This first topic introduces participants to the challenges related to SSE’s access to finance. It invests in explaining that access to finance is often a complicated issue related to both the stage and robustness of the business model development of the SSE entity as well as the intrinsic inefficiencies of available funding streams to understand SSE objectives and impact potential. The topic explains which type of services should be available to SSE enterprises in different stages, as well as the deficiencies and gaps that should be addressed in order to develop appropriate and sustainable funding sources to support SSE development. Moreover, it details that while difficulties SSE entities often face in accessing finance are connected to the lack of appropriate services and products, in many cases these mainly reflect an inability of those ventures to develop a business model that would dynamically negotiate access to private and/or public markets. Thus, access to finance usually passes through both the ability of the SSE entity to prove its entrepreneurial potential as well as the capacity of funding sources to understand the model and logic employed. To this end, this first topic invests in underlining the importance of non-financial services as both a means and the tools that facilitate SSE access to both funding and markets.