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The $100 million New Voices Fund created by Essence Ventures CEO Richelieu Dennis goes in on the C series round, Arlan Hamilton's BackStage Capital announced its $36M women of color owned business fund. On a list of Black investors in the US who write big checks to Black tech entrepreneurs and other promising startups are: Marlan Nichols of Cross Culture Ventures, Monique Woodard formerly of 500 Startups, Brian Dixon of Kapor Capital, Charles Hudson of Precursor Ventures, Chris Bennett of Soldsie, Erica Joy Baker of Patreon, Erik Moore of Base Ventures, Hadiyah Mujhid of Black Founders and HBCU, INC., Kathryn Finney of Undivided, Kesha Cash of Impact Amerika Fund, Kwame Anku of Black Angel Tech Fund, Mandela Schumacher-Hodge Dixon of Founder Gym,Shauntel Poulson of Reach Capital, Sarah Kunst of ProDay, Peter Boyce II of Rough Draft Ventures and General Catalyst, Troy Carter partner in Cross Culture Ventures.
Capacity Builders:
The Greater New England Minority Supplier Diversity Council brings MBEs and corporate members together for networking and establishing mutually beneficial relationships. Follow gnemsdc.org
The Black Economic Council of New England (BECMA) opens the door for Black-owned business moves into stakeholder positions with sizable projects. Follow becma.org.
Here are some of the accelerators, startup incubators, investment cooperatives, angel investors and lending organizations who target Black-owned companies, minority-owned companies and people who have never ever had a business before.
Bookmark ACCION, the LOCAL micro-loan provider offering funding. You will have to pay it back. They specialize in single employee firms and small businesses. Start with a small fund request, get money, get more later. Location: 10 Fawcett Street, Suite 204, Cambridge, MA 02138 and worldwide. ACCION.ORG
Smarter in the City - This one is the ROXBURY-based accelerator offering a 5-month program that comes with cash, workspace, mentors and resources to help you get your business started or boosted. When the City of Boston funded redevelopment of Dudley Square, a niche public conversation about innovation districts began to slide towards the hood. Cambridge's Kendall Square and the Seaport's Innovation District had started it, now attention turned on DUDLEY SQUARE. Grove Hall Main Streets jumped into the fray as well. Smarter-in-the-City became the first ( or second to Future Boston ) accelerator to target Roxbury residents who wanted to start a company in the hood that would create jobs for Roxbury. SMITC was born, brought over by a creative, connected entrepreneur from MIT.
TCPProject-Epicenter may well be Boston's most creative funding apparatus for startups where Eighty-nine percent of the participants are people of color. When selected into the program you receive MBA level training, mentoring, finance, legal, business plans, pitching, capital, sales and business etiquette. The program is focused on LOCAL creative ideas rather than billion dollar disrupters. Investments are in music, fashion, restaurants, DJ, Hip-Hop, food trucks and more.
MASS CHALLENGE - is a Boston-based global accelerator powered by the Boston Foundation and institutional investors, MassChallenge applicants are domestic and international entrepreneurs. From its home in the Seaport Innovation District, Masschallenge provides office space, a marketplace, big cash prizes and expertise to startup founders. Winners receive cash, no strings attached in amounts from $10,000 to $100,000 and more.
Investors focused on Women Business Owners
BackStage Capital is a West Coast based venture capital fund provider who targets Black women, LGBQT, minorities and people of color from underrepresented communities who are not selected for funding by the white man's investor establishment. BackStage Capital
DigitalUndivided leads high potential Black and Latinx women founders through the startup pipeline; from the beginning of the startup funnel (idea) into the innovation ecosystem.
Pipeline ANGELS recruits accredited women investors to invest in things
THE PLUG connects you to national millennial led Black-tech initiatives, investors, and networking conferences.
Local Funding Contacts and Investors
LCR - The Lawyers for Civil Rights BizGrow Workshop Series and one-on-one business and legal counseling service. Free and open to the public. Website
VLA - Volunteer Lawyers for the Arts of Massachusetts provides legal services, advice, and educational programming to artists and cultural organizations in Massachusetts. Website.
