DEG Impulse

Maternal health should never depend on income!💗 In Kenya, maternal mortality remains alarmingly high—530 deaths per 100,000 live births in 2020, a setback to early 2000s levels. 🩺One woman who refuses to accept this reality is Dr Lorraine Muluka, CEO & Co-Founder of Malaica. As an obstetrician-gynecologist, Lorraine has spent over a decade working to improve Kenya’s healthcare system. In 2021, she made a bold decision: to dedicate herself fully to a startup that would transform maternal healthcare. 🚀 Malaica provides pregnant women with continuous support through a hybrid model that combines online and in-person care. Pregnant women are connected to an online team of midwives, community health workers, and specialists who offer pregnancy education, guidance, and early warning sign recognition. Women also access antenatal visits and deliveries with Malaica at its partner hospitals, ensuring adherence to World Health Organization guidelines. ⚕️ With non-dilutive funding from the German Bundesministerium für wirtschaftliche Zusammenarbeit und Entwicklung (BMZ) via #develoPPPVentures, supported by us at DEG Impulse, Malaica can now: 🤲 support 1,350 more women, 🤲 employ 17 new midwives, 🤲 partner with 5 hospitals. 💜 Lorraine’s motivation? “The best care is not just given; it is shared, understood, and felt.” This #WomensMonth, we celebrate women like Dr Lorraine Muluka, who are reshaping healthcare and saving lives. Maternal health must never be a privilege - it should be a right. #MaternalHealth #Innovation #Impact #HealthTech #WomenInLeadership

🛣️How do we accompany partner companies over the course of a #develoPPP project?   🌱 For us it’s about supporting our partners to implement their projects and achieve impact while responding to the challenges they experience. We do this through progress reviews, in-depth check-ups and face-to-face meetings with our partners in the field - among other things. That’s exactly what our three colleagues Megan Moss, project manager, Miriam Amine, M&E expert, and Stephanie Lutz, reporting specialist, did in February during their visit to ETG, a long-term DEG client, and Parrogate.   🌾 The ETG-Parrogate initiatives are being implemented with support from the develoPPP programme in both Malawi and Zambia. The projects focus on strengthening the supply chains to bolster local food security. The aim is to raise smallholder farmers’ resilience, with a special focus on women and youth, and to diversify the types of crops they grow and sell. Additionally, more than 325 local jobs have been created directly with the companies, including at the newly established facilities for soybean oil production.   #Malawi and #Zambia faced a catastrophic drought in 2024, which led us to work together on a response to these very challenging conditions, in order to ensure the best outcomes. In addition, our colleagues also went to meet the project’s target group: the smallholder farmers. 👩🌾   🤝 “Seeing the impact of our joint efforts firsthand and experiencing the team’s commitment on the ground was very impressive,” remembers Megan Moss. "Witnessing the direct impact of the project on the community was an inspiring experience" adds Stephanie Lutz. And Miriam Amine tells: “The project highlights how important and impactful private sector initiatives can be – even more in the context of shrinking foreign investments and support from development agencies.”   A huge thank you to our partners ETG and Parrogate for their warm welcome and valuable insights. We’re looking forward to the next phase of this exciting journey. 🙌

🌍 Boreal Light’s Mykolaiv Solar Desalination Plant Nominated for Global Water Awards 2025! 💧🏆 We are thrilled that the Mykolaiv Solar Desalination Plant in Ukraine, a project developed in close partnership with Grundfos, has been shortlisted for the Global Water Awards 2025 in the "Desalination Plant of the Year" category! 🚀 Why is this project special? 🔹 500,000 people now have access to clean drinking water in a region devastated by war. 🔹 Europe’s largest solar desalination plant – sustainable, fully powered by renewable energy. 🔹 2.75 million liters of water per day – built in record time (just 4 months!). 🔹 A model for crisis response – with over 220 requests to replicate this solution across Ukraine. This nomination is more than just an award—it recognizes the power of innovation, resilience, and collaboration in delivering life-changing water solutions where they’re needed most. 💪 Support this mission! Vote for us and help us push for a future where no community is left without safe, clean water. #GlobalWaterAwards #GWS2025 #GWI #WaterForUkraine #SolarDesalination #WaterInnovation #BorealLight #Grundfos Boreal Light GmbH Anna Shepelenko 🇺🇦 Dr. Hamed Beheshti daniel alex DEG Yuliia Chernetska

