Former members of the Parliamentary and Diplomatic Protection command (PaDP) allegedly shared racist, sexist and homophobic messages in the group between 2018 and 2021, according to a whistle-blower who has come forward with an archive setting out the “sick” exchanges. It was detailed that a picture of a mocked-up T-shirt with an image of Sasha Johnson, who was shot last year, was shared among the public servants depicting a bullet hole in her head with the words “black lives splatter,” according to the Daily Mirror, who first reported the story.
Isoken Igbinedion was just 10 years old when she had a “very dangerous encounter” with chemical relaxers that caused her natural hair to fall out. After this experience – she then went on to spend the next 20 years using extensions to give her hair a chance to regrow and in that time, she realized how much friction there was in the hair products and services market. Now at 30-years-old, she’s the CEO of Parfait, a Black-owned company that uses AI and facial recognition technology to provide custom wig products
Timeless London-based watch and accessories company, Vitae, reached two major milestones last year securing $1million in sales and distributed 5,000 solar lamps to Sub-Saharan school children. The solar-powered lamps were distributed in partnership with Pen to Paper Ghana, a Ghanaian non-profit that works to deliver lamps to students so that they can complete their school work with efficient lighting. But now its founder William Adoasi has just announced that the brand is launching each limited edition watch with an NFT. Talk about innovative! In a video, Adoasi said: “It’s William
Parfait, an AI and facial recognition-powered beauty technology focused on providing custom wig products to consumers, announced today a $5 million Seed round led by Upfront Ventures and Serena Ventures. Millions of Black women waste exorbitant amounts of money and time on difficult-to-install hair products that don’t properly fit or match their skin tone. While the market for manufactured hair wigs is expected to grow to $13.3 billion by 2026 according to Arizton, innovations to the products and services remain stagnant—until now. According to its founders, Parfait is uniquely suited to
Floyd Mayweather has announced the drop of a new NFT Project called Mayweverse. The project will consist of 5,000 NFTs and is set to launch on Wednesday. Fans on Twitter, however, are not pleased with the announcement and accused him of scams, taking people’s money, and abandoning projects. There will be five different NFT cards with a quantity of 1,000 available for each. In a tweet on the official Mayweverse account, it tweeted: “The mint price will be 0.3ETH bringing you maximum profit and value.” Floyd had previously launched a
The Black News Channel, a cable news station focused on serving Black viewers, ceased operations on Friday afternoon after its billionaire backer declined to provide more funding for the startup. Now it’s currently under fire after former network employees took to social media to claim they were blindsided when operations were stopped abruptly. They also claim they have been waiting weeks for their final paychecks, just to be told they would not be receiving them as promised. Founded by former GOP congressman J.C. Watts back in 2020, the network was
Some 60 organizations have signed up for what is thought to be the biggest ever worldwide pilot of a four-day working week. The trial will run for six months from June and see more than 3,000 workers participate. There will be no loss in pay for employees working one fewer day a week – instead, they will be asked to maintain 100% productivity for 80% of their time. It comes as new research last month found some 72% of office workers in the UK said they would prefer a four-day working week. Countdown
I’m sure you’ve used or heard of Calendly.com and if you haven’t, get ready to meet its founder Tope Awotona. Born in Lagos, Nigeria, into a middle-class family, Awotona’s father was a microbiologist and entrepreneur while his mother worked at the central bank. At 12, Awotona witnessed his father get shot and killed in a carjacking. This is something he has previously spoken about in length to Inc Magazine. By age 15, he had moved with his family to Atlanta, studying computer science at the University of Georgia before going into business
Imalipay, which describes itself as a one-stop-shop financial services platform, has closed a $3 million seed in debt and equity round. The fintech raised an $800,000 pre-seed round in 2020. It was launched in late 2020 by Tatenda Furusa and Oluwasanmi Akinmusire after Furusa noticed the challenges ride-hailing drivers faced when accessing working capital or emergencies like running out of fuel in Nairobi. COO Akinmusire and Furusa met while working at Cellulant before starting ImaliPay. They received funding from Google Black Founders Fund last October before closing this seed round, which welcomed participation from Leonnis Investments.
Wale Ayeni, the regional head of venture capital investments for the IFC in Africa, has left the International Finance Corporation (IFC), it was reported on Wednesday. Wale Ayeni wrote: “After 5+ thrilling years at the IFC, last week was my last. I cannot but be grateful for the years filled with purpose, joy, learning and growth working alongside extremely passionate and mission-driven colleagues focused on changing the narrative in emerging and frontier markets, with action, and through technology. “The wealth, breadth & depth of the experience was only possible by
