Speakers - William J. Kramer

William Kramer is founder and president of The Global Challenge Network.

He brings to GCN experience as a business entrepreneur, starting a dozen separate companies during his business career; as the founder of a non-profit organization, The Knowledge Initiative, an international NGO; and as a staff member of the World Resources Institute, where he served in a variety of posts, most recently as Director of Education and Training for the Markets & Enterprise Program. During six years at WRI, Mr. Kramer also served as a Senior Fellow, and as Deputy Director of the Development Through Enterprise Program. He was director of a groundbreaking conference on business engagement with low-income populations, Eradicating Poverty Through Profit: Making Business Work for the Poor, in San Francisco, December 2004, which drew 1200 participants from 70 countries, and defined the nascent field of “base of the pyramid” (BOP) studies. He was instrumental in establishing www.nextbillion.net, the leading blog focusing on issues of business engagement with low-income populations, where he was a frequent contributor. In his 30 years in the private sector, Mr. Kramer built numerous businesses in bookselling, book distribution, and publishing. He invented the modern bookstore/cafe, opening Kramerbooks & afterwords in Washington in 1976, laying the foundation for the still-dominant business model in the industry. He also established the firm which became Daedalus Books, a leading purveyor of high-quality sale books and remainders. Bill is a principal author of The Next 4 Billion: Market Size and Business Strategy at the Base of the Pyramid, the first data-based study of business engagement with the poor, published in 2007 by WRI and the International Finance Corporation. He is the author of numerous articles for popular and academic audiences, including recent articles for the MIT journal, Innovations, Vodafone’s Corporate Responsibility Dialogues, and the Kennedy School of Government. He has delivered lectures to many corporate and association meetings, and given lectures at leading business schools around the world. Mr. Kramer will personally lead many of GCN’s seminars and courses on business engagement with the BOP.

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