Google has announced that 60 new startups would join their Black Founders Fund, specifically designed to help support Black founders in Africa. Since launching the program in 2021, Google has invested in 50 startups from nine African countries, creating over 500 jobs and raising over $87 million to help support underrepresented founders. The Black Founders Fund has invested $20 million in funding to help founders across the US, Europe, Africa, and Brazil. The latest cohort will receive up to $100,000 in capital, including access to the best of Google, people, products,
VC firm, Kapor Capital, announced that it officially raised $125 million in a pre-seed funding round. The new fund, the platform’s largest to date, has been backed by partners including Cambridge Associates, Align Impact, Ford Foundation, Bank of America, PayPal, and Twilio. The new funding, which has been ongoing since last year, was raised by the company’s managing partners, Uriridiakoghene “Ulili” Onovakpuri and Brian Dixon, as part of Kapor Capital’s new leadership. The Oakland-based venture capital firm founded in 2011 by Mitch Kapor and Freada Kapor has actively worked to bridge
Black-owned professional network, Black British City Group (BBCG), has launched its flagship City Booster program, designed to help support the growth of Black founders. Through BBCG’s City Booster program, Black entrepreneurs not only be eligible for grants of up to £3,000 but will also have access to coaching opportunities and skill-based workshops to help them elevate and grow. The City Booster program run by BBCG aims to provide mentorship, skills-based workshops, and financial support to Black founders. In addition, the program, which spans nine months, will give Black entrepreneurs exclusive
A new Chicago Business Bulletin report has revealed that not enough has been done to support Black and Latinx startups. Compared to other top startup ecosystems, Chicago has higher share capital deals. Additionally, Chicago leads significant startup ecosystems in the share of venture capital funding garnered by underrepresented founders. Since 2019, 5.1% of Black and Latino-founded companies have participated in a venture capital deal, compared to 2.5% nationally. “This report is intended to raise awareness of the strategic movement underway in Chicago to drive greater, more equitable investment by and among VCs
American clothing company, Old Navy, will donate $500,000 to the Fifteen Percent Pledge to support the growth of Black creative entrepreneurs. The collaboration, an expansion of the Old Navy’s Project WE series, marks the first product collaboration for the Pledge to support diverse artists as they enter the retail industry on a national level. Project WE, launched in 2021, has helped create a space for diverse and talented artists to gain visibility and equitable access. “Old Navy is proud to amplify and celebrate diverse voices through our Project WE initiative
Minneapolis-based e-commerce app, GoodCarts, has partnered with Shopify and Operation HOPE to help build Black-owned online businesses through the 1 Million Black Businesses (1MBB) initiative. Black-owned financial, educational platform, Operation HOPE, is a leading global provider of financial dignity education and economic empowerment programs for low-income or moderate-income youth. The organization founded by John Hope Bryant aims to create a whole new approach to community upliftment. Its 1MBB initiative, in partnership with Shopify, will help millions of Black businesses start, grow, and scale over the next decade to ensure the racial
Black-owned startup, thirdweb, has raised $24 million in investment funding. The funding round led by Haun Ventures, Coinbase Ventures, Shopify, and Polygon, also included Shrug VC, Joseph Lacob, and others. The ground-breaking tech startup founded by Steven Bartlett and Furqan Rydhan aims to provide developers with a Web3 development kit to help reduce the time and cost of building and launching applications. The developer tool assists programmers in building NFTs, marketplaces, DAOs, and more. “Web3 is the most important technological shift I’ve witnessed in my lifetime,” said Steven Bartlett, co-founder
Incredible Health, an award-winning job-matching platform for nurses, has closed an $80 million Series B funding round. The latest funding round was led by Base10 Partners, including investors Andreessen Horowitz and Obvious Ventures. To date, the digital marketplace has hit a staggering $1.65 billion valuation, making its founder, Dr Iman Abuzeid, one of the very few Black female founders spearheading a unicorn company. Abuzeid founded the nurse-hiring startup in 2017 to act as the bridge between healthcare workers and industry hires, matching “the right nurse with the right role at
Tech startup ImIn has further closed $1 million in seed funding to expand its employee scheduling app. Black-led venture capital firm Collab Capital led the funding round. ImIn, founded by Chime Solutions exec Lauren Wilson, is a staffing software platform aimed at helping the call center industry. After seven years of working at her father’s high-volume call center business, Wilson came up with the idea to launch her app after identifying the missed opportunities both companies faced because of a familiar yet widely accepted industry challenge: absenteeism. According to a 2017 US Department
Black-owned digital app, ShearShare, has raised $2.3M in a seed funding round led by Fearless Fund. The round also included Level Up Ventures, New York Ventures, Gaingels, Chloe Capital, Portfolia, Pipline Angels, Bacon Family Trust, and ACV Auctions co-founder Jack Greco. The additional funding brings ShearShare’s total funding amount to $6.2M. Known to many as the “HairBnB,” ShearShare has created an easily accessible mobile app that provides licensed beauty and barbering professionals with flexible and affordable spaces to rent. In addition, entrepreneurs can use these spaces with no-term leases or commission fees.
