Wade Tink probably didn't expect his social enterprise would grow by 1000 per cent – albeit off a small base – and reach annual revenues of more than $1 million only two years after taking it over.
Project Everest grew 1000 per cent last year and is on track to grow 250 per cent this year. In calendar 2016 the venture made $1 million in revenue.
![Wade Tink is the founder of social enterprise Project Everest.](http://web.archive.org./web/20171028095249im_/https://www.fairfaxstatic.com.au/content/dam/images/g/y/6/r/d/3/image.related.articleLeadwide.620x349.gy6kp2.png/1503999004552.jpg)
Tink, 31, served in East Timor as an Australian army officer in 2006, an experience that inspired him to acquire an 80 per cent share of Project Everest in 2015. He wanted to do a better job than the big international aid organisations whose work he witnessed first-hand in the army.
Project Everest builds sustainable commercial solutions to community problems in developing areas. It relies on Australian and, to a lesser extent, Singaporean university students as its manpower; working on a Project Everest initiative usually counts as academic credit.
Under its business model, fees are earned through the money students and universities pay to take part in a Project Everest program. The cost of the program is built into the usual course fees, which might be a little higher than standard fees for a subject.
Students can pay for courses that include a Project Everest program through the usual HECS mechanism. The fee covers training in Australia, food, accommodation, transport and project costs. Students pay for flights themselves.
Project Everest is a social enterprise, so it aims to be self-sustaining. Mission Australia defines a social enterprise as a venture that aims to be financially sustainable while providing economic, social and environmental benefits to local communities.
There is very little current research into the rise of the social enterprise as a business model. One report, Finding Australia's Social Enterprise Sector 2016: Analysis suggests there are 20,000 social enterprises in Australia.
Project Everest has been operating for four years and 450 students have worked on its four-week programs in Fiji, Cambodia, East Timor and Malawi.
Its purpose is to make products and services with a social benefit. "We don't go to India, make socks and sell them back in Australia, and then fund some project over in India. What we're trying to do is make a product and service that fits a market we're working in," Tink says.
A farm agricultural project in Fiji is an example. "In a country like Fiji you have farms of about five hectares; subsistence family farming, where goods are sold into local markets. These people don't have access to good agricultural advice or support.
"So we're building a digital solution that involves smart phones, drones and soil testing to provide a solution. Farmers can get advice on their mobile phone in real time about what to grow, when to grow it and when to harvest. It helps them understand pests, pesticide usage and get good agricultural advice," says Tink.
Project Everest is working with the Fijian Ministry of Agriculture alongside a number of other partners. Farmers will pay $200 a year to access the app, which Tink says is a fraction of what a similar service would cost in Australia.
"But we only want to take businesses from zero to one. We start out with design thinking and understanding the end user, communities in developing countries. Then we come up with ideas, create prototypes and test in the community. We prove there's a potential business entity that could attract investment through venture capital to build the social business up. And at that stage we pass them off into other businesses to help them succeed," he adds.
Tink acknowledges there are challenges in running a social enterprise.
"There's no legal definition of social enterprise in Australia. Some people don't agree with what we do [but] I feel like we're doing it the right way given what we're trying to do.
"When you use private enterprise; getting people to pay for the solution, not by giving it to them, that's a massive ideological shift."
On the continent
Tink is in Europe at the moment expanding the business. Project Everest is already working with University College London.
Being Australia-based, Project Everest only generates revenue across the mid-year and summer university holidays when students have time away from their studies to take part in projects, so cash flow management has been a serious challenge.
"It's been a painful process. I have a finance background so I thought I had it covered. But we have cash flow issues because we can only sell four months of the year," he says.
Expanding into Europe means Project Everest can earn revenue in the European university holidays by sending students on projects during those times, which are March through May and August and September. Â Â Â
"In Europe it's a different education system, so we're navigating that, but the university response over here has been great," he says.
Project Everest has been self-funded so far but Tink is open to external investment down the track. "We are not a unicorn because we don't have a digital base, but [a digital base is] my goal."
US bespoke car maker Local Motors has a business model he admires. It designs cars from scratch, using a collaborative model where people from all around the world come together to design cars, which are built in micro-factories around America.
"I want to be able to solve social problems in a collaborative fashion. We've had our first crack at this through our Crowdicity platform, which we launched in July," Tink says. Crowdicity is an online platform where people can collaborate on projects.
"I want to facilitate an engineer in Australia having input on a problem we're facing in a rural village in Malawi. I see that as the future of our business," he adds.
Another idea is to effectively codify and license Project Everett's processes so they can be used by other organisations.
Tink's advice to other social entrepreneurs is to always look after the team working for the business.
"There's no way we could do what we do without amazing people. They're everything and we try to look after them as much as we can. People come first, always."
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