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A Michigan-based venture capital fund focused on investing in businesses owned by people of color has joined forces with a renowned investment firm, paving the way for expanded growth and a more significant impact for both organizations. According to Crain’s Grand Rapids Business, the New Community Transformation Fund has partnered with Michigan Capital Network, which will manage fund’s, daily operations, and offer strategic guidance. Discussions between the two Grand Rapids firms began months ago. Paul D’Amato, CEO and managing director of Michigan Capital Network, said it “made sense” for both organizations from the start of the process. “We share their goal of creating access to capital for people of color because we know that business growth, entrepreneurship and capital investment strengthens our economy and makes our state more attractive to other businesses looking to relocate,” D’Amato said, Crain’s Grand Rapids reported. Through the affiliation, which gives the venture...
AFROTECH™ Conference 2024 was in Houston, TX, from Nov. 13 to 17 — and on Day 3, LinkedIn hosted an Executive Stage session titled “The Path Forward: Adapting Amidst Rapid Tech.” Career expert Drew McCaskill and technology leader Bef Ayenew led the panel to discuss artificial intelligence’s transformative impact on jobs, teams, and companies. With 1.1 billion members leveraging LinkedIn for career growth, knowledge sharing, skill development, and community building, many have already enhanced their profiles with AI skills . “We’ve seen 140x in times in LinkedIn members globally adding AI skills to their LinkedIn profiles. That’s 140x increase in people adding those skills,” McCaskill said. “70% of companies are reporting that they’re using AI already at work. If you think about it like this, 25% of the skills needed for the jobs that all of us do and have been doing for the past eight years have changed.” “So even if you’re not changing jobs, your jobs are changing on you,” he...
Nowadays, people are more aware that STEM (science, technology, engineering, and mathematics) and STEAM (science, technology, engineering, arts, and mathematics) are not simply the future. Arguably, both are the most important sectors driving economic growth and academic tracks today. From an professional standpoint, both STEM and STEAM are natural segues into the technology industry. With concerns around digital divides and achievement gaps, it is understandable that leaders in the Black community are pushing even harder to ensure that youth and adults, making career pivots have access to opportunity. More importantly, pointing to representation in the tech field gives prospective employees and students choosing academic paths a relatable and attainable goal. Which happens to be the perfect pivot into; currently, women make up 35% of the current tech workforce. This is such a significant improvement from the early 2000’s when women made up approximately 9%. In 2023, women held only...
Tech moves at a fast clip. I’ve seen this firsthand in my career, the last eight years of which I’ve spent at McKinsey & Company helping businesses use tech more efficiently, by developing cloud and security transformations. The systems and technology may evolve, but one thing has remained largely the same: I’m often the only Black woman in a room full of technologists. We might speak the same technical language, but our experiences couldn’t differ more. I’ve tried to embrace everyone’s differences, relating to people in other ways. Because this has been my journey, this topic was incredibly important to me as it is so to so many others. Closing the Black tech talent gap — which persists despite diversity efforts from the world’s leading businesses — is now more important than ever. Black people make up 12 percent of the U.S. workforce but only 8% of employees in tech jobs, and an even smaller 3% of technology executives in the Fortune 500, no surprise to many of us who are...
Pinterest is investing in the future of Black tech! Under the mission of increasing diverse representation across the workforce, the platform has teamed up with dev/color — an accelerator for advancing Black technologists — for a multi-year, multi-million dollar partnership, according to a blog post. “At Pinterest, we’re on a mission to bring everyone the inspiration to create a life they love, and that mission starts with building a workforce that is representative of the world we live in and where everyone feels a sense of belonging,” the blog post writes. “We believe that diverse and inclusive teams build better products and are essential to growth and innovation. That is why we are specifically making a strategic investment in Black tech talent.” Pinterest and dev/color will work together to empower Black engineers and leaders through advancing their careers and recruiting Black technologists at all levels and specialties. Additionally, they aim to spur relationships,...
When speaking about the definition of multi-faceted, you have to put respect on Masego’s name. From trailblazing in his own musical lane to being able to smoothly switch from singing to playing the saxophone in a split second, there’s no box to contain his talent. With his upcoming endeavors, the musician is proving that “What can’t Masego do?” is merely a rhetorical question.
Seeing a Black woman break into the tech industry is always an accomplishment to celebrate, but what makes the win even more major is how they lift up others along with them. In the age of social media, the underrepresented group is not only sharing their experiences in their fields but also using their platforms to create a domino effect of Black talent going from sending in their resumes to signing job offer letters. Here are 10 Black women tech influencers who are working with big names like Google, Meta, and Microsoft that are teaching the ins and outs of the industry to help bring more of the community on board.
