The Catalytic Capital Consortium (C3) is moving forward with a new chapter of work to expand the flow of catalytic capital for funds, initiatives, and enterprises addressing the world’s most pressing challenges.
We are doubling down on our ultimate goal—to increase the market’s understanding and use of this vital form of impact investing and to support progress on the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). With this next chapter, we will focus on advancing a strong community of catalytic capital practitioners that can grow the volume, pace, and impact of transactions using catalytic capital – capital that is patient, flexible, and risk-tolerant.
With escalating challenges to peace and security, health, climate, equality, and economic opportunity, the need for catalytic capital is greater than ever. Fortunately, interest in and understanding of catalytic capital is growing too. Many investors urged C3 organizers to move beyond the initiative’s early work to accelerate global impact. They recognize the need for debt, equity, guarantees, and other investments that accept disproportionate risk or concessionary returns—because those instruments have proven to be the catalyst for addressing both urgent and emerging challenges, while often paving the way for other types of capital to participate.
This year, we are bolstered by the support of new funders who signed on in late-2024, including Blue Haven Initiative, Builders Vision, Ceniarth, The Lemelson Foundation, Small Foundation, and Walton Family Foundation. Three additional funders announced just this week are also adding their expertise and support, including Ford Foundation, Sorenson Impact Foundation, and Surdna Foundation. Together, these nine are joining the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation to expand C3’s role as a connector, facilitator, and grantmaker. That means bringing together experienced catalytic capital practitioners to tackle market- and transaction-level challenges, while also building on C3’s prior work to fund research, best practices, training programs, and investment tools.
C3 also has created three new collaborative investor groups focused on climate action, equity and inclusion, and African markets. These investor groups bring together leading catalytic capital investors to share their ideas, delve into capital gaps, and explore grant-funded solutions to address some of the most significant challenges in their respective thematic areas of focus.
Some of this work flows from the C3 Learning Labs conducted in the first few years of our work, convening seasoned catalytic capital investors to discuss barriers to deals and projects, and ways to overcome them. (Read our Guidance Notes from those discussions.) We are continuing to support these “dealmaker” conversations to reflect current market activity, particularly given new global challenges.
At the same time, C3 is furthering regional impact investing networks to fund new education and outreach efforts. This objective helps more investors understand, plan for, and assess catalytic capital opportunities. We also are working with a range of global partners to launch and promote catalytic capital training programs, including expanding a train-the-trainer curriculum funded by our early grantmaking and promoting both Toniic’s training program and Prime Coalition’s catalytic capital intermediation resources library. (To access the train-the-trainer program, email C3Grantmaking@newventurefund.org.)
Finally, we will be inviting grant requests in the coming months to support a small group of research projects, investment tools, and other opportunities in critical areas. The funding will help broaden and deepen investor engagement and increase the deployment of catalytic capital.
All of these pieces are moving forward on parallel tracks. Sign up to hear about new opportunities to participate in our community of practice. And please subscribe to our quarterly newsletter for more information on C3’s ongoing work.
Stacy Xiao is the program officer who leads the day-to-day implementation of C3 Grantmaking’s work.
Strengthening the Catalytic Capital Community to Address the Challenges of 2025 and Beyond
The Catalytic Capital Consortium (C3) is moving forward with a new chapter of work to expand the flow of catalytic capital for funds, initiatives, and enterprises addressing the world’s most pressing challenges.
We are doubling down on our ultimate goal—to increase the market’s understanding and use of this vital form of impact investing and to support progress on the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). With this next chapter, we will focus on advancing a strong community of catalytic capital practitioners that can grow the volume, pace, and impact of transactions using catalytic capital – capital that is patient, flexible, and risk-tolerant.
With escalating challenges to peace and security, health, climate, equality, and economic opportunity, the need for catalytic capital is greater than ever. Fortunately, interest in and understanding of catalytic capital is growing too. Many investors urged C3 organizers to move beyond the initiative’s early work to accelerate global impact. They recognize the need for debt, equity, guarantees, and other investments that accept disproportionate risk or concessionary returns—because those instruments have proven to be the catalyst for addressing both urgent and emerging challenges, while often paving the way for other types of capital to participate.
This year, we are bolstered by the support of new funders who signed on in late-2024, including Blue Haven Initiative, Builders Vision, Ceniarth, The Lemelson Foundation, Small Foundation, and Walton Family Foundation. Three additional funders announced just this week are also adding their expertise and support, including Ford Foundation, Sorenson Impact Foundation, and Surdna Foundation. Together, these nine are joining the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation to expand C3’s role as a connector, facilitator, and grantmaker. That means bringing together experienced catalytic capital practitioners to tackle market- and transaction-level challenges, while also building on C3’s prior work to fund research, best practices, training programs, and investment tools.
C3 also has created three new collaborative investor groups focused on climate action, equity and inclusion, and African markets. These investor groups bring together leading catalytic capital investors to share their ideas, delve into capital gaps, and explore grant-funded solutions to address some of the most significant challenges in their respective thematic areas of focus.
Some of this work flows from the C3 Learning Labs conducted in the first few years of our work, convening seasoned catalytic capital investors to discuss barriers to deals and projects, and ways to overcome them. (Read our Guidance Notes from those discussions.) We are continuing to support these “dealmaker” conversations to reflect current market activity, particularly given new global challenges.
At the same time, C3 is furthering regional impact investing networks to fund new education and outreach efforts. This objective helps more investors understand, plan for, and assess catalytic capital opportunities. We also are working with a range of global partners to launch and promote catalytic capital training programs, including expanding a train-the-trainer curriculum funded by our early grantmaking and promoting both Toniic’s training program and Prime Coalition’s catalytic capital intermediation resources library. (To access the train-the-trainer program, email C3Grantmaking@newventurefund.org.)
Finally, we will be inviting grant requests in the coming months to support a small group of research projects, investment tools, and other opportunities in critical areas. The funding will help broaden and deepen investor engagement and increase the deployment of catalytic capital.
All of these pieces are moving forward on parallel tracks. Sign up to hear about new opportunities to participate in our community of practice. And please subscribe to our quarterly newsletter for more information on C3’s ongoing work.
Stacy Xiao is the program officer who leads the day-to-day implementation of C3 Grantmaking’s work.
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