Arlan hamilton12/5/2023 Hamilton is known for being bold and unapologetic about her beliefs. A typical VC can’t - he wants to see a hoodied white guy.”Īrlan Hamilton sits on stage during the Bloomberg Business of Equality conference in New York on May 8, 2018. “But I can do pattern matching and see that a black woman in her forties can get these returns. “I’m looking at having obnoxious returns,” Hamilton is quoted as saying in “Leapfrog,” a 2018 book by investor Nathalie Molina Niño and author Sara Grace. The average amount raised by a black female founder was just $42,000.īut Hamilton is the first to admit that her work is not charity. According to a Project Diane report, the average initial round of funding for all startups raised in 2016 was $1.14 million. Black female founders, for example, have trouble raising money compared to their counterparts. “And in some cases, they were working on stuff that was so much more advanced.”ĭata backs up what Hamilton saw. One revelation: “Everybody’s saying ‘no’ to even talking to the black, like, no matter what they’re working on,” Hamilton said. That curiosity led her down an information-seeking spiral that included years of research into startups, entrepreneurship and venture capital. Gwynne Shotwell: She turns Elon Musk’s bold space ideas into a real business.Judith McKenna: Walmart spent $16 billion to break into India.The latter is launching this month in four cities. That includes a $36 million fund devoted to investing solely in black female founders, and an accelerator program that helps startups with diverse founders scale their companies over the course of three months. Since then, Backstage has added more to its plate. In May 2018, Backstage Capital announced it met that number a year and a half early, investing $4 million in 100 startups to date. It’s already exceeded its first major benchmark: investing in 100 startups by 2020. “I will never be able to please everyone, and I’m not trying to,” Hamilton, the founder of venture capital firm Backstage Capital, told CNN Business.īackstage Capital, which launched in 2015, invests in underrepresented founders who identify as LGBTQ, women and people of color. Hamilton’s path may seem riskier to some, but it’ll pay off, she says. She proudly goes up against investors known for “pattern matching,” a term for the practice of seeking out future entrepreneurs based on characteristics of past successful ones - in other words, they’re looking for the next Mark Zuckerberg. She refuses to execute on her mission quietly.
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