The Power of Local: One Vision, Two Approaches

This article was written as a collaboration between the WeRobotics team and The Power of Local Challenge team. During the outreach phase of the Power of Local Challenge, Sonja Betschart, an Ashoka Fellow and co-founder of WeRobotics, reached out to the Challenge team, noting the shared tagline “The Power of Local” and asking a simple but powerful question: “How can we collaborate?”

That question sparked a meaningful partnership between WeRobotics, a nonprofit organization shifting power to local experts through inclusive technology and locally-led solutions, and the Power of Local Challenge, an Ashoka Changemakers initiative spotlighting organizations that place local leadership and small business ecosystem builders at the center of community-driven change.

You can also find this article on the Ashoka Changemakers blog, where you'll discover more stories, insights, and resources.

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Small businesses are the building blocks of local communities. With their deep connection to the people they serve, they are uniquely positioned to address community needs. Thus, small and medium enterprises (SMEs) are essential drivers of job creation, economic growth, and community development. 

This is where The Power of Local Challenge situates itself. What stands out about the Challenge’s approach is that rather than directly awarding small businesses themselves, it focuses on empowering and disbursing grants to the ecosystem builders who create the conditions for these businesses to thrive. Because when small businesses flourish, so do the communities they serve.

Much has been said about the importance of cultivating business-friendly environments to drive development. But what truly shapes a thriving business environment? Access to resources — credit, networks, opportunities for collaboration, and supportive regulations — is key. 

Expectedly, this resonates with WeRobotics: it forms the crux of the team’s day-to-day work facilitating and supporting the Flying Labs Network using collaboration and knowledge sharing as core values and guided by the Glocalization Model and a vision to amplify the Power of Local. For the WeRobotics team, this means, in part, supporting local drone, data, and AI experts in the Global South to solve challenges in their communities. And the Network allows for this by providing the space for these local experts to connect, learn from and with one another, co-design solutions, and return to their local contexts with a strengthened global perspective to replicate and adapt them. A key learning for the WeRobotics team has been that meaningful and lasting change happens through collaboration for collective progress. 

Naturally, our shared commitment to the Power of Local led us to explore the different paths we take to this goal. We discovered striking similarities between the utilization of both technology and business as tools for social good. The unique challenges faced by SMEs—limited resources, the need for agility, and the pursuit of sustainability—mirror those encountered by the local experts of the Flying Labs Network and beyond. More than that, driving meaningful systems change through the Power of Local requires a strong focus on ecosystem building. 

Who are Ecosystem Builders?

Ecosystem builders are essential to systems change and development work. While local experts are busy designing and implementing solutions within their communities, ecosystem builders work behind the scenes, ensuring that these experts have the resources, connections, and support needed to succeed. They provide platforms for collaboration, curate essential tools and resources, forge key partnerships, secure funding, and bring people together for broader advocacy efforts. The organizations and people who step into this role are indispensable. 

The Power of Local Challenge recognizes ecosystem builders as critical to the success of small businesses and the impact they have on the communities they serve. The Challenge aims to source innovative projects, initiatives, and organizations that are enabling small businesses to best serve their communities, and applicants showed up in full force: nearly 900 applicants shared their incredible ideas and work, truly demonstrating the power of local knowledge, talent, skills, and more.

For WeRobotics, localized, decentralized, and bottom-up approaches that center local expertise can activate the abundance of solutions that we must tap into in order to address pressing global challenges—multiplying the actors working for positive social change. The organization’s work co-creates the conditions for local experts in the Global South to thrive in the spaces from which they are often excluded. By working collaboratively and inclusively between local and global organizations, WeRobotics contributes to local and regional ecosystems where the power to create change is held in everybody’s hands.

The Challenge’s focus on ecosystem building is particularly relevant to WeRobotics because it lies at the heart of the organization’s systems innovation work, especially through the Glocalization Model. The model acknowledges that local experts with a shared vision can achieve greater impact by coming together in strong, diverse networks. Through collaboration and knowledge exchange, they strengthen one another’s expertise, form vital partnerships, and amplify their collective impact. This is what it means to build a thriving ecosystem. It is why the Flying Labs Network is guided by the African proverb: Alone we go fast, together we go far.