NEVCA - the New England Venture Capital Association produces Unpitch, a coffee table meeting event designed to put entrepreneurs seeking funding together with investors seeking to make investments. The organization co-founded HACK.DIVERSITY, an initiative to stream college students into paying technology company intern positions,then permanent employment. Also NEVCA administers TECHGEN, an online platform for intern shopping and there are ongoing NEVCA investor related events throughout the year. The NEVCA member investor takes risks on companies needed $50,000 or more.
The Boston UJIMA PROJECT is a Roxbury-based investment co-op. Residents, financial institutions and grant givers fund UJIMA who in turn fund hyper-local small and very small startups from Black Boston neighborhoods. the Facebook page.
Dorchester Bay Loans - dorchesterbayloans.org does what the name implies in addition to loans, provides free technical assistance to start-ups and growing businesses. Must live in, or have a business in Dorchester, Roxbury, Mattapan, Hyde Park, Jamaica Plain or Roslindale, and need to purchase inventory, equipment, tenant improvements or for working capital.
The Boston Impact Initiative provides a mix of funding and grants to companies growing up in urban Boston that have a stake in that community, are growing and have hired employees who live in the neighborhood. bostonimpact.com
Boston Community Capital supports foreclosure relief. bostoncommunitycapital.org
Partners for Common Good bases its loans on the borrowers capabilities and its connection to the community. pcgloanfund.org
National Black Tech Groups
People of Color in Tech is a West Coast group that interfaces with Silicon Valley area startups and high tech firms. Follow them and they'll lead you to the money.
The Black Founders Group was co-founded by Monique Woodward who began targeting Blacks and Latinos with $$ millions from 500 Startups.
The Capital Network connects 100s of Angel Investors to startups and businesses seeking funds to grow who are usually based in Massachusetts - click
Certification
Minority Business Development
Download or search our MBE Directory
Preview certified minority business profiles in Massachusetts online at our InnercitySoftware.com website. You can also access digital contact records for MBEs in New York, North Carolina, Atlanta, and more to come.
The Minority Business Development Agency targets firms with annual revenues of over $1,000,000 or are on track for rapid growth. Boston minority businesses may pursue procurement status with corporations as a minority business enterprise because there are perks to receiving the designation. One reason is limited competition when competiting on bids and prime vendor status. Minority business certification in Massachusetts is a plus but it is not required to become successful in your industry sector. Certification is recommended if your goal is to focus on large corporate and government procurements because those institutions track diversity spending. There are many flavors of certification for business types. The letters MBE WBE PBE and DBE represent a few of them.
Minority Business Enterprise Certification is processd by State, City and Local government offices. The Greater New England Minority Supplier Development Council is also a certifying body as are the Federal Government agencies and other national minority purchasing councils and organizations. Boston based organizations such as BECMA - the Black Economic Council of Massachusetts, the Collette Phillips Global Agency, The Boston Chamber of Commerce and Color Magazine hold events designed to help companies meet c-suite influencers: CEOS, Chief Diversity Officers, Presidents and Vice-Presidents, who champion diversity and service contracts with minority-owned businesses.
The Greater New England Minority Supplier Development Council - gnemsdc.org - The GNEMSDC is an effective, certifying minority enterprise development agency. The GNEMSDC connects large corporate buyers with minority business owners and sellers via hosted meetings, briefings and funtions. We've attended GNEMSDC events held with the Boston Red Soz, North Eastern University and Boston Scientific and found them to be effective at expanding your business.
Massachusetts SDO - Supplier Diversity Office - mass.gov - The Massachusetts Supplier Diversity Office investigates and certifies companies for the state MBE, WBE, M/WBE certification program. These certified MBEs and WBEs participate as vendors, contractors, and professional service providers to the state of Massachusetts and their certification is honored at the state's largest corporations and institutions. Most contracts and purchase orders from governnment offices have minority business participation language.
5 Ways to get funding nobody talks about
Buy Lottery Game Tickets until you win big enough.
Make something out of thin air that cost practically zero and sell it.
Rather than ask crowdfunders for donations, sell crowdfunders something.
Ask a customer to pay in advance.
Ask your customer for funding
Great companies to know
construction management - JANEY COMPANY
A black-owned OPM or owners project manager specializing in building construction and managing projects from soup to nuts. Their impressive portfolio has that WOW factor. JANEY COMPANY recently built and opend a new Teen Center in Mattapan. The firm has erected structures for NorthEastern University, Whittier Health Clinic, Mattapan Community Health buildings, hotels, office parks and more. Call JANEY at (617) 267-6200. view their impressive portfolio online at www.janeyco.com.
