Since its launching in 2001, the NESsT Venture Fund has provided enterprise development support to hundreds of social enterprises in Central and Eastern Europe and Latin America.

Recognizing that social enterprises require different types of support at the different stages of their social enterprise development process, the NESsT Venture Fund is comprised of two types of portfolios:

- a “later-stage portfolio” of more advanced social enterprises receiving multi-year financing and capacity- building assistance to start-up or expand a social enterprise; and

- an “early-stage portfolio” of social enterprises receiving support to complete business plans, feasibility studies and/or pre-feasibility studies for their social enterprises.

Read more about the social enterprises that have received support from the NESsT Venture Fund:

- NESsT Venture Fund Central Europe Portfolio

- NESsT Venture Fund (Fondo Nido) Latin America Portfolio

Measuring the impact of its capacity-building is crucial for NESsT. Following are the results of our ACCESS impact-tracking system for organizations in Central Europe and Latin America that went through our Early Stage process during 2008 and 2009 and completed our surveys.

- ACCESS Report for NVF Early Stage Organizations in Central Europe 2008-2009

-ACCESS Report on the Early Stage Portfolio of NVF in Latin America 2008-2009

Also the Flagship Indicators Report from NESsT tracks and benchmarks the performance of NESsT's entire portfolio. Here is the latest Flagship Indicator Report gathering information for the 44 organizations that were part of the incubation portfolio in 2008-2009.

- Flagship Indicators Report - NESsT Incubation Portfolio 2008-2009

- Flagship Indicators Report - NESsT Incubation Portfolio 2008-2009 (Spanish version)

ACCESS Latin America:  Assessing the Skills and Knowledge gained through the NESsT Social Enterprise Development Planning Stage.  

ACCESS Central and Eastern Europe:  Assessing the Skills and Knowledge gained through the NESsT Social Enterprise Development Planning Stage.  

FLAGSHIP INDICATORS:  Assessing the Performance of the NESsT Portfolio at Social Enterprise Development Incubation Stage. 

This represents a 16% Increase in the number of beneficiaries reached

through social enterprise from 2008-2009

Social enterprises added jobs at a rate of 24% per year, despite a global recession.

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“The process is incredibly interesting, it produces a degree of reflection that can only result in the growth of the organization and the team. It contributes to the professionalization of the organization, which is very important to organizations and to the sector in general.”
(Fundación Rumbos, Argentina)

“It was a real luxury to work with the advisers who lead the workshops, as well as the invited guests and participants. The detailed support, the structure of the stages, and the use of the different tools demonstrate the integral nature of this approach.” (FASINARM, Ecuador) 

 “Now we have a more attractive tool for businesspeople to support our social entrepreneurship thanks to NESsT.” (WellGiving, Slovakia)

“We are very satisfied with the professionalism, the cooperativeness and the human kindness of NESsT's staff.” (Welldorf, Hungary)