LIS (Social Innovation Laboratory)

We develop and test innovative social business models that bring local development solutions to low HDI communities, where people who need the solutions are the key players in this construction.

In Brazil we face a challenge: about 13,2 million people are unemployed (Source: IBGE, may 31th), where the most part of this people are living in poor communities.

In other way, Brazil is knowm by your potencial to innovate, even in the worst scenarios.

Observing that data, LIS fosters social business as an alternative to income generation and local development, where people can find innovative ways to use resources and transform their lives.

The State of Ceará has approximately 9 million inhabitants, with almost 14% of the population living in extreme poverty, which represents 1,253,244 inhabitants in absolute numbers. In addition, Ceará is the third state in the ranking of inequality in the Northeast and the seventh in the country, with a GINI index of 0.560.

In addition, one of the main structural problems of its economy is the high rate of informality in the labor market, where it presents 56.3% of its workforce in informality, in addition to the factor that many entrepreneurs have difficulty initiating some type of development.

Basically LIS works in 3 ways:

1. Social Connection is a social technology that fosters the development of social projects and businesses, co-creating solutions with communities. It has a 03 day event format, whose main purpose is to get ideas from the head and "put it on paper".

For this purpose, there are lectures, many activities (hands on), connections with other participants, mentors, startups and professionals that will be available throughout the event helping teams to develop projects / businesses.

2. Social Lab - is based in 3 possibilities:

- To create for traditional companies, entrepreneurs, public and private institutions, professionals and others, new business models that bring solutions for local development, generating profitable and sustainable businesses, that is, of social impact.
- Pre-acceleration program and boosting social business.
- Articulation with investors and programs to promote business and projects.

3. Management of social impact projects - Consulting and support for the implementation and management of social impact business generated in Social Connection and Social Labs.

We consider the Social Innovation Laboratory an innovative solution because it is applied in the interaction with the local community. As a result, people appropriate the solutions, empower themselves, introject that knowledge, and replicate where the reality to be transformed exists.

It should be noted that Social Connection is not a ready model. It's a transformational approach where people who need solutions are part of it, taking on the process of change.

Besides that, we bring to companies the opportunity to really understand the best business models to the communitties trough the possibility to co-create this models.

The core technology is the Project Thinking, approach based on agile, design thinking, neuroscience and lean and created by Eduardo Freire, one of the LIS partners. 

Project thinking was applied in more than 30 large companies in Brazil, bringing to them results that changed and or potencialized even more the business and what we see that have total fit to bring social transformation and innovation!

Our focus is in the singularity!

We saw each community as a ecosystem, that have your own culture, problems, environment and, the main, your people!
With this model, we could help each community look your own problems and create your own solutions, what makes more sense than just replicate models hoping that it fits to all places!

In the first Social Connection we hited about 30 people directly, but now we´re with new partnerships that will help us to increase our reach and impact, due to the evolution and the implemetation of the business creating impact at all over the comunities.

Looking this scenario, we hope to impact 200 people directly and more than 5.000 indirectly people in one year.

In a five year view, we hope to impact 2000 people directly and more than 100.000 indirectly people!!

In the next year we hope that LIS was running in all the States of the Northeast part of Brazil, bringing results in all the communities that we work, helping us to validate the model and expand.

In five years we expect to create strategic chapters all over Brazil, bringing results in all the regions, showing that the model of the LIS has fit with the social problems and help the communities go trough them, what will help us to start to develop our international expansio strategy!

The main barrier is about the sponsors for the project!

We are not a non-profit organization, but our focus is not to explore the sponsors, but the most part of the people get worried about the fact that we have revenues for each of our products.

This revenues are for the effort of our team to bring the best social technology for the people and to keep LIS running as well.

But one really good point about LIS products is that there´s no charges for the communities!

We just want to offer a solution that help the money to circulate.

Other point, looking for a 5 year goals, is about the expansion model. Expansions use to need heavy investments, and it could be a problem that we could go further with the help of the MIT Solve!

Actually, we started!!!

