Equitable inclusion platform 1000 Black Voices has partnered with The British Consulate to launch their accelerator program dedicated to helping support the ambitions of Black tech founders. The partnership will be focused on breaking down the obstacles faced by Black tech founders, particularly when scaling and growing their business. The program kicks off on September 21 and will run until the end of this year. “Ultimately, a lack of venture funding has resulted in a challenging environment for marginalized founders to tackle and get their business off the ground,” said 1000 Black
“I got my job through Twitter 🎉” I never thought that I’d be the one saying those words. I’ve always seen posts of people from tech Twitter who have shared that they got a job on Twitter or that online presence helped them secure a job. Little did I know that I would be a witness to this too. Welcome to all, and thank you for taking your time to read about my journey of how I got into tech, the challenges I’ve faced, the resources I’ve used, how I
Ingressive Capital, a $10 million venture capital fund launched by Maya Horgan Famodu with its headquarters in Nigeria, celebrated a five-year-mark last week. Horgan Famodu launched Ingressive when she was just 25. Today, at the age of 31, her fund is focused on leveling the playing field for female entrepreneurs: about 40% of its portfolio companies are founded or co-founded by women. In 2020, Ingressive doubled its fund to $10 million, with backers that include Nigeria’s sovereign wealth fund, Michael Seibel of Y Combinator, Techstars, and others. The fund that invests
“Try not to use the word minority, say underprivileged or underserved; otherwise, if you say minority, investors will make certain assumptions.” “What assumptions?” “Oh, you know…” That was an interaction between a first-time Black founder and a white venture capital (VC) investor who was supposed to be advising her. Speaking to POCIT, she said she felt several investors she had spoken to had an unconscious bias towards her as a founder and the audience she was targeting. While she understood POC markets were ‘small’ in her native country – on
Public protests demanding justice for Black people killed by police have brought a reckoning to the business world, with executives forced to resign, companies overhauling internal policies, and employees quitting in protest. For the tech industry, this reckoning has been going on in some form since 2014. The industry, which prides itself on agility, had previously failed to move the needle on workplace diversity and take complaints seriously. While there’s been an improvement over the years, some may argue it’s still failing to take robust action. In October 2019, Pinterest, a giant in the sector,
Steven Bartlett’s The Diary of a CEO regularly tops the UK charts, pulling in 6.6 million streams a month and more than £1 million ($1.2 million) a year in advertising. He’s had a roster of high-profile guests, including Molly-Mae Hague, Craig David, Liam Payne and Piers Morgan, and despite this, he still says: “I don’t think of myself as an interviewer or a podcast host.” In an interview, the man who seemingly has it all reveals some truths about his journey. He is, after all, the millennial who dropped out of university
Josh Malemba had no idea that an after-school hobby would turn into an impactful business. Now at the age of 20, the Leicester student has created his very own company, CodeSuite, and he wants to teach the next generation how to get into the tech world Code Suite is an educational company that breaks down barriers of entry for young people wanting to get into technology by teaching them coding skills. The student has a passion for educating and encouraging young people to develop digital skills that will help them
Nana Ghartey’s voice assistant software may have started out in his grandmother’s house, but it’s now being used by the thousands of older and visually-impaired people all over Ghana excluded by Western voice technology. How did he get into tech? Ghartey taught himself mobile app development and built desktop applications, websites, and eventually mobile games, none of which were part of his school curriculum, by reading the programming textbooks that an uncle visiting from the US had left behind. Here’s his story. In 2010, the wealthiest American tech companies had
Balancing entrepreneurship and childcare can be a daunting task, made worse by the pandemic. The rising costs of childcare in the UK and the USA are forcing an increasing number of primary caregivers – the majority of whom are women – to juggle both business and caring for their children. Thousands of childcare centers that closed temporarily because of lockdowns are still at risk of shutting permanently. These centers tend to be low-margin businesses with low levels of cash reserves and may not be able to reopen due to the additional expenses
Diana Vicezar is a Paraguayan entrepreneur studying Computer Science, Cognitive Science, and Data Science at Pitzer College in Claremont, CA. Originally born in a small country called Paraguay, home to roughly seven million people, the technologist is set to work for Meta this summer as a project designer intern. Apart from her UX designer experience – she is also the founder of Mapis, a platform designed specifically for international students on a mission to help them access the career guidance they need during internship and job hunting in the United
