Essilor
Better Vision for the Poor
By Aneel Karnani, Bernard Garrette, Jordan Kassalow, & Moses Lee
Stanford Social Innovation Review Spring 2011
Copyright 2011 by Leland Stanford Jr. University All Rights Reserved
Stanford Social Innovation Review Email: info@ssireview.org, www.ssireview.org
Action Case Study
Better Vision for the Poor would seem that private companies could profitably supply eyeglasses to the poor—an ideal situation for applying the bottom of the pyramid (BOP) approach popularized by C.K. Prahalad. In 2005, Essilor International, a publicly traded French company, launched a BOP initiative targeting the Indian By Aneel KArnAni, BernArd GArrette, JordAn KAssAlow, & Moses lee rural poor. But the project has yet to make a profit. Estimates for the number of poor people worldwide who VisionSpring, founded in 2001 as a nonprofit dedicated to reducneed eyeglasses are startling. The World Health Organization ing poverty and generating opportunity in the developing world reports approximately 517 million people in developing counthrough the sale of affordable eyeglasses, uses a social entrepreneurtries are visually impaired because they do not have access to ship approach. In 2009, VisionSpring sold 201,000 pairs of readycorrective treatment. The Centre for Vision in the Developing made reading glasses. It is now trying to scale up its efforts and World at Oxford University has a higher estimate: More than 1 hopes to sell 1 million pairs of eyeglasses per year by 2012. Yet even billion people need but do not get vision correction. There is a if VisionSpring achieves this goal, the impact is too little, given that simple, old, and cost-effective technology to solve this probbetween 500 million and 1 billion people need eyeglasses—and the lem—eyeglasses. Yet the problem persists on a vast scale. For number is growing. the poor, eyeglasses often are either inaccessible or unaffordable, Another approach to solving the vision problem emphasizes forcing
By Aneel Karnani, Bernard Garrette, Jordan Kassalow, & Moses Lee
Stanford Social Innovation Review Spring 2011
Copyright 2011 by Leland Stanford Jr. University All Rights Reserved
Stanford Social Innovation Review Email: info@ssireview.org, www.ssireview.org
Action Case Study
Better Vision for the Poor would seem that private companies could profitably supply eyeglasses to the poor—an ideal situation for applying the bottom of the pyramid (BOP) approach popularized by C.K. Prahalad. In 2005, Essilor International, a publicly traded French company, launched a BOP initiative targeting the Indian By Aneel KArnAni, BernArd GArrette, JordAn KAssAlow, & Moses lee rural poor. But the project has yet to make a profit. Estimates for the number of poor people worldwide who VisionSpring, founded in 2001 as a nonprofit dedicated to reducneed eyeglasses are startling. The World Health Organization ing poverty and generating opportunity in the developing world reports approximately 517 million people in developing counthrough the sale of affordable eyeglasses, uses a social entrepreneurtries are visually impaired because they do not have access to ship approach. In 2009, VisionSpring sold 201,000 pairs of readycorrective treatment. The Centre for Vision in the Developing made reading glasses. It is now trying to scale up its efforts and World at Oxford University has a higher estimate: More than 1 hopes to sell 1 million pairs of eyeglasses per year by 2012. Yet even billion people need but do not get vision correction. There is a if VisionSpring achieves this goal, the impact is too little, given that simple, old, and cost-effective technology to solve this probbetween 500 million and 1 billion people need eyeglasses—and the lem—eyeglasses. Yet the problem persists on a vast scale. For number is growing. the poor, eyeglasses often are either inaccessible or unaffordable, Another approach to solving the vision problem emphasizes forcing