Investment process

If you manage a fund and want to partner with us to help build a better, more sustainable future, here's what to expect from our investment process.

Our investment process considers the social impact, financial return and systems change risk and return of each investment, and the fund managers ability to deliver.

The process has four stages: pre-due diligence, due diligence, onboarding, and ongoing portfolio management. Due diligence and onboarding alone typically take between four and ten months combined; pre-due diligence timing varies depending on your proposal and our committee schedule.

  • Who do we invest in?

    We invest in fund managers who provide finance or other support to social enterprises and charities, rather than investing in those organisations directly.

    Not sure you meet our criteria? See our investment requirements for more information.

  • How do I apply?

    Submit an expression of interest to apply for investment. Remember to take a look at our investment requirements beforehand to understand the criteria we look for.

    We recognise that all elements of a proposal may not be fully formed at the point of application, and we often co-develop investments alongside the fund manager, especially when they are filling market gaps and aligned to our strategic goals. For example, we typically work with applicants to develop their impact management approach before making a commitment.

How we assess investments

  • alt=

    Pre-due diligence

    We aim to quickly identify if your proposal meets our investment criteria and strategy. If we believe there is likely to be a fit, we take a one-page recommendation whether to proceed to full due diligence to our Investment Committee.

    How long does pre-due diligence take?

    Timelines vary depending on your expected fund schedule, additional information requests and competing proposals in our pipeline

  • alt=

    Due diligence

    This stage aims to build an externally tested understanding of your proposed solution. You will be asked to meet with our Investment Committee so they can learn more about you and you can get to know us as a strategic partner. The investment team responsible for your application will present a recommendation to the committee with a draft head of terms; the committee may ask for further diligence on specific areas.

    How long does due diligence take?

    The due diligence stage can take between two and six months, though it can vary depending on how far proposals change or additional evidence is needed.

  • alt=

    3. Onboarding investments

    This stage aims to formalise the goals and responsibilities that have been agreed between us. We do this through the legal documents, the Impact Canvas and the agreed financial model and forecast.

    The Impact Canvas is our own shared impact management tool, agreed individually with each fund manager to set out the impact goals an investment is expected to deliver and how they will be measured.

    Applicants usually take the lead in preparing the first draft of the legal documents, supported by their own legal advisors. Our internal legal team will appoint legal advisors to help us review and negotiate drafts of the documents.

    How long does the onboarding process take?

    It takes between one and four months from agreement in principle to signed documents. This can be shorter if legal documents are already prepared.

  • alt=

    Managing portfolio investments

    We manage our investments over the lifetime against their original target impact outcomes and expected financial returns, as well as how we see them contributing to our system change goals.

    We do this through:

    • Regular engagement, including sometimes holding roles on advisory committees or observing investment committees
    • Determining valuations twice annually
    • Assessing impact, systems change and financial performance annually and following up as required. Find out more about our impact approach
    • Inviting our managers to meet our executive team every 12-18 months to discuss performance and foster our strategic partnership
    • Actively engage when things don’t go to plan or there are changes needed to the product or strategy to find a solution that balances the impact, systems change and financial goals of the investment

    Beyond capital, we aim to add value to our managers – connecting fund managers to external partnerships, tools and resources to help fund managers achieve their scale ambitions. Find out more about our Investment Network

FAQs

We typically invest between £500,000 and £15 million. See our Investment requirements for the full criteria, including term and return expectations.

A member of our investment team will be assigned to your application and is your main point of contact throughout the process. If a proposal meets our investment criteria and is taken through to due-diligence, our team will arrange a kick-off meeting, followed by management meetings so we can get to know your team and proposal in more detail.

Our Investment Committee reviews and approves investments and are responsible for overseeing portfolio performance. All proposals taken to due diligence stage are presented to the Investment Committee directly.

We sometimes take an observer or advisory role on a fund's committees as part of our ongoing engagement, alongside regular reviews of performance - though this varies by investment.

We value all feedback to continually improve our process – we will seek feedback at the end of each process. In addition, every two years we survey all participants to aggregate feedback on our process – the results of this are shared with our Investment Committee and Board and feed into ongoing improvements in our approach.