Now being delivered as a series of live virtual workshops
Mobilizing Private Capital is now available through live virtual workshops, including customized sessions for organizations and groups. Our next open, in-person workshop is planned for early 2027.
Mobilizing Private Capital.
From Strategy to Scale in Blended Finance.
Returning in 2027
Our next open, in-person Mobilizing Private Capital workshop is planned for early 2027. The Ottawa experience will retain the collaborative format: practical learning, working sessions, peer exchange and opportunities to connect beyond the formal program.
Images courtesy of TCC Canada.
Build a future in which capital flows more smoothly into sustainable development, private investment is mobilized at meaningful scale, development, trade and investment priorities are better integrated, and promising ideas convert into committed capital.
What must change to unlock greater momentum?
The session begins with a provocative, practitioner-led examination of the barriers, assumptions and opportunities shaping the movement of capital.
- What will it take to unlock meaningful institutional participation?
- Which structural, risk, governance, liquidity and portfolio barriers are critical, and what kind of pathways can unlock scale?
- How can stronger capital linkages and collaboration support impact funds within the Canadian ecosystem?
- Why do strong initiatives stall before capital is committed, and what can materially improve conversion?
- Are DFI and MDB balance sheets, risk-transfer tools and catalytic capabilities being used boldly and strategically enough?
- How can pipelines, platforms and ecosystems become credible pathways to investability?
- How can Canada integrate development, trade, investment and domestic priorities more effectively?
Where the conversation will go
1. Unlocking Institutional Capital at Scale
Move beyond aspiration to examine the barriers, structures, risk allocation, portfolio logic and market conditions required for meaningful participation at scale.
2. From Strong Ideas to Committed Capital
Explore why promising initiatives lose momentum, and what improves strategic clarity, stakeholder confidence, alignment and conversion.
3. Capital Corridors for Canada and Beyond
Connect development, trade, investment and financing around real priorities, growth markets and economic opportunities at home and abroad.
4. Building Pathways to Investability
Build strong transactions, sectors and ecosystems toward pipelines, platforms, portfolios and bankable assets that larger pools of capital can enter, aligned with economic opportunities.
Join a live virtual workshop now — or hear first about the 2027 in-person offering.
We are currently working with organizations and groups interested in live virtual delivery. The next open, in-person workshop is planned for early 2027.
Live Virtual Workshops
Bring the workshop to your organization, network or group. Sessions can be tailored to your participants, priorities and the blended-finance challenges you are working through.
Tell Us You’re InterestedIn-Person Workshop — 2027
Prefer the in-person experience? Join the update list and we’ll let you know when dates and registration for the next open workshop are announced.
Get 2027 UpdatesA new era of capital mobilization is reshaping blended and sustainable finance. Are you ready?
Recent global fora such as the Fourth International Conference on Financing for Development in Sevilla, together with OECD and G7 initiatives, have reinforced the urgency of mobilizing investment for sustainable development and translating commitments into action.
As future international fora continue this work, attention must increasingly turn from ambition to implementation, including the structures, partnerships and practical pathways required to move capital.
Canadian institutions have a distinct opportunity to connect global financing priorities with Canada’s own development, trade, investment, infrastructure and climate ambitions.
Global capital flows are being reshaped by climate priorities, geopolitical change, constrained public resources, changing development mandates and growing pressure to mobilize investment differently. Financing gaps remain immense, while governments, development institutions, foundations and investors are being pushed to move from ambition to execution.
Blended and structured finance remain among the most important tools for connecting public-purpose priorities with private capital, but their potential depends on stronger structures, clearer propositions, more strategic collaboration and credible routes to execution.
The question is no longer whether these approaches matter. It is how leaders and institutions make them work at greater speed, credibility and scale.
Built for professionals seeking to lead, collaborate and mobilize capital more effectively
These sessions are designed to change how professionals and organizations operate across increasingly sophisticated financing environments, building the strategic insight, collaborative capabilities and practical confidence needed to advance blended and sustainable finance initiatives from concept to committed capital.
With on-the-ground practitioner engagement, the experience immerses participants in evolving blended and sustainable finance ecosystems through expert dialogue, current structures, interactive discussion and capital mobilization perspectives from global experts.
Professionals across the capital mobilization ecosystem
Designed for practitioners and leaders working across the institutions, markets and partnerships that shape how capital moves.
A highly facilitated practitioner experience
Crystalus will frame leading-edge and sometimes disruptive ideas, make sophisticated structures accessible, and guide disciplined dialogue among practitioners focused on how capital actually moves. The experience is designed to create insight, constructive debate and practical application rather than passive participation.