Earlier last week, the unprecedented announcement of Black Girls Code CEO and founder Kimberly Bryant being removed as the nonprofit’s head came in as a shock to the tech community. Kimberly Bryant alerted the public about the breaking news with a “press release” on Twitter. “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,” Bryant wrote via Twitter. 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. VC: @BlackGirlsCode — kimberlybryant.eth (@6Gems) December 21, 2021 The tweet caused an uproar from her counterparts and followers who wanted to learn more details of the indefinite suspension and how to support Bryant. Recently, Bryant shared a statement with TechCrunch to further clear the air.
Navigating the tech space as a Black entrepreneur requires a certain level of perseverance to ultimately see their innovative ideas turn into reality. It’s this relentless determination that took Kelauni Jasmyn’s paper napkin idea to recently closing in on $25 million for her national technology venture fund — Black Tech Nation Ventures (BTN.vc) — in under a year.
When the Forbes 30 Under 30 list releases each year, it’s a time to give young leaders and innovators their flowers. The annual list also serves as a moment for readers to praise honorees, discover new talent, and be inspired to excel within their own endeavors. Forbes’ Black honorees in categories such as science, technology, healthcare , and gaming , in particular, are ones to revel on as the Black community is underrepresented within these spaces and deserves proper recognition. Take a look at this year’s Black honorees that are breaking barriers in their respective fields. Editorial Note: This piece has been updated to reflect additional honorees on Dec. 6, 2021.
On the centennial of the Tulsa Race Massacre on June 1, Tyrance Billingsley II decided to launch an organization to aid Black entrepreneurs living in the area once known as Black Wall Street . The native Black Tulsan entrepreneur teamed up with SecondMuse to launch Black Tech Street , a national initiative and tech hub on a mission to mobilize resources and companies to build a community for Black-owned technology companies. “I am a born and raised Tulsa entrepreneur, ecosystem builder and community leader. I excel in visioning and convening people to work together toward building collective progress,” Billingsley told AfroTech. “I am passionate about the tech industry and envisioning ways we can use technology to enhance quality of life.” SecondMuse has a decade of experience incubating entrepreneurial ecosystems to create equitable economies. With 13 global offices, the global innovation company will be lending personnel and resources to Billingsley to execute Black Tech Street’s...
In honor of International Women’s Day, we here at AfroTech thought it was only fitting to recognize the work of 31 Black women in tech. Too often, Black women’s accomplishments, especially in the technology field, are overlooked or overshadowed. We encourage you not only to check out these women’s profiles and businesses but also to help shine a light on other Black women in tech this month and throughout the rest of the year. Check out the list of 31 Black women in the tech sector below: Asmau Ahmed, CEO of Plum Perfect, an app that helps women find beauty products in line with their skin tone Sheena Allen, Founder and CEO of CapWay, which works to service the underbanked Shellye Archambeau, Current Board member of numerous tech companies, former President of Blockbuster.com, and CEO of MetricStream Angela Benton, Founder and CEO of Streamlytics, which helps make transparent what users are consuming on streaming services Jean Brownhill, Founder and CEO of Sweeten, which helps to...
The tech industry is always on the hunt for fresh talent to bring forth new ways of thinking and innovative concepts to build a better future for our society. Michael Jordan, Princewill Imouokhome, and Gentill Abdulla — three young Black men who graduated from Texas A&M University — are a part of that rising generation of innovators who are on track to be tomorrow’s tech leaders. Together, these three created an anonymous sexual assault reporting system under their company The Garden with the help of blockchain technology, which has the potential to simplify and add greater security to data management, according to Forbes . In the summer of 2017, Jordan, Imouokhome, and Abdulla had an idea to create a tech resource that could be of great use to sexual assault survivors, which today is known as OYA . Oya – noun: An African Goddess of change Now it also stands for an anonymous mobile blockchain sexual assault reporting system. Help us give survivors of sexual assault a voice. Download...
As more economic and diverse professional opportunities for African-Americans present themselves in regions other than Silicon Valley, Black entrepreneurs are beginning to look into migrating down South to start their businesses. Similar to Atlanta, which has become a new hub for Black techies, Dallas is developing into a strong corporate business and philanthropic sector for Black entrepreneurs. Among those businesses in Dallas looking to lead the charge as the country’s emerging cultural hub is a startup accelerator and impact-first fund Impact Ventures . Designed with a vision of collaboration and entrepreneurship, Impact Ventures believes that while talent knows no geographic bounds, access and opportunity do. “Impact Ventures has worked strategically to build more equitable and inclusive local economies through its culturally responsive business support structure focused on stimulating job growth and driving equity within the Dallas economy,” said founder and Chief Executive...