First Mile Innovation (A): Social Capital Based Value Chain Aggregation - Assessing Energy Ventures in Emerging Markets

Published 27 Aug 2012
Reference 5803
Industry Agriculture
Region Asia
Length 15 page(s)
Summary

The Vayugrid case study encourages students to develop their own understanding of the economic, political and social dimensions that define this entrepreneurial venture in rural India. It clarifies the importance of embedded innovation in developing a suitable business model to leverage a fragmented supply chain.

Teaching objectives

The case highlights how:(1)producer-consumer communities stimulate local wealth creation to ensure supply and demand are met, 2) aggregation of demand and supply-side communities enables economies of scale, (3)leveraging a fragmented supply chain redraws the profit pool and permits economies of scale,(4)incentivisation can be built into the system to ensure the longer-term sustainability of the supply-and-demand-driven network.

Keywords
  • supply chain
  • agribusiness
  • social capital
  • biofuels
  • energy
  • smallholders
  • India
  • Q41112