Description: A \$108 million social impact investment fund designed to provide financing to advance the development of drugs, vaccines, diagnostics and other interventions against diseases that disproportionately burden low- and middle-income countries.
Start date: Launched in 2013.
Status: Operational.
GHIF is an impact investment fund which finances high potential impact medical R&D opportunities. In practice this means medical innovations that target diseases of the developing world. Potential losses to investors are underwritten by the Gates Foundation and the Swedish International Development Cooperation Agency.1
Scope: GHIF is disease neutral, and only funds late stage development.
Access: GHIF has no bearing on the price or distribution of drugs.
Innovation: Incentives are linked to potential impact, and so are partially linked to health impact itself.
Efficiency: GHIF is a market-based funding mechanism, in that it is a decentralised selection procedure which is influenced by profitability on the market.
Governability: GHIF does not require a particularly complex governance structure. It is subject to the problem of selection.
Political Feasibility: GHIF is supported by a range of governments and funders, and has the potential to attract funding that would otherwise not have been available.
GHIF is an impact investment fund which targets medical R&D. We have not examined other examples of such a funding mechanism.
Targeted at: Investors
Stakeholders on board:
Gates foundation
JPMorgan Chase & Co
Merck
GSK
Pfizer
Grand Challenges Canada (funded by the Government of Canada)
the German Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development (acting through KfW)
Sida
BMZ
AXA
Storebrand
IFC
the Children’s Investment Fund Foundation
the Swedish International Development Cooperation Agency
GHIF website: admin. “Global Health Investment Fund.” Accessed July 10, 2017. http://www.ghif.com/.
