Women Nano-entrepreneurs Initiative
Redesigning finance for women’s needs. And realities.
Gender & social equity
Inclusive livelihoods & informal economy
Across India, millions of women run small businesses that support their families and communities. With almost no access to capital.
We built the case to make them visible. And viable as a market.
The challenge
Access denied. Opportunities lost.
India has an estimated 11 million nano-entrepreneurs — businesses operating at the smallest scale, often earning less than USD 100 a month. Many of them are women: a tailor working from her living room, a vendor with a chai stall, an artisan selling handmade crafts at a local market.
Only about 5% of nano-entrepreneurs have access to formal credit.
Research consistently shows that even modest, well-structured capital can unlock meaningful income growth at this scale. But the vast majority rely on savings, family support or informal moneylenders.
Their existence is a testament to their resilience and resourcefulness.
And to their potential to grow with structural support.
Meet Dina, a textile entrepreneur
I know a modern sewing machine would let me take on bigger orders. But I have no business address, no balance sheet, no paperwork. So, no bank will give me loan for it.
Barriers by design
Most financial products are designed for salaried workers or registered businesses. Not for women working informally, often from home, often blending household and business finances.
No credit history
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Informal businesses often have no reliable paper trails. This makes lending seem like a leap of faith, not a calculated risk.
Missing evidence base
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Funders and lenders lack comparable data on growth potential and repayment capacity of women nano-entrepreneurs.
Products built for others
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Loan sizes, repayment structures and collateral requirements are all designed for borrowers from other sectors (and classes).
Fragmented support systems
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Capital and enterprise development operate in silos, leaving entrepreneurs to navigate and bridge the systems.
Our approach
Building the case, not just the product
The challenge was not only a design problem, it was an evidence gap. Lenders who had never looked closely at this market had no reason to believe they should.
We designed a pilot instrument to achieve two goals: deliver capital to women entrepreneurs in a form that actually fits their lives, and generate repayment data that makes the case for the next lender. And the next.
Implementing a new model
A risk-sharing facility to unlock lender participation for productive asset loans
Technical assistance to improve enterprise readiness, utilisation and repayment performance
Market-building pathways to transition toward commercially viable lending products
The core innovation
Designing around her reality, not ours.
Rather than asking nano-entrepreneurs to conform to existing infrastructure, we designed around the actual shape of women's informal enterprises. Flexible repayment tied to income cycles. Small ticket sizes appropriate to nano-scale capital needs. And an enterprise support layer integrated into the lending relationship.
The goal was not just to disburse loans. It was to build evidence for a market.
The results
Proving what’s possible
The pilot instrument was backed by committed grant support and a confirmed implementation ecosystem, including capital providers, intermediaries and lenders.
The facility design and fund flows enable an immediate move into execution and evidence-generation at scale. Each loan disbursed, repaid and documented builds the data infrastructure that makes the next lending decision easier.
Pilot live
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First-of-its-kind instrument in active testing with women nano-entrepreneurs
Multi-tier
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Lenders, CSOs and enterprise support integrated in one model
Replicable
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Designed to scale across geographies, sectors and enterprise structures
“The model shifts the risk calculus for the financial system, positioning women entrepreneurs as a viable, high-potential engine for socio-economic growth.”
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Who we are
Global experience.
Regional expertise.
Based across Asia and Europe, we combine global reach with local insights to create impact at scale.
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