What makes us who we are

Impact Factory in a nutshell – and why you should apply to us with your impact idea!

Not just earning money at work, but doing meaningful work, helping and empowering others, being truly sustainable, and making sure all of this stays that way tomorrow: as an impact startup forge, we’ve been awarding startup fellowships to young green & social entrepreneurs on the campus of the family equity company Haniel for five years now. Our community currently includes more than 100 active teams, and it grows every six months. Our support adapts to each startup’s stage of maturity, and we’ve developed three different programs for this:

You have a really good idea but are still at the very beginning? As a Create-up, you turn that first thought into an economically viable business model. If you’ve already taken the first step of founding, we go looking for customers with you as a Ramp-up and support you as you enter the market. But we also welcome teams that are much further along. For them, there’s our Fellow network, where you can exchange ideas and help each other. We’re not competitors – we’re like-minded free thinkers who are rethinking business!

We meet with our program participants at least twice a month in our Meet & Work sessions, alternating between online and offline meetings. In our offline sessions, we focus on collaboration and work intensively on current challenges (e.g., prototyping or problem-solution fit). Online, it’s about expert input on topics like legal questions or marketing. This lets us offer you more flexibility (and, of course, safety) while growing together as a community.

OUR PURPOSE

Why Impact Factory? Because we do social entrepreneurship like hardly anyone else! What that means – what makes us special – Program Manager Dirk Sander explains to you personally:

Problems are the raw material for innovation. We want to be the problem solvers! While comparable accelerator programs put the profit motive or an exit orientation front and center, we want to develop sustainable solutions – solutions with impact. For us, economic viability and social value are equally important goals. While you work through proven methods with us and with each other in our workshops, we also offer you – in addition to the usual investors – a gateway to a network of very different stakeholders. By that I mean foundations, municipalities, nonprofit organizations, or banks focused on the common good. This lets us support niche ideas that otherwise couldn’t exist at all. These can lead, for example, to hybrid business models with a corporation on one side and a nonprofit organization on the other. What always matters to us is the greatest possible benefit to society!

Our home is Duisburg, but our fellows come from all over Germany and the neighboring German-speaking countries. We’re now even getting applications from the USA.

Here in the Ruhr region, we’re also active on the policy side. Part of our philosophy has to be helping to shape and rethink the political framework. As I said: problems are the raw material for innovation. Social problems are the raw material for social innovation. Unfortunately, we have a lot of these construction sites in the Ruhr region, but with more than five million inhabitants, we also have plenty of smart, committed minds to tackle them. The Ruhr region’s politics and economy haven’t managed it in the past – can its society manage it in the future?”

To prove that Berlin isn’t the only place that does startups, we’ll soon be introducing you to successful founding teams from our hometown of Duisburg as a first deeper look – coming soon here on the blog. From now on, you’ll regularly get insights into the world of impact startups and our work here. Stay tuned!

BECOME PART OF OUR COMMUNITY!

Whether you’re starting from scratch, already looking for your first customers, or already active on the market – we’re looking for exciting new ideas that help shape the economy of tomorrow. Become part of a growing network of like-minded entrepreneurs and strong program partners. Apply by November 14 for Impact Factory’s sixth batch. Go to the application form. We’re looking forward to hearing from you!