Business Models

A successful business model is at the heart of any new venture. In most cases, a company can’t do what it has always done, but must take a different approach when engaging majority markets. This could mean re-engineering products and services, exploring new distribution channels, or seeking support from an experienced partner. There is no universal solution, and new strategies are being tested every day as more companies enter this arena.

Below, you'll find articles and blog posts about base of the pyramid business models: successful ones, ones that have encountered challenges along the way, and ones that are just getting started.

The First BASE Forum: Sharing Success Stories

On June 27 and 28, the IDB’s Opportunities for the Majority Initiative held its first major international conference in Sao Paulo, Brazil. The BASE Forum drew an overflow crowd of almost 800 registrants from a variety of backgrounds, including business, international development, government, and nonprofits, all eager to learn about the concepts behind base of the pyramid business models and how they are playing out at companies throughout Latin America.

How Companies Use Distribution Platforms to Reach the Base of the Pyramid

We know that one of the biggest barriers to working effectively with Base of the Pyramid (BOP) communities is that in many cases, existing distribution systems simply do not reach them. These are real, physical gaps. For instance, a lack of paved roads makes it difficult for companies to deliver goods and services to rural villages or poor city neighborhoods, and make access to affordable or reliable transportation scarce. Such communities are also often literally disconnected from many basic services, including electrical grids, plumbing and waste water treatment or telephone wires.

Eight Companies Join the Corporate Leaders Program for Success in Majority Markets

Feeding a Hunger for Knowledge about the Base of the Pyramid

Last year, Opportunities for the Majority joined forces with the Global Alliance for Improved Nutrition [GAIN] and the FEMSA Foundation to carry out a regional mapping study of private sector involvement in meeting the nutritional needs of the base of the pyramid in Latin America.

From Beans to Sustainable Incomes: A New Path to Profit for Nicaraguan Farmers

Large areas of highly fertile volcanic soil have made bean production a centuries-old staple of the Nicaraguan economy and food supply. Although small bean producers have inherited a rich and important legacy, they have often struggled to earn a fair profit due to low productivity rates, lack of credit access and difficulty in organizing cooperative farming mechanisms.

Life Insurance (and more) for the BOP: An interview with Pedro Bulcão

There are many ways private companies can serve base of the pyramid (BOP) populations. These underserved communities represent a large untapped market and, as such, offer a number of opportunities to organizations willing to address their basic needs in a responsible and profitable way.

Internet Access for Underserved Rural Communities: The Promise and the Challenges

A country of widespread inequalities

At about 2:00 pm on Thursday, July 9, I received an e-mail saying, “we are at a store and it works!” I knew exactly what this cryptic message meant and where it was coming from: a remote rural village in Yucatan, Mexico, where many houses do not have electricity and, until that moment, access to Internet was limited only to the very few who could afford a thirty minute walk and a ME$200 taxi ride to the nearest town.

Conversion Sound – Making Hearing Happen

Worldwide, about 280 million people suffer from debilitating hearing loss, yet globally only 7 million hearing aids are sold annually. In the case of low-income populations, hearing problems affect two thirds of the population, because they face many problems in treating hearing deficiencies, which is reflected by the fact that less than a million hearing aids are sold in these majority markets.

“Construction Doctors” Bring Training and Jobs to Brazil’s Housing Market

The Brazilian housing sector has expanded significantly in recent years – so quickly that the supply of trained construction workers has not been able to keep pace.

Eighty percent of construction activities in Brazil are self-managed ventures, carried out by workers with little or no training. Most of Brazil’s estimated 4 million construction workers are not adequately prepared to deliver quality work, and are vulnerable to avoidable construction site risks.