A startup or start-up is a company or project undertaken by an entrepreneur to seek, develop, and validate a scalable business model. While entrepreneurship includes all new businesses, including self-employment and businesses that do not intend to go public, startups are new businesses that intend to grow large beyond the solo founder. At the beginning, startups face high uncertainty and have high rates of failure, but a minority of them do go on to become successful and influential.
Niklas Zennström is a Swedish entrepreneur and technology investor. He is co-founder of the charity organization Zennström Philanthropies.
William Drayton is an American social entrepreneur. Drayton was named by U.S. News & World Report as one of America's 25 Best Leaders in 2005. He is responsible for the rise of the phrase "social entrepreneur", a concept first found in print in 1972.
Jean Case is an American businesswoman, author, and philanthropist who is chair of the board of National Geographic, CEO of Case Impact Network, and CEO of the Case Foundation. She is married to AOL co-founder Steve Case.
Legatum Limited, also known as Legatum, is a private investment firm, headquartered in Dubai, United Arab Emirates. Legatum is a partnership that uses its own funds to invest globally. The firm also invests in activities to promote entrepreneurship and free enterprise as well as anti-slavery, health and education initiatives.
Paul Rice is the Founder & CEO of Fair Trade USA, the leading third-party certifier of Fair Trade products in North America. Since launching Fair Trade USA in 1998, Rice has brought Fair Trade into the mainstream and built a movement to expand its impact. He has challenged and collaborated with hundreds of companies to rework their global supply chains to obtain high-quality products that support community development and environmental protection.
Susan Davis is an author, public speaker, consultant and expert on international development and social entrepreneurship. She is the Chairperson of Solutions Journalism Network, an Adjunct Associate Professor at New York University Stern School of Business, a coach to social entrepreneurs and active on many boards and advisory councils.
Tory Burch is an American fashion designer, businesswoman, and philanthropist. She is the Executive Chairman and Chief Creative Officer of her own brand, Tory Burch LLC. She was listed as the 88th most powerful woman in the world by Forbes in 2020.
Blake Mycoskie is an American entrepreneur, author, and philanthropist. He is the founder of Toms Shoes and co-founder of Madefor.
Angela Benton is an American businesswoman. Benton founded NewME (acquired), the first startup accelerator for minorities globally in 2011. She is a pioneer of diversity and one of the most important African-Americans in the technology industry. She has helped minority-led tech companies raise over $47 million in venture capital funding.
Fredrick Douglas Scott is an American private equity investor, business consultant, philanthropist and contributing writer for Entrepreneur magazine, who pleaded guilty to conspiracy in 2014. In 2010 he was named one of Ebony magazine's "Top 30 Under 30", described as "the youngest African-American hedge fund founder in history", according to the Ebony article.
Turn 2 U Inc. dba The Last Mile (TLM) is an Oakland, CA based 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization whose mission is to provide opportunities for personal and professional growth for justice-impacted individuals through education and technology training. The Last Mile is celebrating more than a decade as an organization, originating with its first program in San Quentin State Prison with the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation. TLM has leveraged the power of public-private partnerships with Department of corrections and industry-leading companies to build and expand its programs. Programs are currently operating in 16 facilities across 7 states in the United States, including California, Indiana, Oklahoma, Michigan, North Dakota, Montana and Massachusetts. TLM has been able to expand its purpose, "To Imagine, Build, and Open Doors," into other facilities through these partnerships as well as funding and employment opportunities from the technology sector. Through in-prison education, transitional support, and workforce reentry, TLM is disrupting the system of mass incarceration across the United States. In-classroom curricula and course material prepare students for meaningful employment in modern job roles including web development, software engineering, and audio and video production. Students cultivate personal and professional development in alignment with the technical education and with the support of TLM reentry staff, volunteers, and a community founded on shared lived experience.
Digital Opportunity Trust (DOT) is a Canadian charitable organization and social enterprise that provides technology, entrepreneurship and leadership training programs for young people in East Africa, the Middle East, Latin America, and Canada. The organization's headquarters are in Ottawa, Ontario, with local operations around the globe. Since the organization was founded in 2001, DOT has directly affected more than 6,000 young people worldwide, who have gone on to reach over 1 million of their fellow community members. More than 90% of alumni, reportedly secure employment or start their own businesses within six months of completing DOT programming.
Defy Ventures is a United States-based 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization founded in 2010 by Catherine Hoke. The organization's goal is to address the social problems of mass incarceration, recidivism, and related issues by providing well-being, entrepreneurship, employment, and personal development training programs to individuals with criminal histories.
Ashoka is an American-based nonprofit organization that promotes social entrepreneurship by connecting and supporting individual social entrepreneurs. Their stated mission is "the creation of an association of the world's leading social entrepreneurs—men and women with system-changing solutions for the world's most urgent social problems—and fostering a global culture of everyone being a changemaker for the good of all".
Marcela Sapone is an American entrepreneur. She is the CEO of New York-based startup Hello Alfred, which she co-founded with Jessica Beck in 2014 while in business school.
Gay Gaddis is an American entrepreneur, speaker, author, and artist. In 1989, she founded T3, an advertising agency that grew into one of the largest female-owned agencies in the U.S., under her leadership for 30+ years with offices in New York, Atlanta, San Francisco and a headquarter in Austin, TX. T3 was a Certified Woman-Owned Business from 1999 - 2019, and through the T3 and Under program, Gaddis has been a pioneer in allowing parents to bring their newborn children into the office as a means by which to improve their transition to daycare. She currently serves as CEO of Gay Gaddis, LLC, empowering the next generation of business leaders through a women's development program she founded at the McCombs School of Business at University of Texas entitled Women Who Mean Business. She is an active speaker on women’s leadership, company culture and entrepreneurship. Her book, Cowgirl Power: How to Kick Ass in Business and Life, was released in January 2018, sharing insights and examples how to develop personal power and lead like a fearless cowgirl.
Presidential Ambassadors for Global Entrepreneurship (PAGE) was a collaborative advisory group created by former United States President Barack Obama tasked with creating entrepreneurial growth in America.
Njideka Françoise Harry is a World Economic Forum Schwab Foundation for Social Entrepreneurship Fellow.
Social entrepreneurship in South Asia involves business activities that have a social benefit, often for people at the bottom of the pyramid. It is an emerging area of entrepreneurship that is supported by both the public sector and the private sector.
