On Thursday, September 13, Telecentre.org Foundation (TCF) and Hystra, a consulting firm specializing in hybrid (social and business) strategies, will present you with the opportunity to find out “what works” in terms of full projects - as opposed to technologies - combining both an economically viable model and socio-economic impacts on their end-users, in the field of ICT for development (ICT4D). Hystra’s Lucie Klarsfeld will be our resource person during the webinar that will take place from 8:00 AM to 9:00 AM GMTas part of the on-going TIS Talks series.

Last year, Hystra and Ashoka, a global organization that identifies and invests in social entrepreneurship, conducted a joint study to review over 200 initiatives worldwide that used ICT to provide education, healthcare, agro-services or financial services to the Base of the Pyramid (BoP). Results of the study are revealed in the report entitled “Leveraging Information and Communication Technology for the Base of...”, a copy of which may be downloaded from the TCF Online Library.

The study provides strong evidence that people in rural areas with poor access to goods and services stand to benefit the most from ICT. During the webinar, Lucie will dive deep into the proven models and strategies for this.

Why should you attend this webinar? Here are some good reasons:

• For those networks advancing ICT-based businesses, thinking about the launch of one, planning or just aiming to learn:  there are lessons to be picked up from models that are working and from those that are not.
• The models that will be explained are a tool to design or rethink your business based on proven strategies
• The webinar will double as a crash course on the way that ICT can deliver financial services, health, e-agriculture and education to BoP markets
• It will also be a very good source of information to nurture innovation processes in telecentre networks
• It provides insights to avoid going the wrong way when thinking about telecentre based enterprises
• It is a great opportunity to engage in a conversation with someone that has deep knowledge of the ways to develop effective ICT based businesses to serve the markets reached by telecentre networks
• It is also a chance to engage in a conversation with other networks regarding the issues faced to design, plan and implement ICT-based businesses on their respective networks.

To participate in the free webinar, visit http://engageteachers.adobeconnect.com/telecentre at least 10 minutes before the scheduled time.

TIS Talks is also made possible with the support of Intel, a major partner of TCF.

(Photo credit: Hystra.com)