Dr Rashae Barnes, the founder and CEO of Evals Equity Women’s Fund, has announced that September 30 will mark the first-ever National Black Funding Day. The national holiday was registered through National Day Archives. It aims to recognize and honor the accomplishments of Black entrepreneurs in the funding industry, while highlighting the disparities in venture capital grants, and educational resources for underserved communities. Funding for Black founders Black founders have long faced challenges in securing funding for their businesses, and the current economic climate hasn’t helped. Following George Floyd’s murder,
Kiddie Kredit, a Miami-based startup founded by Evan Leaphart, has raised $1.4 million in funding to expand the reach of its financial literacy app. Investors include Nueterra Capital, Plain Sight Capital, Fuerza Ventures, Verve Capital, and former pro athletes Dwyane Wade and Baron Davis. “I was drawn to what Evan and team are working on with Kiddie Kredit. It’s important to give kids a head start and especially on the topic of credit,” said Dwyane Wade, according to Refresh Miami. teaching credit through chores The mobile app teaches kids aged
Stemuli, a Black woman-owned edtech company providing AI-driven game-based learning through its educational metaverse, has announced the merger of infinity.careers and Oppti into Stemuli. Immersive education A lack of engagement in K-12 classrooms today is resulting in math and science scores being at an all-time low. This creates long-lasting negative impacts not only for the students themselves but also for their communities and the national economy. Stemuli reports that we facing a loss of $8.5 trillion in potential earnings because students are not prepared for the workforce that awaits them.
Looty is the anonymous collective digitally capturing 3D representations of looted artifacts, repatriating them in the metaverse. For centuries, museums and private collections around the world have been home to thousands of stolen artworks. With many attempts to return these pieces failing, digital entrepreneur Chidi Nwaubani is taking a different approach: digital repatriation. ‘Relooting’ Art Nwaubani is the founder of Looty, whose anonymous collective visits museums to digitally capture 3D representations of looted artifacts. The artifacts are housed in virtual museums in the metaverse and repatriated to their places of
EVEN, a creative platform that enables artists to sell their music directly to fans, has closed a $2.2 million seed round led by CSA Partners. Mag Rodriguez founded the platform last year to help Black and brown artists retain equity in their creative work. The blockchain-based direct-to-consumer platform allows artists to sell their music directly to their fans before uploading their music to streaming platforms. When fans purchase music, they can get access to it one to two weeks before they drop on streaming platforms, as well as exclusive content,
Described as The Amazing Race meets Shark Tank, RoadPitch is the Black-owned program connecting Black tech founders with investors across the US. The brainchild of Barley Sober founder Rohan Brown and electrical engineer Meagan Turner, the program takes Black tech founders on weeklong trips to pitch to investors in cities they aren’t native to. The pair met virtually in 2022 while coordinating StartupBus, a national hackathon on wheels. Getting Black founders in the room “Because of the pandemic, a lot of people have gotten accustomed to sending over a deck
Massachusetts-based Black-led startups are getting a $100 million boost from MassMutual’s second MM Catalyst Fund (MMCF). MassMutual announced that it is adding $100 million to its MMCF. The fund will continue to make investments in startups led by Black and historically overlooked founded-companies in the company’s home state of Massachusetts. MMCF will also invest selectively with fund managers in MassMutual’s First Fund Initiative, which focuses on first-time fund managers from Black, Latine, and Indigenous backgrounds. Building on past success The MMCF has backed 16 companies across various industries since its
The Bean Path is a nonprofit organization founded by Dr. Nashlie Sephus, which is using tech to sow expertise, grow networks, and fertilize communities in Mississippi. The Makerspace, a 6,400-square-foot collaborative community workshop building, is the first step in solidifying Sephus’ vision of creating a science, technology, engineering, art and math (STEAM) hub on 21 acres of previously neglected land. Identifying Blind Spots The Jackson, Mississippi native was introduced to engineering by her eighth-grade science teacher. After pursuing a degree in computer engineering, Sephus earned a PhD in electrical and
London-based healthcare jobs marketplace platform, Nolea Health, has secured £1 million ($1.2 million) in seed funding to tackle mental healthcare staff shortages. The financing round was led by Frontline Ventures, with participation from Calm/Storm Ventures and other notable industry figures, including Anne Heraty, ex-CEO of CPL Resources, and Mahiben Maruthappu, CEO of Cera. Nolea Health’s platform matches mental healthcare clinicians with vacant jobs across different healthcare organizations, reducing the time taken to hire staff by up to 90% and the sourcing costs by up to 85%. Addressing the mental health crisis with
BK-XL, a new Brooklyn-based early-stage startup accelerator for Black, Indigenous, and people of color (BIPOC) founders, has announced its inaugural cohort of 12 startups. With each startup receiving up to $500,000 each, BK-XL’s capital is on par with other big-name accelerators like Y Combinator, and, by relative investment size, is the largest BIPOC-focused accelerator in the US. Clara Wu Tsai, a Brooklyn Nets owner and Vice Chair of BSE Global, created the accelerator in partnership with Visible Hands, a VC firm for underrepresented founders. “We created BK-XL to identify and