💜Morgen ist Weltfrauentag: Müttergesundheit darf keine Frage des Einkommens sein! 💜 In Kenia ist die Müttersterblichkeitsrate 2020 auf 530 Todesfälle pro 100.000 Lebendgeburten gestiegen – zurück auf das Niveau der frühen 2000er. Malaica möchte gemeinsam mit DEG Impulse etwas dagegen tun: Das HealthTech-Startup setzt sich dafür ein, dass mehr Frauen in Afrika während der Schwangerschaft die nötige Unterstützung erhalten – und senkt so die Müttersterblichkeit. 🩺 Wie das funktioniert? Malaica vermittelt schwangere Frauen über eine Online-Plattform an registrierte Hebammen, die sie während der gesamten Schwangerschaft begleiten. Bei Fragen können die Frauen jederzeit online Kontakt zu ihrer Hebamme aufnehmen und so schnell und unkompliziert Unterstützung erhalten. Zudem schulen die Hebammen die Frauen darin, Gefahrensignale frühzeitig zu erkennen. Durch die enge Zusammenarbeit mit lokalen Krankenhäusern werden alle notwendigen Untersuchungen professionell durchgeführt, um eine sichere Schwangerschaft und Geburt zu gewährleisten. Mit der Förderung des Bundesministerium für wirtschaftliche Zusammenarbeit und Entwicklung (BMZ) über das Programm #develoPPPVentures kann Malaica nun 👏 1.350 weitere Frauen begleiten, 👏 17 neue Hebammen einstellen und 👏 Kooperationen mit 5 Krankenhäusern aufbauen. Fotos: (c) Malaica

Next on the shortlist for Desal Plant of the Year is the Mykolaiv solar desalination plant in southern Ukraine. Designed with resilience in mind, this facility can supply up to 3,000m³/d of fresh water for potable and irrigation purposes, impacting the lives of up to half a million people in this conflict-hit area. This collaborative project drew desal systems from Boreal Light GmbH, pumps from GRUNDFOS, and backing from DEG Impulse. Powerfully demonstrating the resilience of solar-driven desalination, the Mykolaiv plant operates independently from the city's severely damaged power grid. Reliable operation is guaranteed through integrated solar PV power generation, supplementing the damaged central water supply network and ensuring water availability in a time when security is a luxury. The system utilizes 5 independent desalination units, plus enhancing security through drawing feedwater from a nearby channel, eliminating the need for large and vulnerable storage tanks. The plant also employs real-time tracking of system parameters to facilitate remote troubleshooting. Custom insulation, heating systems, and piping ensures that sub-zero winter temperatures pose no threat to reliability, meaning the system can continue to bolster utility resilience even in the harshest environmental conditions. To celebrate real efforts in the centre of European conflict, you can vote now for your Global Water Awards winners. Results released May 13th at the #GWS2025 Gala Dinner. #GlobalWaterAwards #Desalination #Resilience

Webinar: “Oportunidades de Financiación para proyectos PEI en Colombia: Conoce develoPPP” 🌍 🏭 Se llevó a cabo un espacio virtual dónde se dieron a conocer las oportunidades de financiación no reembolsable que pueden tener los Parques Eco-Industriales y sus empresas en Colombia y Perú, por medio del programa develoPPP, apoyado por el Ministerio Federal de Cooperación Económica y Desarrollo de Alemania, GIZ (Deutsche Gesellschaft für Internationale Zusammenarbeit GmbH) y KFW DEG Impulse como socios implementadores. Durante la sesión, se abordaron temas fundamentales como los beneficios en financiamiento y apoyo técnico, los requisitos mínimos de presentación para las empresas y las pautas para presentarse al Concurso de Ideas en 2025.✨ Pueden visualizar el video en nuestro canal de YT: https://lnkd.in/ekZUCQDn . Cesar Barahona Christian Susan Natalia Cortés Orrillo Carmen Julia García Yazmin Cruzatti Navarro Pamella Bocanegra Gervasi Catalina Suárez Hurtado Guillermo Rivera Huamán Juan Sebastián Gutiérrez Botero Juan David Salazar Espitia Sara Zafra Murcia UNIDO Circular Resource Efficiency Unit . . #IndustriaSostenible #EconomíaCircular #ParquesEcoIndustriales #DesarrolloSostenible #ColombiaSostenible

🪄#FasteLOVEnd - Liebe statt Hass und Hetze. ❤️💚🧡🤍💜💖Als DEG Impulse sind wir natürlich auch dieses Jahr bei der DEG -Karnevalsparty dabei. Wir feiern die Demokratie, das (kölsche) Grundgesetz und die Vielfalt. Wir wünschen allen Jeckinnen und Jecken bunte, friedliche Karnevalstage. 🫶

