Dublin-based social entrepreneurship platform ChangeX is looking to increase its impact as it celebrates its 10th birthday, scaling higher impact and value ideas globally.
The organisation, which was founded in January 2015, has previously focused on transformation within communities, with simple ideas such as community gardens and coding clubs backed by funds and other supports from larger organisation.
However, the next phase of its growth will mean ChangeX takes deeper-impact, higher-value ideas to global scale quickly, following a test phase provided by a new partnership with ServiceNow on a small number of projects, including ecosystem restoration, solar energy and plastic reuse.
“The goal was to see if we could spread these innovations in months rather than decades. We launched it in Q2 [second quarter] of 2024, and by the end of the year, so around six months later, we had those innovations up and running right across nine countries,” said ChangeX chief executive and co-founder Paul O’Hara.
“For us it was a big breakthrough, because if we can do it for a few ideas, then there’s no reason we can’t do it for thousands of ideas. The next phase now is taking all that we’ve learned and trying to take 1,000 proven innovations to global scale.
“Now that we have that breakthrough, the next 10 years is about taking all that we’ve learned and having a much bigger impact.”
The organisation is hoping to make proven innovations accessible to communities globally.
ChangeX now employs 26 people and has plans for further expansion in 2025.
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“We’ve had a good couple of years. Our growth rate has been in and around the 100 per cent mark for the last couple of years, and we’re expecting likewise this year coming, both in terms of revenue and impact,” said Mr O’Hara. “We funded just under 1,500 projects in 26 countries, up from 15 [countries] the year before. We’ve expanded to a lot of new regions. The impact was a little over 750,000 people.”
That expansion included Asia, where the company is now active in Japan, Indonesia, Vietnam and Singapore.
It has also signed a number of new partnerships, including with ServiceNow, while expanding its existing agreements with companies such as Microsoft, Lego and Amazon.
Established in 2015 by Mr O’Hara and Niamh McKenna, ChangeX has been backed by investors such as Ben & Jerry’s co-founder Jerry Greenfield, Realex Payments founder Colm Lyon, Draper Esprit’s Brian Caulfield, Andreessen Horowitz partner John O’Farrell and Storyful founder Mark Little.
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