I discover it actually fascinating to make use of exponential applied sciences to construct a virtuous and social community the place everybody advantages, and the place even micro-transactions are possible and manageable at scale. This fashion, it’s potential to assist these at the margin of society even with the little they want (for instance, a small buy of groceries), guaranteeing transparency and safety for donors, contributors, helpers, and controllers. Right here is the case of WeSherpa. We interviewed Maria Rosaria Sanna, co-founder of the Lugano-based startup, who reconciles expertise and group in on a regular basis life. They’ve simply began, however the potential is clear. Right here’s our dialog.
Inform us a bit about your self and your background.
My skilled journey started in advertising and marketing, however lately I’ve had the chance to delve into ESG matters, which led me in 2022 to pursue some coaching in Sustainability and Influence on the Polimi Graduate Faculty of Administration. My reference to Ticino is comparatively current however very significant: it was right here that, because of Pierfranco Sofia, with whom I shared the grasp’s program and who concerned me within the WeSherpa challenge, I used to be launched to a context strongly oriented in the direction of native social innovation. His entrepreneurial drive, mixed with the deep information of the territory and institutional dimension introduced by Paolo Bortolin, had been essential substances in constructing our workforce.
WeSherpa is a challenge that brings collectively completely different backgrounds — financial, social, and technological — round a shared imaginative and prescient: to exhibit that redistributing buying energy is extra worthwhile than concentrating wealth. In essence, if we now have an efficient instrument for monetary inclusion, like our community, we are able to assure impacts that conventional donation fashions don’t obtain.
So, what’s WeSherpa? What does it do and what stage is the challenge at? Inform us extra.
WeSherpa is a fintech startup with a social vocation, born with the purpose of reworking donations into easy, on a regular basis gestures near the group. We had been impressed by the idea of “suspended financial system”: shoppers can deposit credit score at important items shops so that somebody in want can buy these objects at a lowered worth, with dignity and in response to their wants. Every part occurs digitally, tracked and clear via our app. Donations are redeemed at 100% and might solely be utilized by beneficiaries licensed by native social organizations, producing a concrete influence immediately.
The mannequin is economically supported by accomplice shops who pay a share payment on the donations they obtain, which for them is successfully an further income. With that payment, we keep the platform. On this approach, generosity immediately produces actual socioeconomic worth and interprets instantly into tangible advantages for each recipients and shops, contributing to the well-being of the group, whereas the donor additionally positive factors the benefit of lowering their taxable earnings.
It’s a community as a result of it’s potential to donate remotely, for instance, for firms. A neighborhood enterprise can undertake WeSherpa as an answer to help its group by donating. Donations are channelled to accomplice shops. The enterprise receives an immediate certificates, which can ultimately change into an NFT, helpful for non-financial reporting and positive factors visibility on the app amongst citizen donors. In brief, it’s a clear gesture to say, “I’m right here and actually supporting my group, I wish to assure honest entry to important items in native shops.”
Right now, we’re in a really dynamic section: we now have launched our market take a look at in Ticino, with 11 lively shops and goal to achieve 20 within the coming weeks, increasing territorial protection and provided companies. The preliminary indicators are decidedly encouraging; our knowledge present that for a purchase order of 10 CHF, a client provides no less than 5 CHF. That is additionally attention-grabbing for shops: we’re speaking a few 50% improve in gross sales. This confirms that we’re heading in the right direction.
Do you utilize exponential applied sciences like AI or Blockchain? How will they alter our world?
WeSherpa was born as a “blockchain for good” challenge as a part of Pierfranco’s thesis for his Grasp in Sustainability and Influence. As , measuring social impacts continues to be a fancy subject (it’s rather more advanced to measure long-term social impacts than environmental ones), and it has attention-grabbing market potential within the influence finance sector.
Right now, the challenge has change into a real “revenue with function” mannequin. We’re engineering the usage of blockchain and can start its prototyping within the coming months, in parallel with the online 2 evolution of the service (app + cost community). For us, expertise isn’t an finish, however an enabling instrument—it’s used to make social influence measurable, which is a basic prerequisite for constructing belief and creating a really clear mannequin.
The thought of measuring influence in internet 3.0 continues to be on the coronary heart of our blockchain use, and donation certificates—particularly for companies—can be issued as Social Credit score: an NFT product that permits firms to exhibit immediate and native social influence, which may be included of their sustainability report with a click on. Our purpose is to launch this technical infrastructure growth by 2026, which can be possible as soon as we’ve raised capital and confirmed the enterprise thought’s validity available in the market.
The function of exponential applied sciences in advertising and marketing is transformative. As a advertising and marketing skilled, I grew up fascinated by more and more subtle and exact targets, however I additionally spent many hours counting what number of out-of-target shoppers I had reached, as a result of the wants and elements driving buying are extraordinarily fluid and mutable. Algorithms can be quicker than us at skipping sure patterns to focus immediately on conversion objectives and optimizing investments to maximise the consequence, figuring out folks almost certainly to answer sure stimuli, no matter sociodemographic traits. The excellent news is that we, as people, will at all times be referred to as to pay attention and have a deep understanding of individuals, producing worth propositions that actually make sense for somebody.
