Black Girls Code founder Kimberly Bryant has been removed from leading the nonprofit. In a statement, its board said it’s currently investigating allegations of “workplace impropriety,” but Bryant still remains a staff member. In a tweet published on Tuesday, the tech leader said: “Press release: so it’s 3 days before Christmas and you wake up to discover the organization YOU created and built from the ground up has been taken away by a rogue board with no notification.” Many have rushed to her support with some people asking how they
Paylend, a Kenyan fintech startup focused on providing access to finance and digitizing MSMEs in Kenya, announced it has raised $2 million seed investment. The funding came from Next Chymia Consulting HK Limited, an Asian-based company that provides global entities with blockchain applications, consultancy services, and training. Paylend’s mission is to support MSMEs across Africa to solve access to continuous capital while bridging the consumer data gap by connecting consumers to products and services. Paylend’s model enables consumer data collection that allows for a thorough understanding of consumer needs and
The technology industry has long been criticized for overlooking Black and Latino founders, but it seems that since George Floyd’s death some companies and investors have taken action. Black and Hispanic tech startup funding ticked up in Florida and Georgia this year, following an influx of investors jumping on the bandwagon of supporting diverse communities. Data from Crunchbase compiled for Reuters showed startups with a Black or Hispanic founder got 3.5% of the record $311 billion U.S. venture funding in the year to Dec. 16, up from an average of 2.5%
You should probably know what NFTs are by now since these three-letter words have been floating around our headlines, Twitter timelines, and TV screens for the past few weeks now. But for those of you who are behind on this latest trend – we’ll let you off and give you a little reminder. What is an NFT? NFT means a Non-fungible token. The best explanation I’ve seen for it is “Non-fungible” more or less means that it’s unique and can’t be replaced with something else. For example, a bitcoin is
Nigerian mobility tech startup Metro Africa Xpress Inc. (MAX)has secured $31 million in Series B funding. The latest funding round was led by the global private equity platform, Lightrock, making its first investment in the African mobility space. Through their Digital Africa initiative, the UAE-based international venture capital firm Global Ventures also took part in the round, as did existing investors Novastar Ventures and Proparco, the French development finance institution. MAX currently designs and assembles its line of electric motorcycles. The firm says, “beyond solving the mobility challenges in Africa, we
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:
Pop duo Chloe and Halle Bailey are speaking out against the lack of diversity in the tech sector and advocating the importance of Black girls being on the forefront of the coding sector.
The BECA Playbook aims to challenge the corporate diversity gap and transform the future of business by building the next generation of C-suite marketing executives.
A Black teenager from Prince George’s County, Maryland, has officially become the youngest glider pilot in the nation’s history.
