Samasource, a San Francisco-based social enterprise with an award-winning microwork model that has connected thousands of marginalized people to paid employment, closed a $7.5 million philanthropic funding round led by The MasterCard Foundation with participation from existing funders, including the California Endowment, the U.S. Department of State and the Dutch Postcode Lottery/Oxfam Novib.
This funding will be used to create technology-enabled jobs for thousands of youth globally, to continue to develop Samasource’s robust technology platform, the SamaHub, and to support expansion of the organization’s microwork model into low-income communities in Gulu, Uganda and California.
“We are grateful to receive this investment from some of the world’s leading philanthropic funders,” said Leila Janah, founder & CEO of Samasource. ”The capital generously provided enables us to serve more marginalized women and youth than ever before and expand into new areas, including the United States. With this support, we will dramatically change the lives of thousands of poor women and youth by providing them with what they want most—paying work.”
To date, Samasource has connected more than 3,000 marginalized people in nine countries to paying work—totaling over $2 million in wages. Samasource’s award-winning microwork model brings free, specialized technology training and paid digital work to poor women and youth around the world. This enables people to gain skills, earn a living wage and break the cycle of poverty for themselves and their families. 75% of Samasource workers move up to higher-paying work or higher education.
The MasterCard Foundation is leading this round with an investment of nearly $5.3 million. This will allow Samasource to significantly broaden its impact by developing additional features to scale its proprietary microwork platform, the SamaHub. The funding will also support Samasource’s network of delivery partners to train 10,000 East African youth, and provide direct employment to over 4,000 young people living in slums and peri-urban areas in Kenya and Uganda.
The new investment round will also support the landmark opening of Samasource’s first domestic program, SamaUSA, which will train low-income students to support themselves through online work. Starting in northern California with funding from The California Endowment, SamaUSA is designed to equip marginalized people in California with new technology skills and link successful program graduates to jobs on online work platforms as a strategy to improve their health and well being through earned income.