the organization by taking a seat on the board, however, this is not a requirement for every investment we make as it may not be appropriate in every case.

How will you measure social and environmental impact?
Measuring social and environmental impact is an important part of our work, and we continue to invest resources into developing this component of our model. We will work with our portfolio of companies to identify appropriate targets for each enterprise and understand how they relate to others in our portfolio. We have identified our fist set of criteria and will continue to work closely with other investors (philanthropic and commercial), practitioners and academics to focus intensely and innovate in this space of social metrics and blended returns.

Are you profit-maximizing?
In addition to advising in investing in social enterprises, we are an innovative social enterprise ourselves.  We operate under strict margins and understand that at times profitable enterprises choose not to be profit-maximizing to protect their social impact.  We therefore strive to only support sustainable and potentially profitable ventures, and we focus on dual social and financial maximization of returns rather than just financial.

Why not use philanthropic donations to establish funds and then recycle it?
We seek to test the conventional risk/return paradigms and there is no better way to prove this than with commercial investors. In addition, we believe that the current base of philanthropic resources available to social ventures should not be drained. Instead, we need to expand the sources of capital available to social and environmental ventures which can use commercial capital as well as help support philanthropic capital to be more powerfully deployed in areas which are not appropriate for commercial finance. Additionally, commercial capital has the ability to be more flexible at times with regard to structure, use and supply.  Finally, if we are able to build an attractive track record, capital markets are a virtually unlimited source of funding.

What is your relationship with Blue Orchard Finance?
The founder of Bamboo Finance is also the co-founder of Blue Orchard Finance (Jean-Philippe de Schrevel), but these are completely separate legal entities with different investors and different objectives.  Unlike the focus on social enterprises taken by Bamboo Finance, Blue Orchard's mission is to promote private investments in projects and enterprises that contribute to the sustainable development of micro-entrepreneurship in emerging economies.   Bamboo Finance and Blue Orchard are housed in the same office space in Geneva. 

What is the relationship between Bamboo Finance and Oasis Fund?
Bamboo Finance provides investment advisory services to the Oasis Fund and we are looking for additional clients. 

How to contact us?

Messages can be sent to info @bamboofinance.com or direct mail can be sent to:  32 Rue De Malatrex, 1201 Geneva, Switzerland.