A collaborative two-day in-person format.
The 2027 agenda will be refreshed for current market developments. The structure below illustrates the workshop format and areas of focus.
DAY 1 | In-Person Workshop Format Strategic Orientation & Blended Finance Foundations
Day 1 begins with provocative questions, opening with the challenges that must be addressed to unlock greater momentum. It then creates a shared strategic foundation for senior dialogue and practical application before exploring the changing capital landscape, blended finance structures and emerging capital corridors.
Registration, coffee and informal introductions before the day begins.
A provocative, practitioner-led opening discussion on the barriers, assumptions and opportunities shaping the movement of capital.
- What will it take to unlock meaningful institutional participation?
- Which structural, risk, governance, liquidity and portfolio barriers matter most?
- Why do strong initiatives stall before capital is committed?
- Are DFI and MDB balance sheets, risk-transfer tools and catalytic capabilities being used boldly enough?
- How can pipelines, platforms and ecosystems become credible pathways to investability?
- Challenges and opportunities in mobilizing capital for ideas with clear impact potential
- How development finance ecosystem players think, operate and make decisions
- How mandates, incentives and institutional constraints shape what funders and investors can support
- Participants’ impact financing ideas, challenges, strategic questions and emerging insights
- Industry leader perspectives on how ODA, concessional capital and agency agendas are being reshaped—and what this means for mobilizing private capital at greater scale.
- Funders, managers and proponents are operating in an environment where capital scarcity, strategic priorities and execution demands are intensifying.
- Blended and structured finance remain critical tools for connecting public-purpose priorities with private capital, but success depends on stronger propositions, clearer structures and credible routes to execution.
Light lunch will be provided in the event space.
- How grants, technical assistance, loans, equity, guarantees, insurance, derivatives and hedging can underpin blended and catalytic finance structures
- Common structuring concepts, including capital stacks, funding continuums, first-loss positions and risk-sharing arrangements
- Key terms such as concessionality, additionality, risk, return and impact metrics, and how they are understood by funders and investors
- Canada’s development finance architecture and key funding envelopes
- Informal Q&A on financial terminology, structured finance concepts, transaction design and participant-specific questions
- Identify where development, trade and investment priorities can align around real market opportunities.
- Surface the catalytic capital, risk-sharing tools, partnerships or platforms needed to move from strategy to transactions.
- Explore how stronger capital linkages and collaboration can support investable pathways across global markets.
Close the day by connecting the strategic orientation, blended finance foundations and lab insights to the more advanced structuring and execution agenda on Day 2.
An informal opportunity for participants, speakers and invited guests to continue the conversation and build relationships following the session.
DAY 2 | In-Person Workshop Format From Structure to Scale: Unlocking Capital & Driving Commitment
Day 2 moves from foundations into practical execution: institutional capital, transaction structures, deal spotlights, investability pathways, conversion readiness and senior practitioner insight on what it really takes to mobilize capital.
Coffee and informal conversation before the day begins.
- Institutional capital, including pension funds, insurers and other large pools of long-term capital, holds tremendous promise for scale but remains difficult to mobilize.
- Explore barriers to participation, including credit risk, tenor, ticket size, liability fit, governance, hidden risk, liquidity, portfolio relevance, transparency and credible exits.
- Examine practical ways to reduce friction, strengthen investor confidence and unlock larger pools of long-term capital.
- Using IDB Invest’s synthetic risk transfer / securitization structure and IFC securitization examples, participants unpack how MDB balance sheets, portfolio risk transfer and credit enhancement can mobilize institutional capital.
- The session makes sophisticated transactions easy to understand: showing why they matter, how they work and what they may signal for the next generation of blended finance structures.
Light lunch will be provided in the event space.
- Scaling and mobilizing capital increasingly depends on building investable platforms, portfolios and ecosystems.
- Explore how assets can be de-risked, aggregated and matured over time to support deeper investability.
- Explore how landscape and natural capital finance can combine grants, concessional capital and commercial investment across conservation, sustainable land use and local livelihoods.
- Consider what is needed to turn fragmented opportunities into credible investment pathways, including governance, project preparation, revenue models, aggregation and technical assistance.
- Why some deals stall while others gain traction, and what practical factors shape whether capital mobilization efforts slow down, fail or succeed.
- How strategic clarity, stakeholder constraints, risk/return logic, concessionality, alignment and execution agility influence conversion.
Participants use the Conversion Readiness Framework to test how proposals, partnerships and structures can move closer to credible commitment.
