ImpactAlpha Open

Financing local climate projects + Singapore rises as an impact investing hub

Dennis Price · August 19, 2025

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In this week’s Open:

  • Cities stack capital to keep climate projects on track
  • From Singapore, Tsao Family Office seeks impact in Africa
  • Spotlight: Small Foundation’s working capital facility for Africa’s emerging managers
  • Podcast: Fixing blended finance

Let’s jump in. â€“ Dennis Price

Must-reads on ImpactAlpha

  • From Singapore, Tsao Family Office expands the LP pool for impact strategies in Africa. Tsao Family Office, established more than a decade ago by the family behind maritime company Tsao Pao Chee Group, is the latest investor to join the LP roster for London-based TLG Capital’s second Africa Growth Impact Fund. “In Asia, our family office stands out in terms of our interest and appetite for impact,” Tsao’s Leslie Lim tells ImpactAlpha’s Jessica Pothering. Check them out.
  • How local governments are financing climate action without federal funding. Private capital and public-private partnerships are increasingly important to keep climate projects alive, writes HIP Investor’s Nick Gower in a guest post. City planners, financial managers, council members and mayors, Gower argues, must “think like portfolio managers,” blending equity, preferred equity, private credit, debt and lines of credit in their mix of funding sources, much like businesses do. See how.
  • These DIY investors are notching impact and exits by building startups from scratch. Some investors are creating “venture studios” to execute on promising business ideas. Rotterdam-based Enviu co-creates business ideas with promising entrepreneurs, incubates them with technical support and capital until they can fundraise external investment, and then sells equity shares and recycles the proceeds to other ventures in its portfolio, reports ImpactAlpha’s Lucy Ngige. Read more.

Agents of Impact

🏃 On the move

  • Energy Impact Partners added Skakel McCooey, previously with Bain & Company, as an associate.
  • ArcLight Capital Partners’ Angelo Acconcia was appointed president of the firm.
  • Impact Frontiers added Marina Silva-Rodriguez as an associate, Saki Tsuru as a senior associate for curriculum development and research, and Mikko Ariake as an assistant.

The Week’s Podcasts

🎧 This Week in Impact

Host Brian Walsh takes up ImpactAlpha’s top stories with editor David Bank. Up this week: Can open deal data and standardized reporting fix what ails blended finance? How the Singapore-based Tsao Family Office is leaning into impact. And, goodbye accelerators, hello venture studios – how do-it-yourself emerging market investors are building startups from scratch.

  • Listen to the new episode of This Week in Impact. Get the podcast in your feed by subscribing on Apple, Spotify, or YouTube.

The Week’s Deal Spotlight

💰 With working capital and warehousing, Small Foundation boosts emerging fund managers in Africa (video)

For emerging fund managers in emerging markets, fundraising has largely meant making the rounds of international development finance institutions. Dublin-based Small Foundation is testing two models to build stronger local financing ecosystems by backing such managers with grants, loans and investments. “We’re recognizing the range of challenges [managers] face as they launch,” Karina Wong told ImpactAlpha in a video interview as part of our Pathways to Growth series with the Collaborative for Frontier Finance. “We’re looking across those and trying to catalyze different vehicles that can support a range of funds and fund managers.”

Pop Impact

đŸŽ„ Sustainable livelihoods as seen at the Woods Hole Film Festival

The southernmost tip of Cape Cod is home to several of the world’s preeminent marine science institutions, including the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution. The charming town of Woods Hole also hosts one of the oldest film festivals in New England. ImpactAlpha’s Pop Impact columnist,Dmitriy Ioselevich, came away from this year’s festival impressed with how filmmakers are using visual storytelling to “rewire how we think about sustainability challenges.”

Get in the Game

đŸ’Œ Step up

  • Social Finance is looking for a director of investor relations for impact first investments in Boston.
  • Reinvestment Fund is hiring a manager of research operations in policy solutions for a hybrid role in Philadelphia.
  • Global Innovation Fund is seeking a senior managing director of partnerships in London.

Dozens of job opportunities are available to subscribers each week on ImpactAlpha’s Career Hub.

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