Pilot kick-off!!

So the pilot is now official! We have decided to sponsor Ranjith and Satish Koteeswaran , aged 14 and 15 years respectively (their father, Mr T Koteeswaran runs a tea stall across our street, in Chennai) for our first Micro-loan initiative. The loan amount would be Rs 10,000 each for their first 6 months of schooling (to cover the costs of tuition, books and uniforms), and based on the repayment history and return of investment, we might plan further loan extensions. We have decided to fix a nominal interest rate of 10% (very low by MFI standards!), and hope to recover the full cost with interest within a reasonable time frame (the board has, of course, agreed to absorb the cost of default into the terms of loan extension, in the spirit of entrepreneurship). Keeping my fingers crossed for the experiment to succeed!

Meanwhile, we have already started to brainstorm on the strategy to revamp our website into a social investment channel. We will be getting together next week to build a roadmap, and identify the immediate next steps to kick-start this process. Exciting times ahead, will keep everyone posted!!