VANCOUVER, British Columbia, June 13, 2023 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- Today, the TELUS Pollinator Fund for Good is proudly launching its second annual impact report, detailing the nearly $40 million of its initial $100M investment commitment which has almost doubled its portfolio to 26 mission-driven startups, and is generating promising early results with portfolio companies delivering a 155 per cent revenue growth.
“The Pollinator Fund invests into early-stage, for‐profit companies where impact is baked into the business model. We support tenacious, mission-driven and diverse founders by leveraging TELUS’ broad network to make introductions, open doors, and guide the portfolio companies to maximum growth and impact,” said Blair Miller, Managing Partner, TELUS Pollinator Fund. “As one of the world’s largest corporate social impact funds, communicating our progress to our stakeholders is an important aspect of our commitment to advancing the impact investment ecosystem. We want to inspire other corporations to step up, and like us, invest in the next generation of responsible businesses.”
Investment with tangible social impacts
Since its launch in 2020, the Pollinator Fund has backed compelling solutions in four key pillars: supporting responsible agriculture, caring for our planet, transforming healthcare and enabling inclusive communities. The Pollinator Fund led numerous investments in 2022 into companies at the forefront of their sectors, including a series A in Virtual Gurus, which provides virtual assistance services while creating meaningful employment for marginalized groups, a bridge round in GotCare, which extends the reach of health care providers into the home setting, and a series A in Flash Forest, which accelerates wildfire reforestation using drones and technology. Highlights over the last year include:
- Advancing diversity, equity, and inclusion with 54 per cent of portfolio companies led by Indigenous and racialized people and 42 per cent led by women
- More than 1.1 million lives touched through improved services, products or income
- 22.2 million hectares of land sustainably managed
- 1.8 times increase in income for marginalized workers.
The Pollinator Fund has been recognized for excellence as an impact investor - not only through the investments across North America, but also by being awarded with Foresight Canada’s 2023 BC Cleantech Awards as Funder of the Year, and being named a finalist for Fast Company’s World Changing Ideas Awards for Social Impact Investing. With a large base of portfolio companies already, including Flash Forest, GotCare, Eli Health, Propagate, Moozoom, Shoelace Learning and Virtual Gurus, with even more to come, the future of social innovation through the Pollinator Fund is promising.
Advancing the impact investment ecosystem
The Pollinator Fund is launching the Pollinator Impact Navigation Tool which is built to serve the needs of startups and equip them with the information required to begin managing their impact and communicating outcomes to investors. The tool will help early-stage companies assess their progress in developing an Impact measurement and management (IMM) system, identify priority areas to address in order to level up their IMM system, and track, manage and communicate their impact on an ongoing basis in a meaningful way. The Pollinator Impact Navigation Tool is released as an open-source resource to enable other impact investors to improve their own operations by deploying the tool to their portfolio companies.
To learn more about the highlights of the fund and commitments made to date, read the TELUS Pollinator Fund for Good Impact report.
Founders looking for a practical resource for impact management can access the Pollinator Impact Navigation Tool.
About the TELUS Pollinator Fund for Good
The $100 million TELUS Pollinator Fund for Good is one of the world’s largest corporate social impact funds, and focuses its investments on for-profit companies and founders committed to driving social innovation. The TELUS Pollinator Fund is an extension of TELUS’ long-standing commitment to leveraging the power of technology to drive positive social and environmental outcomes for all Canadians by funding the development of solutions for transforming healthcare, caring for our planet, supporting responsible agriculture and enabling inclusive communities. To learn more about the TELUS Pollinator Fund, please visit: telus.com/pollinatorfund.
For media inquiries, please contact:
François Marchand
TELUS Media Relations
francois.marchand@telus.com
A video accompanying this announcement is available at: https://www.globenewswire.com/NewsRoom/AttachmentNg/5689ff38-1a02-493f-8553-936ecf1871c9