Effective Ecosystem Building

So, how do ecosystem builders create inclusive and equitable systems that enable local businesses and local experts to thrive? This is what the Power of Local has taught us: 

1. Weaving collaborative networks of local stakeholders. 

By connecting small businesses and local experts with other actors in their ecosystem (other local companies, organizations, and institutions, local professionals in relevant sectors, policy makers, local authorities, etc.), we activate shared resources and opportunities.

2. Enhancing access to structures of support and capacity building. 

Capacity-building initiatives equip small businesses and local experts with the skills needed to excel. 

The Power of Local Challenge aims to support ecosystem builders whose solutions equip businesses with training, mentorship, and resources that allow small local enterprises to overcome barriers to business. 

Similarly, WeRobotics supports the local experts of the Flying Labs Network to design and implement sustainable solutions to challenges in local communities. As an example, through the Turning Data into Action (TDIA) Program, Flying Labs access both a methodology and a wealth of expertises, ranging from technology support to stakeholder engagement, communications, and monitoring and evaluation strategies. Flying Labs can also request microgrant funding from WeRobotics to implement a learning project of their choice using the methodology and with personalised support. This approach allows for Flying Labs to “learn by doing” and to turn a small project into far-reaching impact and a cascade of opportunities.

3. Focusing on long-term sustainability. 

Sustainability is central to both the Power of Local Challenge and WeRobotics’ Glocalization Model. 

One of the target groups for the Power of Local Challenge are ecosystem builders that offer greater accessibility to financial resources for small businesses, enabling them to stabilize and expand. 

Conversely, WeRobotics’ Glocalization Model views sustainability through the lens of the independence and interdependence necessary in a network. Within the Flying Labs Network, Flying Labs are not dependent on funding and directives from a centralised authority. Instead, they operate independently, determining their legal set-ups and operational priorities within their local contexts. Based on this, they then come together not as beneficiaries but as equal partners to collaborate with other Flying Labs for more opportunities and greater impact. This nurtures adaptability, resilience, and long-term sustainability. 

A Shared Vision for Systems Change

At their core, The Power of Local Challenge and WeRobotics’ mission to amplify the Power of Local share fundamental principles. Both initiatives recognize that local communities are best equipped to address their own challenges. Both emphasize the importance of adapting solutions to local needs rather than applying one-size-fits-all approaches. Both utilize innovation as a tool for social good. Both disrupt traditional top-down development models and prioritize the decentralized distribution of power to local actors.

By building collaborative environments that encourage knowledge-sharing and collaboration, we lay the groundwork for lasting impact. The complex, systemic challenges our world faces require equally complex and systemic solutions. At the heart of these solutions are the ecosystems that enable the Power of Local to thrive. And by investing in ecosystem builders, we can ensure that changemaking is happening on multiple levels: from direct support for small businesses and local experts to the creation of inclusive, sustainable environments that ensure long-term innovation and growth.

As the Power of Local Challenge moves into its finalist phase, the team has been paying close attention to what participants say they need most to succeed. One common thread in the feedback was clear: many small business ecosystem builders are looking for more support when it comes to innovating and scaling their impact. 

In response, and to further our collaboration on the Power of Local, a final engagement session is being put together for Challenge participants to help meet this need. The session will be led by the WeRobotics team, and finalists can expect practical tools and real-world examples to guide them as they think about how to grow their work and deepen their impact. Follow updates on The Power of Local Challenge and stay connected on social media @ashokachangemakers.

As for WeRobotics, the team continues to co-create the Flying Labs Network with local technology experts across the Global South, and champion a different international development model that lays the tools for social change at scale in the hands of local experts. Subscribe to the WeRobotics email newsletter to stay updated on organizational initiatives.