CPA Accounting - Sambookolo, CPA
A black-owned professional accounting and CPA licensed firm lead by principals who do the work and sign off on your financials. They are representing for profits, non profits, individuals with tax return needs and corporations. Sambookolo and Associates CPA LLC is an expert auditing firm and conducts contract compliance auditing and other forms of sophisticated auditing for Fortune 1000 sized firms. Learn more online at www.sambookolo.com
30 years of Black Boston Business History:
The printed edition of The Black Pages of New England directory published by Thelma Sullivan was an important Boston area Yellow Pages style directory of businesses in a print format ( 1990 - 2008), that made it simple to shop with black-owned businesses in New England. Affectionately, known as The Black Pages (BPO), but not longer in print, it was a platform for small and large Black-owned companies to be seen, and for regional corporations to make their brands known to readers of the book.
The BlackPages reached out to others across the United States about providing Black-Owned business listings in other cities and regions." Now there are Blackpage versions everywhere in the USA.
The Negro Motorist Green Book, (1936-1964) was a model Black business directory in print that became the bible of travel for Black motorists. Made by a mailman and published when society separated Blacks from whites at drinking fountains, bathrooms, housing and public establishments, the Green Book provided Blacks with places to eat, stay and buy from that welcomed them. Over 50 locations were in Massachusetts at the time. The Green Book covered much of North America, including most of the United States and parts of Canada, Mexico, the Caribbean, and Bermuda.
MARLEY BRAND STORY
AboutBlackBostonOnline examined the (BOB) Marley Brand company startup history and this is what we found. "JAMN JAVA, Inc." leveraged the Bob Marley name brand, coffee and the social value of organic sustainability to build a business and monetize coffee and cannabis brands.
The top cities in America to start a business in have a few attributes that make them stand out and they are:
1) A large number of seed capital and angel investors exist.
2) There is plenty of networking going on: meetups, business plan competitions, accelerators, workspaces
3) They have a critical mass of entrepreneurs, consumers and suppliers.
So how is it going for the entrepreneur of color in Boston? The answer varies - it depends on who you ask. Few are able to turn down a guaranteed weekly paycheck they get from working for someone rather than working for self 100%. Many who received funding, run out of money because the company idea didn't work. If we had to guess, we would say that the longest lasting Black-owned companies who have been in business in Boston are in the trades: Construction, Highways, Electrical and hospitality such as bars and clubs.
MBE Enterprises have big construction project plans for the Seaport District, the South End and Dudley Square. Skyscraper hotels, tall luxury apartment buildings, and residential complexes complete with artists performance halls are on the table. with over $2 Billion allocated for greenlighted projects. A 25-foot residential tower is planned for Roxbury, a $550 million, 1,054-room hotel has been approved for South Boston’s Seaport District. African American art gets boosted at The Tremont Crossing Project where a brand new museum for the National Center for Afro American Artist is going up with vertically-stacked retail stores, restaurants, 200,000 square feet of office space, 300 market rate apartment units, and 800 beds of University Housing, and a 175 room hotel.
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Rule of thumb: Excellent Credit is a FICO score of 720+, Good is 660-720, Fair is 600-660, Poor Credit is below 600 FICO. Credit is looked at when renting apartments, buying cars, applying for jobs and more. You may not be financially better off than your parents where at your age, but there are proven tactics that raise your credit scores and help you retain more cash to use.
Sherrell Dorsey's THE PLUG DAILY
MBE Enterprises have big construction project plans for the Seaport District, the South End and Dudley Square. Skyscraper hotels, tall luxury apartment buildings, and residential complexes complete with artists performance halls are on the table. with over $2 Billion allocated for greenlighted projects. A 25-foot residential tower is planned for Roxbury, a $550 million, 1,054-room hotel has been approved for South Boston’s Seaport District. African American art gets boosted at The Tremont Crossing Project where a brand new museum for the National Center for Afro American Artist is going up with vertically-stacked retail stores, restaurants, 200,000 square feet of office space, 300 market rate apartment units, and 800 beds of University Housing, and a 175 room hotel.