Investment
Black-led VC Fund Aims to Even the Playing Field for Minority Health-tech Startups By Bertha Coombs
DR. DERRELL PORTER knew he had a good VC investment idea: a company that provides a platform to help partners in 2020 researchers develop and commercialize gene and were white, 15% cell therapies. Asian and just 3% “Academic medical centers and scientific Black, according innovators — they’re not pharmaceutical to the VC Human companies. They tend to look for partners to Capital Survey help finish the development of their programs,” conducted by explained Porter, who founded Cellevolve to help Deloitte, in conjunction with the National Venture make it easier for those researchers to connect Capital Association and Venture Forward. with biotech companies. Marcus Whitney is an African American venture partner and the co-founder of Jumpstart Health in Nashville. He says he felt a cultural shift from investors he’d talked to for years, following the George Floyd protests in 2020 and the focus that summer on racial equity. “I tapped into an awareness that there was a willingness to do something that I’ve never really felt at any point in my life,” said Whitney. He seized on that willingness as an opportunity Getting start-up off the ground meant making to raise capital to invest in Black-led firms. his own connection with financial backers, but “The number one question was, hey, this sounds his timing was bad. He began talking to investors great. I want to be a part of it. But are there actually about Cellevolve in March 2020, on the eve of the enough deals pandemic shutdown. out there?” he When things reopened, Porter found that getting said. venture capitalists to invest was about more than He had no buying into an idea. trouble finding companies and “They’re really making a bet on you as the launched the entrepreneur, and therefore it’s a profoundly personal decision,” said Porter, who holds a medical Jumpstart Nova fund to invest degree from University of Pennsylvania Medical School and an MBA from The Wharton School. He exclusively in noted, “being different or in the situation where the Black-led health investor may not see themselves in you, or may firms. He wasn’t not find a way to connect, that makes it harder to the only one to capitalize on the greater willingness to invest in under-represented founders last year. find capital.” The venture capital industry is among the In 2021, venture capital and private equity saw a least diverse in finance. Nearly eight out of 10 25% jump in woman- and minority-owned firms in 74
March-April 2022
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