“Can for-profit companies create significant, direct impact?” by T.K.

Thank you to @Jacintha Baas, @Judith Rensing, and the @CE team for your help in editing and improving this post.

Introductory Context

Hi, I’m Trish. This is my first post on the EA forum. I spent the past decade building VC-funded, high-growth startups (from pre-revenue to $10M+, from founding team to 250+ employees; pre-funding through Series B), and supporting 100s of early-stage founders through the communities at On Deck and Unreasonable Group.

Last year, I joined the team at AIM to help build the Founding to Give program, which helps people start high-impact for-profit tech startups.

AIM's Founding to Give program aims to launch for-profit startups that create impact through two ways:

1. Build a startup, exit, and donate to effective charities (similar to earning to give)
2. Direct positive impact created through the startup

AIM's research and Founder's Pledge data show high expected value (EV) for the [...]

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Outline:

(00:18) Introductory Context

(01:33) Summary

(02:10) Overview: The Bull & Bear Case

(03:05) Reasons often given for why for-profits can't have significant impact (and their counterexamples)

(03:13) #1 You can't serve two masters

(03:56) #2 Show me a for-profit that is solving for rural malaria prevention

(05:02) #3 For profits can't solve problems for those suffering the most

(06:37) #4 But what about the perverse incentives that will inevitably emerge

(08:07) #5 It would have happened anyway

(10:24) #6 DuoLingo is designed to keep you using the app, not to deliver real learning outcomes

(11:42) Some ideas for where for-profits might be able to create significant direct impact

(13:15) Some ideas for where for-profits might be able to uniquely contribute to the impact ecosystem

(15:06) Next Steps

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First published:

July 11th, 2025

Source:

https://forum.effectivealtruism.org/posts/Se7gdAbjHPLLnRgbf/can-for-profit-companies-create-significant-direct-impact

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Narrated by TYPE III AUDIO.