Tech giant, Meta, has seen an unexpected increase in diverse hires since expanding its remote working options. Facebook, also known as Meta, is one of many companies that have introduced new remote working options for its employees following the pandemic. As a result, between 2021 and 2022, the tech company reported a slight increase in the share of Black, Hispanic, and Asian employees joining its US workforce, while the proportion of white workers dropped by 1.5%. According to Facebook’s Chief Diversity Officer, Maxine Williams, employees from underrepresented backgrounds and people
As the financial downturn continues to daunt the world and we slowly move towards another recession, venture capital funding has dropped significantly, ultimately affecting the progression of early startup businesses. Entrepreneur McKeever “Mac” Conwell shares his tips on how startup businesses can survive, grow, and expand during these turbulent times. Black-owned VC firm, RareBreed, founded in 2021 by McKeever “Mac” Conwell, is a pre-seed fund that invests in early pre-seed tech companies. It also allows angel investors to become limited partners for more significant funds. So not only does it
A new study has found racial and gender bias in the job performance feedback given to business employees. Textio, an augmented writing platform, surveyed over 25,000 business employees and also analyzed actual performance feedback documents, and noted consistent patterns of inequity by gender, race, and age. Latinx and Black employees were more likely to receive job performance feedback that was negatively biased and not actionable. What did they find? According to the findings, Asian people get more feedback than people of any other race—25% more than white people—and Black men
Some of you might have heard about Antler, an early-stage VC firm that invests in some of the most “exceptional” (their words, not mine) founders worldwide. Well, the firm founded by Mark Zuckerburg’s classmate Magnus Grimeland, has a 3-month accelerator program each year. Did Mark and Magnus work together? Not exactly. Magnus might have worked for Mark at TheFacebook, as it was then known, if he weren’t also juggling classes and athletics and caring for his infant son, according to Forbes. Antler, launched in 2017 in Singapore, is striving to combine
This week, the world saw the “deepest, sharpest infrared view of the universe” ever taken by the U.S. Space Agency, NASA. The milestone project was led by Gregory Robinson, a Black scientist at the agency. At NASA, Robinson, 62, is a rarity: a Black man among the agency’s top managers. Robinson was comfortable at another job working as an Associate Deputy Administrator for Programs at NASA when he was asked to take over a stalled NASA project in 2018 after billions of dollars were sunk into the program without yielding
Does Y Combinator invest in Black-owned companies? A question asked back in 2011 by online user prime0196. A time when diversity in tech was awful. It was also the year CNN published a long piece on how Silicon Valley was fighting to keep its diversity data secret. CNNMoney had filed a Freedom of Information request in August seeking EEO-1 data from 20 companies: The tech industry’s 10 biggest firms by annual sales and 10 smaller but influential firms, including Facebook and Twitter. The EEOC denied the request in full, saying
Ebay UK is launching a new hub on its website called Black in Bloom to connect consumers to Black-owned SMEs. The new initiative comes sometime after a report by the major marketplace revealed that one in five Gen Z consumers want to purchase from a business that supports people from underrepresented groups. It also follows a series of collaborations between Ebay and Black Girl Fest (BGF), a festival and platform designed for Black women, girls, and non-binary people. Back in April, the two launched an academy to nurture entrepreneurs with
Black-owned investment accelerator, 1863, has unveiled its investment strategy for “New Majority” entrepreneurs, a term that they use to describe Black and Brown business owners who have been historically marginalized. The investment funding will go towards helping early-stage entrepreneurs develop their businesses to achieve generational wealth and hit their target goals. 1863, founded by Melissa Bradley in 2020, is a business development program designed to bridge the gap between entrepreneurship and equity. The platform works with marginalized entrepreneurs to help accelerate them from high potential to high growth. The firm
Amazon’s Alexa Startups has announced the first cohort for this year’s Black Founders Build with Alexa program. Seven North American startups founded by Black entrepreneurs were selected based on their ability to innovate with Alexa and build the next generation of voice, artificial intelligence (AI), and ambient experiences. The application opened in April and will see up to 10 Black-founded startups partake in panel discussions, demo showcases, and mentorship programs. In addition, the initiative, which will span four months, will give all business owners the chance to develop their Alexa skills. The
On July 11, New York’s mayor, Eric Adams, announced that the city will be boosting its STEM programs with the help of a $1.5 million grant from Pfizer, a biopharmaceutical company known for developing a COVID-19 vaccine. Pfizer’s donation to the Mayor’s Fund to Advance New York City will specifically support students in two STEM-related initiatives, Exploring Futures and College Now for Careers. The programs help support the city’s science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM) educational programs. The extra funding will also go towards building a career pathway for students to help them break into the industry. “Thanks
