I'm investing in Eskala because of their ambitious mission to empower 18 million people living in poverty with financial services.  I love that they are a startup being spun out of a well established, industry leading nonprofit. Microfinance has been one of the most revolutionary approaches to poverty alleviation over the last 50 years, but has always had extremely high interest rates because of the costs of administration. By investing directly in locally owned banking co-ops (over 170 already in the network!) and trusting the ability of those closest to the borrowers to manage risk, they've maintained an outstanding 0% default rate while offering interest rates significantly below the industry average.

The CEO Colleen and her team are strong with domain expertise and have succeeded together previously.   They have over 10 years of operational excellence in building out Global Brigades as a regional leader in sustainable development programs throughout Central America. At a personal level, I have the privilege of knowing they are people of deep integrity, authenticity, and humility. I have a very high level of confidence in their ability to navigate complex decision-making and achieve massive growth without sacrificing mission.

The Eskala innovation has already been recognized as the best economic development initiative in rural Panama by the United Nations Development Program. They are still in the early stages but the direction is clear: Eskala is a bottom-up solution that empowers local stakeholders with capital at scale and might be the best opportunity that exists to help alleviate global poverty through a sustainable business model.