James Ellsmoor, CEO of Island Innovations, frequently speaks at events, Photo Courtesy of James EllsmoorAn educational opportunity developed a passion James Ellsmoor had for island sustainability.
The need to make a living and circumstances led him to turn that passion into a thriving business.
Island Innovation is a virtual organization, and due to Ellsmoor it has developed a community that primarily connects virtually. Its network consists of a variety of members with common links – islands, as its name shows - and their interests, concerns and desire to improve sustainability and learn from each other.
“Guam is somewhat different from the Shetland Islands or Mauritius but there are these certain commonalities that islands share. Island Innovation exists really as a platform to share information, because there’s so much ‘reinventing the wheel’ that goes on to solve problems that have already been solved in different places,” Ellsmoor said.
Island Innovation was organized to include islands of a variety of political statuses, he said. “We know that Washington, D.C. has not necessarily got Guam, or Hawaii, or Puerto Rico in mind when there are international conversations going on.”https://mbjguam.com/sites/default/files/2ndlead-box.png
The aim, he said, is for an independent state like Barbados, a territory like Guam, a state like Hawaii or even a county like the Shetlands or the Orkney Islands to interact and share knowledge island-to island.
The focus on sustainable development is in its broadest term, Ellsmoor said.
“I came from a renewable energy background, but you can’t talk about energy on an island without thinking about tourism, waste management, transportation, conservation – all these things that are linked together,” he said.
Looking at an island system allows people to see how those items interlink and the importance of a “systems approach” to solving problems, he said. “We also focus on a systems-problems and demonstrating things that have a wider application.”
Island Innovation’s role is like that of a matchmaker. “We’re not implementing the projects; we’re introducing the people and giving them a platform to communicate and talk to each other and hoping that they go off and solve things. When I go off and I see people from our network … Fiji working with the University of Malta … I can see those success stories, but we just plant the seeds.”
Ellsmoor said the concept of sharing between very different islands has become a lot more mainstream in the five years that Island Innovation has existed. Equally important is the idea of a “level playing field,” he said. “This is not about the Europeans, the Americans telling everyone they’ve solved the problem and this is how they should do it.” While there are solutions coming from islands in Europe and America, the Caribbean and the Pacific have a lot to show and a lot to teach as well, he said.
Island Innovation’s most recent conference in April was the two-day Island Finance Forum, which attracted almost 6,000 people; in September it will host the 5th Virtual Island Summit, which last year drew 10,000 attendees. “We started that before COVID, when a virtual event was an innovative idea.” The concept made sense to Island Innovations, as it was impossible to get people from islands around the world physically together. The summit in September will have a broader content and is more community based, Ellsmoor said. The finance forums developed from the island summits, he said. “In order to solve the problems, we need to have the finance sector in the room, and they didn’t necessarily respond to the language of the September event.”
Island Innovation has a team of 18 with everyone working remotely on islands around the world. “We have people who’ve now been able to move back to their home island because they now have a remote job. Also, it gives us ears on the ground in different communities,” he said.
Ellsmoor previously worked in the Caribbean. “We have a number of team members there,” he said. “We definitely want to move into the Pacific and do more. We have a lot of community members in the Pacific.”
Interest in Island Innovations is growing in the Pacific, to include the North Pacific, he said. “I think at some point we’ve had leaders from every country speaking at our events."
Almost all islands have a high percentage of the economy that is government-led,” Ellsmoor said. Government engagement is critical, he said. “Our approach is always to make sure we have in the room the private sector, research and academia and civil society.” As well as connecting Islands, Ellsmoor said Island Innovation often finds that those sectors are working independently and don’t know how to communicate with each other. He said, typically, in the South Pacific the private sectors are small.
In addition, Island Innovation hosts some regional virtual events and has now begun physical events also in Madeira and Curacao, but with small audiences. Ellsmoor said that while in-person events are attractive for meeting people and networking, their disadvantages include travel costs and the ease with which conference content can be absorbed virtually.
The company also provides full-service marketing and public relations through the Island Innovation Agency, which offers “unique insights into islands and sustainability,” its website says.
