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This case study was developed using data from secondary sources. The data was collected from the organization’s website, annual reports, press releases, published reports and documents available on the internet.

According to the International Energy Agency’s (IEA) World Energy Outlook (WEO), 775 million people worldwide would not have access to electricity even by 2022, with the majority of them living in sub-Saharan Africa (SSA) (Cozzi et al., 2022). In SSA, energy poverty had been a serious issue over the years. According to the IEA, 600 million people lacked access to electricity in 2019, while 900 million people cooked with traditional fuels (Cozzi et al., 2022). A World Bank report from 2018 said many SSA countries had energy access levels of less than 25% (Cozzi et al., 2022). Energy poverty in SSA hampered sustainable development and economic growth.

Despite significant efforts to address this poverty, Africa remained the continent with the lowest energy density in the world. Although solar and other energy-saving products were appealing, their adoption rates were modest, and their distribution strategies were not particularly effective. The lack of electricity exacerbated a number of socioeconomic problems, as it increased the demand for and use of wood fuel, which caused serious health problems and environmental harm.

While working in Uganda, Katherine Lucey (Lucey) saw that having no electricity had negatively affected women’s health in particular because it was women who were responsible for taking care of the home. These effects were both direct and indirect. The women’s reliance on potentially harmful fuels for cooking, such as firewood and charcoal, resulted in their suffering from respiratory and eye problems, in addition to other health issues. Furthermore, the distribution of energy-saving and renewable energy items was seen as the domain of men, and there was an inherent gender bias in energy decisions. Women were not encouraged to participate in energy decisions, despite the fact that they were the ones managing the home and would gain from doing so. In addition, because there was no light after dusk, people worked less efficiently. Lucey saw the economic and social difficulties that electricity poverty caused for women in rural Africa. She also witnessed how the lives of a few families and organizations changed after they started using solar products. This motivated her to start Solar Sister with the mission of achieving a sustainable, scalable impact model for expanding access to clean energy and creating economic opportunities for women.

Solar Sister collaborated with local women and women-centric organizations to leverage the existing network. Women were trained, provided all the necessary support and encouraged to become Solar Sister Entrepreneurs and sell solar products in their communities and earn a commission on each sale. To provide clean energy at their customers’ doorstep, the Solar Sister Entrepreneurs received a “business in a bag” – a start-up kit containing inventory, training and marketing assistance.

Solar Sister’s business model empowered the women in SSA by providing them with an entrepreneurship opportunity and financial independence. Also, the use of solar products helped them shift from using hazardous conventional cooking fuels and lead a healthy life. The children in their households were able to study after sunset, and people in the community became more productive with access to clean energy.

The COVID-19 pandemic outbreak, however, had a serious impact on Solar Sister. It found it challenging to mentor and encourage new business owners due to restrictions on travel and on group gatherings. The Solar Sisters were unable to do business outside the house either. Their source of income, which they relied on to support their families, was therefore impacted. The COVID-19 outbreak also slowed down the progress achieved by the community over the years and made household energy purchasing power worse. Furthermore, the organization was also grappling with other issues like limited access to capital, lack of awareness and infrastructural challenges. Another challenge lay in monitoring and evaluating the organization’s impact on the last mile.

In the absence of standardized measurement tools and issues in determining the social impact of Solar Sister, it would be interesting to see what approach Lucey will take to measure the impact of Solar Sister on the society. What measurement tool/s will Lucey implement to gauge the social impact of Solar Sister?

This case is intended for use in PG/Executive-level programs as part of a course on Social Entrepreneurship and Sustainability.

The purpose of this paper is twofold. First, it discusses the role of entrepreneurship, in general, and women entrepreneurship, in particular, in advancing the cause of sustainable development. Future research directions that emerge from the body of knowledge that the paper relied upon have been identified. Second, it presents unique cases of eight women-led enterprises in energy sector spread across three continents, namely, Asia, Africa and the USA; identifies the constraints and opportunities, analyses the business models and their impact on the quality of life pointers to demonstrate the role of women-led enterprises in sustainable development.

The paper combines a schematic review of literature at the interface of entrepreneurship and sustainable development coupled with select relevant case studies addressing the interface. The real-life case studies, which are consciously chosen and compiled from secondary data sources, complement and testify the insights drawn from the schematic literature review. The framework for analyzing the case studies is designed around multidimensional drivers and factors that steer the women-led enterprises.

The paper identified the need to look at entrepreneurship through the gendered lens not only for studying entrepreneurship as a discipline, in general, but also to gauge whether the inclusion of women as entrepreneurs is actually advancing the cause of sustainable development. Besides analyzing real-life case studies of accomplished women entrepreneurs to gauge their motivations and mindsets, the process of identification of pain points, identifying differentiating and innovative features, or studying the impact on society, economy and environment, the paper eventually created a schematic framework of key enablers, constraints and strategic response of women entrepreneurs.

Given the dearth of adequate theoretical and empirical contributions on the study of effectuation, mindsets and drivers of how women entrepreneurship steers the process of sustainable development, the paper is an endeavour in that direction.

The study aims to develop recommendations for optimal Internet of things (IoT) based solutions for a smart precision irrigation automation platform using morphological thinking (MT). The smart irrigation system (SIS) can be applied for green roof and green wall (GRGW) design by studying the relationships and configurations that will be analyzed, listed and synthesized, representing “solutions spaces” and their possibilities.

