A new initiative, launched by Dream Legacy Foundation (DLF), an organization that runs innovative programs to boost entrepreneurship within the Black Community and Ryerson University’s business incubator, has just taken off.
Cynthia is an innovative scientist, an advocate for Black girls and women. Through her organization, Black Girls Do STEM, she has been able to help dozens of middle and high school students by exposing them to career pathways and empowering them to become STEM professionals. Black Girls Do STEM has impacted over 60 girls locally and worked across seven school districts, 13 community partners and secured three grant funders in two years. Unfortunately, being a Black woman in a majority white male industry comes with challenges. Speaking to Megha Mohan
Latinx founders are the fastest-growing group of entrepreneurs in America–but their businesses are struggling to scale and that is partly due to the serious lack of funding they’re given. Latinx founders own 350,000 businesses with employees in the United States, and these businesses create nearly three million American jobs, according to research I led with Stanford University’s Latino Entrepreneurship Initiative. And yet they receive a small portion of the investment piece. While overall numbers on funding for Latinx founders are depressing, Individual stories are inspiring. The 2021 Crunchbase Diversity Spotlight Report highlights the 30 Black-
Adventr — an interactive streaming platform — is set to take over the tech sector with its patented voice-control technology. The Black owned startup firm, owned by Devo Harris, a Grammy-award-winning producer, just secured a $5M round. It was led by Paladin Capital, a leading global investor that has an extensive portfolio of revolutionary cyber companies. Fellow investors included Reinventure Capital, In/Visible Ventures, Lightspeed Venture Partners, and Harris’ longtime business collaborator and Grammy-award-winning artist John Legend and Karen Jaw-Madsen. The funding will go toward Adventr’s technology team and marketing to
According to a new study conducted by Thoughtworks, there are fewer opportunities for people from under-represented groups in the UK’s tech sector to hold leadership positions. The firm found – through its research – that out of 300,000 ethnic minorities in the UK in 2020, only 37% were in “positions of responsibility”, compared with 41% of their white counterparts. IT workers from ethnic minorities were also twice as likely to be in non-permanent positions than white workers. Amy Lynch, head of diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) at Thoughtworks UK, said:
California’s civil rights regulator is investigating Google’s treatment of Black female workers following alleged incidents of harassment and discrimination, according to two people familiar with the matter.
And with a more pronounced focus to increase innovative education and close society’s opportunity gap, DeVry University has added two prominent Latina leaders to help in that effort.
Tyson Clark, a general partner at Alphabet Inc.’s venture arm GV and one of Silicon Valley’s most prominent Black startup investors, has died at the age of 43. GV CEO David Krane just issued a statement about the team losing the father-of-three, writing, “With great sadness, we share the news that Tyson Clark, our friend, and GV general partner, passed away yesterday due to sudden complications from a health issue. We are stunned and shattered by this loss. “The GV team extends our deepest sympathies to Tyson’s family and loved ones.
Latinas in Tech have released the Latina Founders list, a compilation of founders from the community who have raised $1M or more and start-up owners that are on track to raise a similar amount. Latinos have always represented just a tiny share of Venture Capital investment, and firms have long thought that Latinas aren’t represented at all, so Cecilia Corral and Latinas in Tech set out to prove this wrong. According to Crunchbase, Black and Latinx founders have raised $2.3 billion, representing 2.6% of overall funding. However, Latina-founded ventures are not even listed in the findings. At the
A Black-led, Gen Z fintech startup providing income-constrained individuals investment opportunities has announced an $18M Series A investment round. The group of diverse investors rallying up to fund Lendtable’s future included SoftBank’s SB Opportunity Fund, Valor Equity Partners, and CEOs of Complex Networks and Social Finance, Inc. The fintech firm, run by founders under 30-years-old, has already disbursed over $2.4 million in match benefits to hundreds of employees in just a year, running the gamut from those employed by small consumer brand companies to Fortune 500 companies like Google, Microsoft,
