AI and digital tools are expanding into emerging markets at pace — with deployment often outrunning the organisational readiness of the institutions expected to adopt them. ESG and fiduciary risk requirements on institutional investors are tightening.
KYC and AML compliance frameworks are applying increasing scrutiny to local partner organisations — even though many have never undergone formal organisational assessments. Official development assistance (decreased by 7.1% in real terms in 2024, as per OECD) has been falling rapidly, on the other hand.
With aid budgets being rolled back by most major donor governments, private capital, technology investments and philanthropies are expected to fill the gap - but the infrastructure for deploying that capital responsibly into local organisations has not kept pace.
The cost of getting organisational readiness wrong — a failed deployment, a grant that doesn’t deliver, a reputational exposure from an under-assessed partner — is higher than it has been before.
The readiness gap is getting more expensive to ignore. Footbridge exists to close that gap, before resources move.