To show our value and to bring strenght to the brand, we ran a Social Connection, what was a really good point to our branding.

Besides that we are looking for partnership with huge companies and knowledge social iniciatives, as CUFA (Centra Única da Favela - Center of the Favelas), what brings confidence to our work!

Looking for the expansion modelo, we´ll try to create cash flow to afford the first tryings in the other states and close partnerships with the main stakeholders of our models, that could bear the costs to bring a new perspective to the poor communities!

Today our team is composed by 3 guys:

Eduardo Freire, Felipe Gatica and João Antonio Cella Justo, where all they work part-time at LIS.

Eduardo Frei:+17 Years of experience in Strategic Management of Projects and Innovation in Management. Stanford Innovation & Entrepreneurship Certificate (in progress). Ad-hoc advisor to UNESCO. Master in Computing by CIN / UFPE .MBA in Project Management by FGV and Post in Public Projects by FIOCRUZ. Professor of the MBA programs of Poli / UFRJ, UFRN, USP / ESALQ, UFPE and the DeVry International MBA.

Felipe Gatica: Consultant in Innovative Management of Projects, has already carried out social impact projects in institutions of the Third Sector in Fortaleza such as Cáritas Brasileira, Banco Palmas de Desenvolvimento and CUFA / CE (Central Única das Favelas).

João Antonio Cella Justo: Consultant in Innovation, Managemente and Project, worked more than 6 years in Local, National and Global Projects in Rotaract, a program from Rotary Internationl, also having strategic leadership positions in the program and being invited to support the strategic planning of Rotary International.

Our partners at the moment are Central Única das Favelas (Unique Slum Central) - CUFA / CE and Centro de Defensa da Vida Herbert de Sousa (Life Defense Center Herbert de Sousa).

They are strategic partners that carry out the social mobilization for the realization of social connection events. They work with local development in the poor communities of Fortaleza and have strong social capital and also seek to promote equity by carrying out their mission. High ability to identify problems in the community for generating solutions and possible business.

Here at Lis we develop and validate business models of social impact and connect them with social entrepreneurs, to create, develop and support social businesses, so that the chances of success of these ventures are greater, through ideation events, training and consulting, and this is how we generate value.

As for our incomes, they come from the sponsorship we seek for these events, helping the cost for the community being closer than zero, by the stakeholders sponsorship , that as we, see the value that community development and new social impact businesses can generate.

In our next first year, we intend to get our break even, trough our 3 products!!

During this time we´ll study our costs and if our business model has the best market fit to bring value to the communities and the companies, by the Social Conexion and the ComuLabs, where the mais focus is create a win-win model, what is suposed to be attractive and bring more partners, helping us path ou financial sustainability.

Other point the will help us is to participate in investment round, what will catalyze our business and could help us to antecipate our view to the future.

Much more than the money, we´re looking for partnerships and menthors that could help us to potencilize our solution, getting more efficiency, impact and supporting the communities to increase your potencial do be sustainable, creating by theirselves a better place that provide new perspectives and oppotunities.

Banco Palmas Institute: Laboratory of Innovation and Research in Solidarity Finance - is an initiative of the Palms Institute for Development and Socioeconomics Solidarity / Banco Palmas and aims to boost and scale Solidary Finance through the use of information technology (IT).

Núcleo de Inovação em Novos Negócios Aplicados (New Applied Business Innovation Center) - Ninna: Venture Builder that connects solutions to the demands of large companies and also boost up startups.

Black Account: Black Account is a financial community that aims to extend access to financial services to all people without bureaucracy and financial education, through simple tools, helping that the credit does not become an enemy.

With this prize, we´ll apply the money to run Social Conections trough the Ceará State, looking for communities that really need new models to improve!

Besides that, it´ll help us to validate in another places, cause just have had one Social Connection in Fortaleza, and it´s importante to us the validation in another points of the State, and the prize will help our team to make feasible.

It´ll help us to measure the real impact of our model, to map and to adjust the besto model to  create solutions and bring learnings in the social business model!