During the past several years, a market-based approach to serving the approximately four billion people at the base of the pyramid has been touted as an untapped opportunity for company growth. It also can be an additional strategy for nonprofits to enhance their effectiveness and a novel approach for aid agencies and governments to more efficiently achieve their development goals.
Social enterprises are organizations that trade goods or services for a social purpose. Profits may be used to support social aims or the business itself may accomplish the social aim through its operation.
Our activities in these areas are conducted in partnership with the William Davidson Institute at the University of Michigan.
Colm Fay, Erb ‘12 and Amrita Kumar, Erb’11 contribute to new book featuring case studies from SRI leaders from around the world. 
“Electricity for the Poor: Distributing Power in India.”
Adam Carver is a 2011 Dow Sustainability Innovation Challenge winner and in the 
Melissa Antokal shares her experience working with the Mpala Wildlife Foundation in Kenya “…although our final report was an intensive, 122-page report including in-depth quantitative analyses of water and energy use, our experience was a rich, challenging and at times funny one.” She and other Erb and SNRE students work under the guidance of Professor Andy Hoffman to provide the research and analysis needed to help the Mpala Wildlife Foundation develop a path to sustainable growth and responsible energy consumption. 
The Erb Institute is delighted to announce the formation of the Coultrap Family International Project Fund, established in honor of Charlotte Coultrap-Bagg (MS/MBA ’11) and in memory of Paul W. Coultrap (MBA ’41). Grants from the Fund will support Erb Institute MS/MBA students via study abroad or other internationally based learning experiences including Master’s Opuses, internships and independent study. Establishment of the Fund is an important step toward advancing the Institute’s strategic objective of increasing global opportunities and representation in our programs. Students may submit funding applications beginning this fall.
Erb Managing Director, Rick Bunch, considers the lessons implicit in Professor Andy Hoffman’s latest research in the wake of the BP Oil and Japanese nuclear disasters. 
