Deep social ventures are social ventures (including charities), where the products, services and interventions they offer draw directly on research expertise for the public good. Chris Fellingham makes the case for how new ways of funding deep social ventures could deliver more diverse opportunities for social innovation and benefits to society.
In the early 2000s the term ‘deep tech’ emerged within the startup world. It referred to challenging scientific and engineering research and development that went into the products or services the venture was building. ‘Deep tech’ wasn’t just a buzzword, it reflected a real change in startup investments that took advantage of breakthroughs in areas as diverse as synthetic biology, Big Data, materials science, quantum technology and Artificial Intelligence. By the 2010s deep tech picked up pace; more specialist VC’s emerged, universities became more pro-active in pursuing commercialisation buoyed by the likes of CRISP-R therapeutics, SpaceX Oxford Nanopore and DeepMind.
Deep tech now represents 20% of venture capital and is the basis of an emerging ecosystem of accelerators and investors. What makes Deep tech exciting is its application of engineering and research to large scale problems in society and the economy – climate change, pandemics, genetic disease, sustainable agriculture that would otherwise prove difficult if not impossible to tackle without the breakthroughs deep tech ventures bring to market. For this reason, governments have doubled-down on support for university R&D, one of the primary sources for deep tech ventures and its potential to deliver change.
While deep tech and increased government funding for R&D is primarily focused on STEM subjects, there has been a growing interest in how similar models might be applied to other research areas focused on social and economic problems. These have come to be known as SHAPE ventures. SHAPE disciplines (Social sciences, Humanities and the Arts for people and the economy) may not always be associated with startups, but there is a growing generation of researchers interested in how startup models, be they for-profit, social ventures or charities can provide a basis for long-term impact.
While deep tech and increased government funding for R&D is primarily focused on STEM subjects, there has been a growing interest in how similar models might be applied to other research areas focused on social and economic problems.
Numbering in the hundreds, SHAPE ventures defy easy categorisation by subject, sector or business model with one exception – over half of them are social ventures. These startups are taking insights from years of research, expertise and studies and building social ventures to tackle societal problems directly. It is here that Deep social ventures are beginning to emerge.
Deep social ventures, like deep tech, have their origins in research and particularly SHAPE research. SHAPE researchers have long studied social challenges, understanding the problem at a deep structural level and designing interventions, the difference now is the increasingly widespread opportunity to use ventures, rather than the traditional route of just policy.
Are deep social ventures just social ventures by another name? Deep social ventures are a new entrant to the family of social ventures (including charities), but they are qualitatively different, they are a new asset class for social ventures and will drive innovation in which problems are tackled and how they are tackled by coupling research insights and evidence to interventions.
Four characteristics define Deep social ventures:
Using research to identify the underlying cause of a social problem
Some problems are easy to spot, others benefit from deep research and insights into problems and their underlying causes. The Shame Lab, created by Professor Luna Dolezal, focuses on the effects feelings of shame have in society, from poorer engagement with healthcare to an increased tendency to violence, which can lead to more involvement in the criminal justice system. In particular, research identified ‘Post-traumatic shame’ as a driver of maladaptive behaviours, this insight coupled with research based methods to identify and manage it enables frontline workers such healthcare workers and police, to better identify and address behaviours rather than just their symptoms.
Designing interventions that work
Social science has long known that many interventions across government, charity and social enterprise that seem common-sense often fail, from the infamous playpumps to the complexities of microcredit lending. Deep social ventures’ interventions are not guaranteed, but they bring the highest standards of research to de-risk the chance that they don’t. The Teacher Success Platform (TSP) developed by Professor Rob Klassen was derived, built and tested through research on identifying attributes in successful teachers. TSP developed its classroom simulations to imitate real life challenges and has since tested them across USA, Europe, Asia, Africa alongside teacher education programmes like Teach First and international development organisations to ensure its insights were transferable across contexts. Since its inception over 150,000 educators have been assessed and supported leading to better classroom outcomes
High-impact interventions
If the first challenge is finding what works, the second is finding interventions that give the most value for money given public, philanthropic and impact financing is always woefully short. Deep social ventures have an advantage here too – immersion in the literature enables them to identify the most high impact interventions to deliver through their social venture. Parenting for Lifelong Health, which focuses on reducing domestic violence against children in LMIC countries by focusing on evidence-based parenting programmes, has done just this and have already prevented an estimated 81,000 children from harm and reached 400,000 families across 35+ countries by taking what works best and delivering it at scale .
‘Reaching from the top shelf’
Researchers aren’t the only ones able to provide evidence- based interventions and not all interventions that work have a research basis or need one to know they are effective. However, some challenges are so complex it’s hard to see the solution emerging from anywhere else. Wise Responder is based on decades of econometric and international research that aims to quantify types of poverty such as health, access to education and sanitation. The research on multi-dimensional poverty alone has been critical in helping international organisations like the United Nations measure progress. However, Wise Responder aims to go a step further and drive impact itself. Wise Responder is working with financial institutions and banks to measure UN SDG 1 – No Poverty. Not only are financial institutions able to now measure types of poverty, they are able to target investment to where its needed be that access to sanitation or improving education. Much of the capital exists (for example sustainability bonds) but only with accurate measurement and targeting – based on quantitative measurements that capture types of poverty – can it be properly target to alleviate the 1.3bn people who suffer from one or more of these types of poverty.
As with all trends, Deep social ventures are not unprecedented. Oxford Policy Management, which provides evidence-based advice to the international development sector, was spun out of the university in 1979. Change comes when a data point like this becomes a trend. SHAPE ventures have grown from a handful 7 years ago to over 300 today and this is driving Deep social ventures in the UK and internationally.
Like ‘Deep tech’, Deep social ventures – and by extension the complex social problems they can help solve – will only achieve their potential if an ecosystem emerges to support them. In the long run this requires change throughout the innovation ecosystem, from UKRI and InnovateUK ensuring funding for researchers to trial and develop interventions, just as they do for deep tech product development, to developing investor and foundation networks to fund and develop expertise in financing, supporting and scaling deep social ventures. Supported correctly, we can enter a new era of social innovation to meet the challenges of the 21st century from poverty to climate change, health inequality to education.
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