Inclusive Business-Model Innovation for Economically Marginalized Communities

Claire M. Dubois

Inclusive Business-Model Innovation for Economically Marginalized Communities

Author(s)	Dr. Claire M. Dubois
Country	United States
Abstract	Inclusive business-model innovation has emerged as an important approach for reconciling commercial viability with broader economic participation among communities that remain underserved by conventional markets. Economically marginalized populations frequently encounter interconnected barriers involving affordability, physical and digital accessibility, limited purchasing power, weak market connections, restricted access to productive assets, insecure employment, and insufficient influence over the design of products and services intended for them. Conventional business models may address these populations only as low-income consumers, thereby overlooking opportunities to integrate community members as suppliers, workers, distributors, entrepreneurs, knowledge partners, and co-creators of value. This study develops an integrated framework for inclusive business-model innovation for economically marginalized communities, emphasizing five complementary dimensions: affordability and access, community co-creation, livelihood integration, localized distribution, and financial sustainability. The research adopts a conceptual-methodological and simulation-based design because no original community-level or enterprise-level dataset was supplied. A synthetic analytical population of 600 business-model profiles was allocated across low, moderate, and high inclusion conditions. The resulting Inclusive Value Creation Index increased from 46.5 under low inclusion to 65.9 under moderate inclusion and 81.8 under high inclusion. These numerical values are theoretical simulation outputs rather than empirical estimates. The analysis indicates that the strongest inclusive models are not characterized simply by lower prices; they simultaneously expand access, incorporate local knowledge into value creation, strengthen livelihood opportunities, develop context-sensitive distribution mechanisms, and preserve sufficient economic viability for continuity and scaling. The study further argues that inclusion should be assessed according to the net value created for economically constrained communities rather than solely by the number of low-income customers reached. Sustainable scaling requires partnership with ecosystem actors, locally embedded capabilities, community participation, and adaptive business-model configurations. The proposed framework contributes to inclusive-innovation and business-model literature by shifting attention from market penetration toward reciprocal value creation and by providing an operational structure for future empirical research.
Keywords	: Inclusive Business Model, Economically Marginalized Communities, Inclusive Innovation, Base of the Pyramid, Community Co-Creation, Social Value Creation, Livelihood Integration, Frugal Innovation, Inclusive Growth, Sustainable Business Models.
Field	Engineering
Published In	Volume 1, Issue 6, November-December 2020
Published On	2020-12-08

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American Journal of Advanced Multidisciplinary Innovation and Research

A Widely Indexed Open Access Peer Reviewed Multidisciplinary Bi-monthly Scholarly International Journal

Inclusive Business-Model Innovation for Economically Marginalized Communities

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