Social Ventures Australia (SVA) will sponsor the Impact Investment Summit to be held in Sydney from the 19-21 October. The Summit will bring world leaders in impact investing together for the three day event, an inaugural event for the Asia Pacific.

Impact investment, which seeks both social and financial returns, is growing in prominence across the world. The market for impact investing is estimated to reach A$32 billion domestically, and US$500 billion – $1 trillion globally, over the next decade.

The Impact Investment Summit aims to grow the impact investment sector and mobilise the investment community to understand and educate its members on how to galvanise capital for social good as well as financial returns. The conference will feature sessions on a range of issues, including designing and implementing an impact investment strategy, sourcing and structuring impact investments across asset classes, and the measurement and evaluation of social impact.

Ian Learmonth, Executive Director of Impact Investing at SVA commented:

‘Like any other enterprise, social purpose organisations need access to capital to allow them to grow, innovate and deliver life-changing social impact.  A larger and more robust impact investing market will realise benefits to the community at every level. It will result in increased capital flow to the community sector, encourage innovation, and enable government to fund social services with greater efficacy.’

SVA links socially-oriented organisations with a need for capital to a network of impact investors by developing and managing a range of impact investment instruments. These include debt and equity investments in social enterprises, Social Impact Bonds (SIBs), and bespoke financial solutions for large scale transactions.

SVA led the development of the $165m Goodstart transaction and raised the capital for Australia’s first SIB, the Newpin Social Benefit Bond.