FAQ

We combine lists of companies from known impact investors, funds, and users. We find those companies and scrape their web-data, including social media. We augment this data with various financial data providers, and then score the companies for investability and SDG impact.

The team consists of researchers from the Zurich University of Applied Sciences. Dr. Orpiszewski keeps in touch with the needs of the Swiss impact investment community. Dr. Orcun Kaya researches to lend the project intellectual girth. Colin Wirz, of Pyango fame, works to implement the project using modern IT frameworks and APIs. Prof. Dr. Patrick Laube and his team map the needs of people around the globe. Dr. sc. ETH Mark Thompson orchestrates the whole enchilada.

In September of 2015, the United Nations (UN) adopted a global agenda for sustainable development. The action plan runs until 2030, and is operationalised through 17 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) with 169 targets. Goals consist of broad objectives like less inequality, no hunger, clean water and sanitation, etc. Each goal comprises measurable targets by which to assess progress. They are an internationally agreed way of measuring sustainable impact.

The idea of Tech4DG started in 2019 in conversations, and is the financial brainchild of Dr. Tomasz Orpiszewski, who in discussions with Swiss impact investors, saw a need for sustainable impact measurements for under-covered private companies in emerging markets. He sought to automate both the search and evaluation of these socially responsible companies, to make them more accessible. InnoSuisse gave him a grant in 2020 to turn that vision into reality. In 2021, Tech4SDG joined forces with various partners to tune the offering.