Meet The Black Founder Who Sold His Tech Firm For Over 11x Its Revenue

Black entrepreneur Luke Cooper is redefining the meaning of success. In a recent interview, the Baltimore entrepreneur opened up about his rollercoaster journey into the tech industry, which unexpectedly saw him generate tremendous success. 

Who is Luke Cooper? 

Luke Cooper, a partner at Preface Ventures and founder of Latimer, describes himself as an ‘intentional entrepreneur.’ Cooper has a proven track record of growing sales and closing multiple $50 million exists while supporting women and BIPOC founders.   

The Baltimore entrepreneur is also a father of two with a deep passion for making the world a fair and equitable place for underrepresenting people. Over the years, he has built companies to ensure no genius goes unnoticed. Amid all of his endeavors, Cooper’s end goal is to spread more wealth within the Black and brown communities.

“As one of the only VC-backed Black founders here [Baltimore, Maryland], it made me unique, but it also made it super difficult,” Cooper said in a statement to Technical.ly. 

“Even after a prior point, I struggled to raise money, and it wasn’t always clear why. It’s frustrating to constantly get grilled 3x as much as the next person.” 

Reports have revealed that a large percentage of investment expectedly goes to straight white men, which is why firms like Latimer Ventures exist—to spread wealth fairly amongst marginalized communities. 

“If there are 300 Black millionaires, that’s 300 more than we have today. Out of 300 millionaires, I hope to create 10 to 15 billionaires – the world is short on wealth accumulation for underrepresented folks,” said Cooper.

“Tech has created more millionaires than any industry in the last 400 [years]. And that being the case, you can draw a direct parallel between my inability as a young Black person to participate meaningfully in this new burgeoning growth segment because most of the money is going in one direction.” 

Selling Fixt for over 11x its revenue 

Despite facing a challenging VC environment, in 2020, Cooper was forced to take a risk with his company, Fixt.

Co-founded by Cooper in 2013, the SaaS-based mobile device repair app aimed to take the hassle out of dealing with mobile device issues. However, like many businesses, the startup faced difficulties raising capital due to how quickly it grew. 

Eventually, Fixt reached a level where it was making a consistent profit and needed to get a capital provider in place to secure its future. So, Cooper decided to convince an investor to buy the company. 

Approximately 60 days after his meeting, Assurant announced their platform acquisition in a deal worth 11 times more than the company’s revenue in 2020. 

In a statement, they said, “Assurant continues to invest in creating uniquely better experiences for our customers. Fixt strengthens Assurant’s proprietary device lifecycle management platform,” said Manny Becerra, president of Global Connected Living at Assurant. 

Lessons for Entrepenuers

Although Cooper’s business journey has been noteworthy, the entrepreneur still wishes someone had told him a few things about becoming a CEO and what this truly means. 

In the series, “Five Things I Wish Someone Told Me Before I Became A CEO,” Cooper gave insight into what he wishes he’d known before embarking on his entrepreneurial journey:

• Don’t try to please everyone. “They love you when they love you, and they hate you when they hate you.”
• Get a dog, get a therapist, and invest in Crypto.
• It’s okay to show up as your whole self every day. 
• Lean in deeply to feedback from the people around you, even when it’s not favorable. It’s okay to look for patterns here.