Why are some enterprises succeeding in meeting BOP needs, and others are not? Successful enterprises operating in these markets use four broad strategies that appear to be critical:

• Focusing on the BOP with unique products, unique services, or unique technologies that are appropriate to BOP needs and that require completely reimagining the business, often through significant investment of money and management talent. Examples are found in such sectors as water (point-of-use systems), food (healthier products), finance (microfinance and low-cost remittance systems), housing, and energy.

• Localizing value creation through franchising, through agent strategies that involve building local ecosystems of vendors or suppliers, or by treating the community as the customer, all of which usually involve substantial investment in capacity building and training. Examples can be seen in health care (franchise and agent-based direct marketing), ICT (local phone entrepreneurs and resellers), food (agent-based distribution systems), water (community-based treatment systems), and energy (mini-hydropower systems).

• Enabling access to goods or services—financially (through single- use or other packaging strategies that lower purchase barriers, prepaid or other innovative business models that achieve the same result, or financing approaches) or physically (through novel distribution strategies or deployment of low-cost technologies). Examples occur in food, ICT, and consumer products (in packaging goods and services in small unit sizes, or “sachets”) and in health care (such as cross-subsidies and community-based health insurance). And cutting across many sectors are financing strategies that range from microloans to mortgages.

• Unconventional partnering with governments, NGOs, or groups of multiple stakeholders to bring the necessary capabilities to the table. Examples are found in energy, transportation, health care, financial services, and food and consumer goods. Enterprises may—and often do—use more than one of these strategies serially or in combination.