Washington, DC – As a part of President Obama's commitment to increase investments and engagement in game-changing innovations, the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) has announced the launch of Development Innovation Ventures (DIV).
Through DIV, USAID seeks to work with a variety of partners to create innovative scalable solutions to core development challenges. Borrowing from the private venture capital model, DIV will seek, through a competitive process to invest resources in promising high-risk, high-return projects that breakthrough innovations often require, but are often difficult to undertake using traditional Agency structures. DIV's goal is to identify and support innovations with a proven, cost-effective impact that can match the scale of microfinance—75 million end users worldwide.
Maura O'Neill, Chief Innovation Officer, and Michael Kremer, a world-renowned economist from Harvard University originally conceived the idea of DIV. Kremer will be joining USAID as the Scientific Director of the DIV and will help recruit new talent and ideas to the Agency.
To read the full, original article click on this link: USAID Press Release: USAID Announces Development Innovation Ventures Program
