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Brothers André and Daniel Albuquerque founded the company Terra Nova in 2001 to mediate land disputes between poor families illegally living in urban areas and the official landowners-with the aspiration to improve the lives of the poor. A business-led approach to the issue, like Terra Nova's, was innovative and contested amid the widespread belief that land disputes fell solely within the public sector's purview. After struggling to develop a viable business model, the company received support from impact investing firm MOV Investimentos. By 2019, Terra Nova finally broke even and was exploring opportunities for scaling. But its leaders had to decide the right expansion model for the social business.

The case concerns the sale of Mae Terra, one of Brazil's leading brands for packaged organic foods, to the consumer goods giant Unilever in 2017. Working with Unilever management, Mae Terra's CEO Alexandre Borges must determine whether and how to keep Mae Terra's B Certification, which attests to its commitment to having a positive social and environmental impact, and what internal governance mechanisms will enable MaeTerra to maintain its mission, values, and practices even as it is integrated into a large volume-driven multinational whose governance follows standard listed company principles.

Brazilian Michelin-star chef Alex Atala managed four restaurants, a foundation advocating for the environment, and a seminar focused on food and sustainability. His new initiative was opening a hotel.

Dr. Vera Cordeiro founded the NGO Instituto Dara in 1991 to help poor families break the cycle of poverty and illness in Brazil. She and her team of employees and volunteers developed a holistic methodology to address the multidimensional sources of poverty based on the pillars of health, housing, citizenship, income, and education. After introducing the seeds of this approach, the case examines the evolution of the organization's attempts to grow its social impact in Brazil and beyond-including a loose network of sister organizations, social franchising, licensing agreements, and government adoption.

Spreadsheet supplement for case 219035.

Vox Capital was the first certified impact investing fund in Brazil. Founded in 2009, it provides early-stage capital for companies offering innovative and scalable solutions to enhance the lives of low-income Brazilians, while aiming to simultaneously generate attractive market-rate financial returns for investors. This case examines the evolution of Vox Capital, across understanding the landscape, launching, raising funds, selecting investees, structuring deals, building investee capacities, tracking performance, developing internal systems, and advancing the field of impact investing.

Technos was the market leader in the Brazilian watch market. Its CEO had made a firm commitment of evolving the company's marketing and commercial practices by focusing less on pushing product to retail clients and more on branding to end consumers to pull watches from retailers. In 2016, the company was about to re-launch its master brand's website. But the more time passed, the greater were the discrepancies between what the marketing, commercial (sales) and retail divisions of the company envisioned as an ideal ecommerce-enabled Technos website. What should be the fundamental role(s) of our master brand's website?