🎯Scaling a startup is tough. Securing the right funding at the right time? Even tougher. That’s where #develoPPPVentures steps in.👣   📈Beyond our initial funding of €100,000 in non-dilutive capital for startups in Kenya, Tanzania, and Rwanda, we’re thrilled to offer up to €200,000 of follow-on funding to further support those startups with the highest potential to scale.   Recently, our colleagues Niklas Fischer and Sven Witthöft were on the ground in Kenya, meeting with promising startups from our portfolio. Huge thanks to all of them for their insights and collaboration: Melanin Kapital, tappi, Irri-Hub KE , Sio Valley Technologies, FlexPay Technologies, Malaica, eProd Solutions Limited, Cliniva, Figorr, Drop Access Limited and GoBEBA.   Backed by the Bundesministerium für wirtschaftliche Zusammenarbeit und Entwicklung (BMZ), we’re committed to enabling startups to grow.🌱

👩🌾 Three million smallholder farmers in #Zambia face significant vulnerabilities due to climate change, as evidenced by last year’s severe #droughts. Due to limited resources and administrative capacities, state subsidy programs cannot cover all needs adequately and promptly and currently only reach a third of local smallholder farmers. 💡 This is where a DEG Impulse #develoPPP project, in partnership with long-standing DEG partner ZEP-RE (PTA Reinsurance Company) and supported by funds from the Bundesministerium für wirtschaftliche Zusammenarbeit und Entwicklung (BMZ), steps in. DEG has been invested in ZEP-RE, one of the leading reinsurers in southern and eastern Africa, since 2014. 🌍 ZEP-RE’s innovative #climate risk insurance leverages digitalization, the use of existing sales channels and satellite-based data to create a scalable and effective solution. Over the next three years, the reinsurer plans to protect 120,000 smallholder farmers against extreme drought and heavy rainfall events via three local insurance companies. Farmers will pay insurance premiums from the sale of their harvest, easing financial strain, while claims are processed using satellite data in real time —ensuring quick and efficient payouts via mobile payment. 📲 "ZEP-RE is proud to support and implement this innovative collaboration, demonstrating our unwavering commitment to financial inclusion by protecting smallholder farmers against climate risks. Through leveraging digitalization and satellite-based data, we aim to create scalable, market-based insurance solutions that ease financial strain and ensure quick, efficient payouts" says Hope Murera, Managing Director & CEO, ZEP-RE (PTA Reinsurance Company) ‘This innovative approach enables simple application and customer acquisition as well as prompt compensations and will demonstrate the up-scaling potential and the economic viability of a market-based insurance solution,’ highlights Abbad El-Rayyes, Manager at DEG Impulse. We as DEG Impulse have supported this initiative by providing funding for product development, employee training and awareness campaigns among the smallholders. Our joint goal is to reach and educate up to 200,000 farmers over the next few years. Additionally, the project will train 10,000 farmers in sustainable agricultural practices and empower 500 women in managing agricultural cooperatives. 🌾 💚 This collaboration represents a vital step toward strengthening climate resilience for Zambia’s farmers.

🦁 Back Real African Lions—Not Just Simba on Disney+ 📺 East Africa presents incredibly exciting and unique opportunities for startups in both B2B and B2C sectors—thanks to mobile payments and direct-to-consumer models. These startups offer attractive margins and high impact potential. Especially the female founders (about half of the startups in our portfolio are led by women!) impressed me in Kenya’s still largely patriarchal society. These are some of my reflections after an intense and inspiring week of conversations with #develoPPPVentures portfolio companies, as well as meetings with startups and investors alongside Africa Tech Summit hosted by GSMA - Mobile for Development and Scaling digital Agriculture Innovations through Start-ups (SAIS) If you're interested in working with startups as an investor or mentor, please reach out! Below is an overview of the 10 portfolio startups we met that are completing Phase A of the program:   - Melanin Kapital – A climate fintech platform that provides capital to SMEs investing in green assets, using data-driven carbon credits. - tappi – A growth engine that helps small business owners harness the power of direct-to-consumer (D2C) marketing. - Irri-Hub KE – IoT-powered drip irrigation systems for smallholder farmers, integrating data analytics to optimize resource use and crop cycles. - Sio Valley Technologies – An innovative company developing edible coatings to extend the shelf life of agricultural products and advanced formulas to support seedling ripening. - Flexpay – A "save now, buy later" solution for durable goods, education, and groceries, transforming the way people save and spend. - Malaica – A maternity care provider working to reduce maternal mortality and healthcare costs in Kenya’s system. - eProd Solutions Limited – An ERP system designed for smallholder farmers, improving traceability, access to credit and financial management. - Cliniva – A healthcare provider focused on women’s health, combining neighborhood clinics with telemedicine solutions. - Figorr – An IoT-enabled cold chain monitoring solution for pharmaceuticals and Kenya’s flower export industry. - GoBEBA – A quick-commerce platform for essential bulky household goods like cooking gas and water, tailored to the needs of Kenyan households. 👉 Check out the full portfolio here: https://lnkd.in/eDwcffDT Niklas Fischer Julia Stausberg-Umuerri Daniel Thomann Marco Christ Hannah Milberg Barbara von Toll Phillip Tettenborn VC4A