alGROWithm, a Nigeria-based growth agency is building Africa’s first growth talent accelerator. While most digital schools and programmes like Decagon, and AltSchool focus on solving the engineering and product talent gaps, growth is largely unattended to but alGROWithm’s GTAP aims to bridge that gap. The Growth Talent Accelerator Programme (GTAP) is a two-phase training programme in partnership with Digital Africa’s Talent 4 Startups Initiative which will help develop world-class growth engineers on the continent. Founded by Bili Sule in 2018, the agency uses growth engineering to design and implement sustainable growth models and strategies for African startups
Since the start of the pandemic, the School District of Philadelphia has worked on getting students connected to broadband internet at home and making sure they have the right devices that will help them learn. Back in April 2020, it rolled out a program to get Chromebooks into the hands of more than 117,000 students via the Fund for the School District of Philadelphia and more than $7 million in donations. But with the distribution of thousands of devices comes the need for routine repairs and troubleshooting and that’s where one West Philadelphia High School class
The US is experiencing a boom in entrepreneurship, and women of color are the fastest-growing group among new business owners. A recent report from Wells Fargo shows that Black-owned businesses nosedived by more than 40% in April 2020, more than other racial and ethnic groups. However, the number of Black-owned businesses has since come back strong, currently at about 30% above pre-pandemic levels. Women of color in general have been driving new business growth during the pandemic, and overall, a record number of people are looking to start their own ventures, according to the White House. And while this is amazing
Startup founders often turn to friends and family for their first bit of funding but for many Black founders, that’s not an option. The “friends and family” round is when people who personally know the founders of a company pitch in money, either as a loan or in exchange for a small ownership stake but for those who may not have many family members or members with little capital – they can’t even ask them. According to the Federal Reserve, the median net worth of Black households in the US is $24,100,
Athlete and activist Colin Kaepernick and his partner’s Canadian businessman Jim Nikopoulos and activist Akim Aliu have made a seed investment in Naomi Osaka’s KINLÒ brand with Kaepernick joining the brand’s board of directors. Osaka has also brought on a new brand President, Mia Meachem, who joins KINLÒ with over 20 years of brand marketing experience with roles across notable beauty brands including Drunk Elephant – a part of the Shiseido organization, The Estee Lauder Companies, and Burt’s Bees. In her new role as President, Meachem will help to drive
The Cultural Custodian recently celebrated dozens of African women leading the way when it comes to NFTs and Web3. Hence, we thought to jump on the wave and shout out the women of color worldwide who are also pioneering in this space. It’s important to celebrate women every day and not just on International Women’s Day. Deborah Ojengbede is the first name that comes to mind. Deborah amasses a following of 16.6K on social media and is the CEO of Afen Blockchain Group. The ‘group’ is an NFT project dedicated
Ahead of international women’s day – Instagram announced that it will be introducing a special tag for professional accounts and influencers that ensures they receive credit for their content. The enhanced tagging feature lets Instagram users show additional information on “People Tags” on their posts. Beyond just a profile’s username, the tags will highlight the creators’ self-designated profile category (titles are chosen from Instagram’s list of categories, like “rapper” or “fashion stylist” or “photographer”) as well as their account’s full name or title. The information is shown when users tap
What are the best Slack communities for Black tech professionals? With so many out there, it’s hard to decide which ones are right for you. So We’ve compiled a list that you should check out. Below is a list of 17 thriving hubs of discussion, collaboration, and innovation spanning virtually all technical specialisms. As a tech journalist getting involved in these Slack communities has helped me learn a lot in a short space of time. Cleveland Tech The Slack community for North East Ohio’s diverse tech community. Developers, designers and tech people of
Raising venture capital is a daunting experience for Black women as both the UK and US startup ecosystems fail Black entrepreneurs with innovative ideas. Furthermore, it’s clear that an entrepreneur’s ethnicity can affect their access to VC in the UK, with Black founders receiving just 0.24% and Black female founders receiving 0.02% of the total venture capital invested over the past 10 years. And before 2021, only 93 Black female founders in the US had raised $1 million or more in venture capital, according to ProjectDiane, a biennial report on the
Born in Los Angeles, Nwandu grew up in a foster home after her mother was killed by her father in a tragic episode of domestic violence. Fast forward to 2014, which by all accounts, looked like it was the year that Angelica Nwandu’s adult life was in a downward spiral. She failed her LSAT and GMAT exams because she couldn’t afford test-prep classes while all her friends were graduating. But her life turned around years after and now she owns one of the largest media brands on social media –