The research examines studying various cases of SIS; and assessing and analyzing the identified case studies through a decision support system (DSS) considering several factors regarding IoT, plant characteristics, monitoring, irrigation system and schedule, climate, cost and sensors used.

To develop recommendations for optimal IoT-based solutions for a smart precision irrigation automation platform.

The research paper analyzes and proposes a simultaneous solution to two conflicting problems. On the one hand, the paper proposes to apply greening of walls and roofs in hot arid regions, which will achieve greater environmental comfort. However, this is extremely difficult to implement in hot arid regions, since there is an objective problem – a lack of water. At the same time, the paper proposes the most rational approaches to organizing an irrigation system with the lowest water consumption and the highest efficiency for landscaping. Accordingly, this paper focuses on evaluating different types of SIS about the hot-arid climate in Qatar. The study aims to develop recommendations for optimal IoT-based solutions for a smart precision irrigation automation platform, which can be applied for green wall and roof design.

The study aims to provide an empirical investigation of social enterprises in the context of experiential learning. Specifically, the study aims to investigate the interplay between faith-based principles and the processes of opportunity recognition and exploitation through an in-depth, qualitative study of social enterprises offered through the Global Social Benefit Institute (GSBI).

In this study, student experiences with social entrepreneurship are examined and their subsequent reflections are analyzed. Applying the Gioia methodology to the sample of student reflection data, this study enriches the growing literature on sense-making by looking closely at how student entrepreneurs engage their own faith-based education in helping their teams, beneficiaries and stakeholders “make sense” of a social change opportunity.

This study finds evidence of variability in the elaboration of the faith-based principles when sampling on the social needs of affection, behavioral confirmation and status.

The results suggest a role for faith-based sense-making when confronting the realities of social change opportunities.

MBA/MS level programs.

Social entrepreneurship, sustainability and business strategy.

The case discusses about how social entrepreneur Katerina Kimmorley founded Pollinate Energy with five of her friends to provide solar lights to the urban slum dwellers in Bengaluru, the capital city of Karnataka, a state in the Southern part of India. The company recruited people known as “Pollinators” for distributing their solar lights to the communities on installments making it affordable to them. To scale-up its sustainable energy initiatives and expand its global reach, Pollinate Energy merged with the US-based solar energy company Empower Generation in 2018 to form Pollinate Group. Since the company was making losses and was a nonprofit organization, the new CEO of Pollinate Group Sujatha Ramani and the senior management team had to tackle the challenge of scaling up the company while financially empowering women microentrepreneurs from marginalized communities.

Study Pollinate Energy’s business model and explore ways in which it can be made sustainable. Discuss the personality traits of Kimmorley which contributed to her success. Discuss how the merger with Empower Generation will help Pollinate Group in expanding its global reach. Explore ways in which the venture can be scaled up further.

Pollinate Group focused on women empowerment to tackle the gender inequality challenge. The company provided equal opportunities for men and women, thereby removing discrimination from access to opportunities, sources, services and promotion of equal rights.

Teaching notes are available for educators only.

CSS 3: Entrepreneurship

Social entrepreneurs in both the developed and the developing countries have established social enterprises with the intent of solving social problems leveraging social innovations that create sustainable social impact goals. The research gap that calls for this research is the question: ‘Are social problems, social objectives, social activities, social outputs, social outcomes and social impact goals of social enterprises the same in the developed and the developing countries?’ Against the above backdrop, this chapter presents a comparative discourse of cases of social enterprises in the developed and developing countries using the Theory of Change framework to provide answers to the above research question. The chapter adopts a qualitative research method to generate rich findings from diverse cases, reports, articles, and other secondary sources from the developed and developing economies. To ensure academic rigour and objectivity, a sample of 50 scholarly works on social enterprises were reviewed, which produced in-depth insights on the subject. Additionally, 16 cases on social enterprises from the developed and developing countries were purposively selected and meticulously analysed using the content analysis (CA) and the thematic analysis (TA). The first finding revealed that the social enterprises in the developed countries focused on ‘the secondary-level social issues’ such as education, health, environmental issues, psycho-social disabilities, wealth inequality, integration enterprises, work-integration services, financial exclusion, and gender balance. This is the focus of Ashoka, Children Commissioner, Allen Carr Easyway, Angaza Design Inc., Bridge International Academies, and others. The second finding indicated that the social enterprises in the developing countries focused on ‘the primary level social issues’ such as illiteracy, poor school enrollment, unemployment, poverty, social exclusion, gender imbalance, weak healthcare system including hygiene and sanitation. This is the focus of VisionSpring, Danone Clover – Daniladies and Danimama, Unjani Clinic NPC, Indego Africa, and others. The implication of the findings is that irrespective of continental contexts, social enterprises are established to bridge critical social problems, hence their philosophy transcends geographical contexts. The chapter concludes with a summary of insightful information and suggestions, which could trigger more empirical research on the subject.

Presents three prize‐winning and five short‐listed entries in the John Smith & Sons (Glasgow) Ltd/Paisley College Library Scottish Schools Essay Competition. Offers imaginative ideas or reasoned views of what books and libraries might be like in the next century.