How systems innovators achieve scale.

Innovation ecosystems. Systems change. Platform innovations. Spillover effects. 

In international development, “systems” are having a moment. For those of us focussed on scaling impactful innovations, this shift is vital. Traditionally, scaling an innovation and achieving systemic change have been viewed as conflicting rather than complementary objectives: scaling starts with a solution and seeks to replicate it widely with minimal changes to systems, while systems change starts with the ecosystem and seeks to achieve major shifts over a longer timeframe. 

At the Global Innovation Fund (GIF), we believe this is a false dichotomy. Scaling does not happen in a vacuum. To move a solution from a pilot to a national or global offering, innovators must engage with the political economy, dismantle systemic constraints, and activate a broad network of actors. 

There is growing recognition from the sector to support this: that scaling innovation and systems change have to go hand in hand.  

Looking across our portfolio, we see four distinct modes through which innovators use a systems lens to ensure their innovation succeeds. 

1. Building demand 

It is a foundational principle that you cannot sell a solution until you have sold the problem. Many GIF innovators invest extensive time on advocacy and marketing to raise awareness of the challenge they are addressing.

When GIF invested in Educational Initiatives, personalised adaptive learning (PAL) was a novel concept in India. Educational Initiatives worked with researchers and field builders like the Central Square Foundation to coach government agencies on what "good" PAL looks like. This systemic advocacy resulted in several Indian states issuing procurements for PAL solutions, and the approach was incorporated into India’s National Educational Policy of 2020. By building demand for the category, they secured a path for their specific innovation.

2. Shaping the enabling environment

Just as an innovation must be well-adapted to its ecosystem to scale, innovators must also reshape their environment to make their innovations stick. This involves policy change, regulatory approvals, creating new standards for incumbents and new entrants, or shaping supply chains.

• The Toothpick Project is utilising GIF’s investment to secure regulatory approvals in new markets for its bioherbicide solutions.
• Mati Carbon is collaborating with global actors to define standards for Measurement, Reporting, and Verification (MRV) in enhanced rock weathering.
• SwipeRx successfully advocated for the formal recognition of digital training for pharmacists across South East Asia. By transforming the pharmaceutical supply chain in Indonesia, they solved for both the availability and affordability of medicines simultaneously.

3. Addressing incentives 

Successful innovators are particularly adept at understanding the deep-rooted incentives and motivations which underpin the status quo in their ecosystem. Scaling requires aligning the innovation with the incentives of the people meant to deliver or adopt it. 

Lively Minds, which has successfully scaled an early childhood education programme in Ghana, is a great example of this. They view parents as the ‘sleeping giants’ of early childhood development, but they also recognised that government ownership requires accountability. Their partnership with the Ghana Education Service included clear responsibilities and accountabilities at the school, district, regional, and national levels, including a "Star Players" programme to recognise standout performers, and corrective support for underperforming districts. By building the performance monitoring infrastructure, they gave the government a tool for ownership at all levels, providing a solid foundation for sustainability at scale. 

4. Crowding-in other innovators 

A critical component of GIF’s investment thesis is de-risking. Often, our investment proves a business model is viable, making it more investable for other investors. This can also “crowd in" other innovators who identify the potential of the opportunities. This is something we welcome at GIF as a sign of a systemic shift.

Take Paga in Nigeria. 

As a pioneer in digital payments, Paga’s early initial success encouraged mobile telecommunications companies to convince regulators to allow them to offer money services. Today, Paga serves 20 million customers, but the entry of other FinTechs has accelerated financial inclusion more rapidly than one company could achieve alone. 

We often talk of “picking winners” but “backing front runners” is more apt. The innovators we back can break-down barriers which allows others to follow with less friction, so that as many people as possible can benefit. 

Indeed, this is one the central aspirations of the GIF-PATH Thrive Fund. By investing in innovations that deliver climate resilient health outcomes, we aren’t just looking for a single “winning” product. We are looking to  demonstrate the potential of the sector as a whole, attracting the capital and talent necessary to solve development problems at scale.

Conclusion 

The common thread through these examples is powerful: when an innovator successfully influences a system, the benefits are rarely exclusive. These systemic shifts are essentially public goods. It is not only Educational Initiatives which benefits from increased public sector demand for PAL solutions, the entire ed-tech sector does. It is not only SwipeRx that benefits from digital training of pharmacists, the entire healthcare system does