The Rise Fund: TPG Bets Big on Impact

It is March 2017 and TPG, a global alternative investment firm with $74 billion assets under management, has recently launched its inaugural impact investing fund-the $2 billion Rise Fund. In an effort to "take the religion out of impact investing," Mike Stone, CIO of Rise, has partnered with Chris Addy at The Bridgespan Group, a nonprofit consultancy, to develop an evidence-based methodology for quantifying the impact of prospective Rise investments. Together, they have come up with a framework that ultimately generates an impact multiple of money (IMM), a measure of the social value created by a company per equity dollar invested. If a company fails to meet the IMM threshold, Rise will not invest in it. The case finds Stone and Maya Chorengel (HBS MBA '97), Rise's senior partner for impact, debating whether to make Rise's first investment in EverFi, an educational technology company that offers a range of online educational programming to its K-12 school, university, and corporate clients.