“We’re still a company at the end of the day,” Ellsmoor said. “We’re a social enterprise so we have these social goals.”
While working in the non-governmental or NGO sector, Ellsmoor found he did not enjoy fundraising and decided a business structure would suit Island Innovation better.
Ellsmoor’s journey began at 18. He grew up in England. “I’m originally from Shropshire on the Welsh borders, from a pretty rural area. He secured a scholarship to attend the University of North Carolina.” It was completely out of the blue. I was the first in my family to go to university,” he said. “I found the scholarship on the internet and ended up going to the U.S.”
Through the funding, he spent a semester in New Zealand, and also undertook a research project on renewable energy in the South Pacific. “I went to Tuvalu, Samoa, Niue and Fiji as part of that.” Ellsmoor was interested in rural development and renewables in the islands, he said.
“Going into renewables there was this obvious issue for islands, but there was also an opportunity. Electricity’s very expensive, but what that means is you can do things that would be economically viable on mainland areas,” he said.
“The use of solar energy is often not about the environment, but about lowering costs – especially in the South Pacific region and the Caribbean. That was the entry point for me and I worked for several years in the Caribbean and also on renewables.”
Ellsmoor studied in Orkney in the North of Scotland for a master’s degree in island studies. He said he was fortunate to “then be able to join those dots, have the network in different places to be able to bring together, and that was really what spawned Island Innovation.”
Ellsmoor wrote for forbes.com on renewables and energy. “I was the first person at Forbes to write about sustainability,” he said. A blog about the islands gained traction, he said. “From that, I had to work backwards and figure out how to build a business model.” The blog started to become a fulltime job, he said, which led to the business. “Now we have the revenue generation from the events, from the media platform and then also the consultancy business, where we do projects.”
James Ellsmoor, CEO of Island Innovations in Portugal, where he is currently located. Photo courtesy of James Ellsmoor
Island Innovation has two European-Union funded projects now, we’ve done projects for various Caribbean organizations.” Clients include governments, private sector companies and NGOs, and universities. “The Caribbean Biodiversity Fund is one of our clients that we work in communication for. They’re the biggest financing organization for conservation in the region, so they’re an NGO.” Island Innovation also has worked for renewable energy companies doing a range of communications, he said. A more structured approach allows Island Innovation to get further with the work he originally set out to do, he said.
Despite the framework and the management team and a need to balance demands on his time, as CEO, Ellsmoor said, “I’m still very hands on for sure. We’re still in the growth phase. Between 2001 to 2002, the team doubled in size from eight to 18 people. “I think we’re now at the point where we’ve stabilized everything and we’re comfortable,” he said.
He enjoys being involved in projects, he said.
COVID had an unexpected benefit for Island Innovations, he said. “We were running virtual events before the pandemic.” The company had already had successful events that we had some presidents and prime ministers speak at, we persuaded people – especially in the islands, that virtual was something of interest.” Ellsmoor said virtual events was using technology that already existed, but it then showed an opportunity for collaboration and sharing. “The first month of the pandemic we were inundated with people asking for a quick chat, and advice, and help.”
Ellsmoor ran a course on how to host virtual events. While people took the course and understood the technology, Island Innovation was still asked to organize virtual events. “That was a time of growth and that’s why Island Innovation was able to grow without needing any external investments,” he said.
After five years, Ellsmoor said the company is still headed for expansion.
“Island Innovation will grow to have a physical footprint in every island region in the world, including across the Pacific.”
Although the company began virtually, he said, “We recognize the need for a physical presence to drive change and want to be an interface for this: a global network for local action.” Plans include future staff recruitment in the Pacific and a series of in-person events with local partners.
“We will also continue to build out our library of information to provide free resources for island communities and stakeholders looking to create change,” Ellsmoor said. mbj
Ellsmoor said the concept of sharing between very different islands has become a lot more mainstream in the five years that Island Innovation has existed. Equally important is the idea of a “level playing field,” he said. “This is not about the Europeans, the Americans telling everyone they’ve solved the problem and this is how they should do it.” While there are solutions coming from islands in Europe and America, the Caribbean and the Pacific have a lot to show and a lot to teach as well, he said.