- Senior industry perspectives on what it takes to align public priorities, private capital and institutional investment around credible opportunities.
- Candid reflections on what helps capital move, where promising ideas lose momentum and how to build trust, alignment and confidence across partners.
Participants work through a practical spreadsheet-based example to see how required returns, minimum return thresholds and upside limits interact, and how concessional capital changes the economics of a blended finance structure.
- Bring together the most resonant insights on institutional capital, risk transfer, investability, conversion readiness and practical execution.
- Close with a forward-looking reflection on how participants can apply the two days to strengthen proposals, partnerships and pathways from structure to scale.
A final opportunity for participants, speakers and invited guests to continue the conversation and build relationships following the session.
The Complete Course in Blended and Sustainable Finance 2026
The on-demand course can be integrated with workshop delivery to provide shared fluency and deeper learning before, during and after live sessions.
- Foundations of blended and sustainable finance and capital mobilization
- Debt, equity, guarantees, insurance, grants, derivatives and hedging
- DFIs, development agencies, institutional investors, banks and impact funds
- Capital stacks, concessionality, additionality and risk allocation
- Pathways from early-stage concepts toward bankability and participation
- Hurdle rates, waterfalls and collaborative structuring strategies
Workshop leadership
Deborah Brean
Deborah is a globally recognized expert in blended finance, sustainable finance and risk management, with decades of senior-level experience across international finance, structured finance and capital mobilization. She has held senior leadership positions with Export Development Canada, International Finance Corporation and Green Municipal Fund, and has led and advised on billions of dollars in structured financing transactions worldwide.
Patrick Brean
Patrick has advised globally on more than $10 billion in blended and sustainable finance initiatives for public, private and philanthropic clients. Prior to establishing Crystalus, he held senior management positions in treasury, capital markets and structured finance, and he is regularly engaged as a speaker, advisor and facilitator on blended finance, sustainable finance and capital mobilization.
Expert perspectives tailored to each session
We are pleased to welcome experienced industry practitioners and guest speakers to selected virtual workshops, depending on the focus and needs of each session and subject to speaker availability.
Current participating experts include:
Patrick Hergt
Partner, Sarona Asset Management
Patrick leads Sarona’s Investor Relations, Marketing and Fundraising and previously served as Director of its private equity practice. He also serves as Vice-Chair of the Canada Forum for Impact Investment and Development (CAFIID) and began his career with Munich Private Equity Partners.
Cameron Khosrowshahi
Chairman, Public Markets Coalition
Formerly Managing Director at Prosper Africa and Director of the INVEST initiative, Cameron brings extensive experience leading multi-stakeholder coalitions and mobilising institutional capital for development. He has overseen initiatives that mobilised more than US$1.7 billion in institutional commitments.
Additional Industry Expert
Profile details to be added.
This space is reserved for the third participating expert.
Speaker participation and timing will vary by session and are subject to speaker availability. Guest speakers will be matched to the focus, audience and needs of each virtual workshop.
What learners and participants are saying
This was the best learning session I’ve had in my career.
More learner and participant commentsSelect to expand
“…exceeded my expectations…excellent overview of key concepts whilst highlighting important nuances.”
“Great content…opens up one’s mind on the potential innovations in inclusive finance.”
“Excellent. Well detailed & with sound clarity.”
“I’ve been interested in blended finance and the impacts we can have globally. This course has given the basics and the high-level insights that I needed.”
“This course is excellent! I appreciate how the concepts are explained in straightforward, easy-to-understand terms that directly apply to my professional context.”
“This course helps understand the players and their motivations across the spectrum!…helps you structure better.”
“A great investment and highly recommended for ALL development professionals.”
“It exceeded my expectations in every way. They…clearly know their stuff!!”
Note: These reviews are from Crystalus online courses and in-person learning sessions. Participant names have been omitted.
Demystifying complexity and helping capital move
Crystalus is a blended and sustainable finance advisory firm specializing in public-private capital mobilization, climate finance, impact investing, innovative finance, fund structuring and capacity building. The firm helps clients and learners understand complex financing clearly, partner more effectively across the capital spectrum and move worthy ideas from concept toward committed capital.
Virtual now. In person again in 2027.
Live virtual workshops are currently available for organizations and groups. Our next open, in-person workshop is planned for early 2027, with dates and registration details to be announced. Join the interest list below to tell us which format you are interested in.
Interested in a workshop?
Tell us what you’re interested in and we’ll follow up with the right information.
No payment is being taken on this page.
Workshop Interest & Updates
Tell us which format you’re interested in and we’ll keep you informed.