Development Innovation Ventures (DIV)

Grants to USA, Canada, and International private, public, nonprofit, and for-profit organizations, government agencies, IHEs, faith-based organizations, NGOs, and individuals to improve the lives of people living in poverty. Funding is intended to support innovative and impactful projects that address international development challenges. DIV is deliberately open across sectors and countries in which USAID operates and aims to help transition the best innovations to scale, thereby improving the lives of millions of people around the world.
Open innovation inspires new solutions to the critical challenges affecting millions of people. In the spirit of open innovation, Development Innovation Ventures (DIV) supports groundbreaking ideas to transform the lives of people living in poverty in developing countries around the world. DIV provides flexible, tiered grant funding to innovators and researchers to test new ideas and models, take strategic risks, build evidence of what works, and advance the best solutions.DIV funds innovations that demonstrate its three guiding principles of: a) rigorous evidence of impact, b) cost-effectiveness, and c) potential for scale and sustainability. Learn more about DIV’s core principles at https://www.usaid.gov/div/about#DIV's_Core_Principles. DIV accepts proposals for funding at the following stages:Stage 1: Pilot:Stage 1 grants support innovation pilots in developing country contexts. Stage 1 innovations are early in their development and require testing to understand user demand, feasibility, impact, and financial viability. Innovations at this stage must be post-prototype or -ideation. While an approach to monitor impact is necessary at this stage, a rigorous impact evaluation methodology is not required.Stage 2: Test and Position for Scale:Stage 2 grants support rigorous testing to determine impact or market viability. Public sector innovations at this stage should demonstrate rigorous evidence of causal impact and cost-effectiveness or use DIV funding to build such evidence. Stage 2 funding can support impact evaluations, further market testing, strengthening business or delivery models for scale, or operational expansion for innovations that have already conducted successful pilot testing.Stage 3: Transition to Scale:Stage 3 grants transition proven approaches to widespread scaling in new contexts or new geographies. Applicants should have demonstrated evidence of commercial viability or rigorous evidence of impact and cost-effectiveness at the Stage 2 level and must leverage additional external funding or partnership.Evidence Grants:Evidence Generation grants support research and evaluations of widely-used development approaches that lack sufficient evidence of impact and cost-effectiveness. Evidence Generation awards support impact evaluations, including randomized controlled trials and, if appropriate, quasi-experimental methods.Applicants should apply to the level that best matches their current scale and evidence base. Read more about DIV’s stages athttps://www.usaid.gov/div/about#DIV’s_Funding_Approach.Some examples of development innovations that DIV may support include the following:New technologies;New ways of delivering or financing goods or services;More cost-effective adaptations to existing solutions;New ways of increasing uptake of existing proven solutions and scaling to new geographies;Policy changes or shifts based on insights from behavioral economics;Social or behavioral innovations; andData collection and rigorous evaluation to measure the social impacts of promising innovations.DIV funds innovations through partnerships that save lives, reduce poverty, strengthen democratic governance, and help people emerge from humanitarian crises and progress beyond assistance. Consistent with USAID’s Private Sector Engagement (PSE) policy, DIV welcomes proposals from a broad variety of applicants, including applicants that engage with the private sector for greater scale, sustainability, and effectiveness of development and humanitarian outcomes. Consistent with USAID’s New Partnerships Initiative (NPI), DIV welcomes applications from organizations that have limited or no experience working with USAID. More broadly, by engaging with innovators, businesses, researchers, developing country governments, and other parties, DIV helps partner countries in their Journey to Self-Reliance, through which USAID and host countries work together toward a time when foreign assistance is no longer necessary by achieving locally sustained results, strengthening local capacities, and accelerating enterprise-driven development.