Professional Business

families didn’t know anyone who could lend them $3,000 if they wanted to start a business.

Phillips is involved with the Center for Black Entrepreneurship on the campus of the historically black colleges Morehouse and Spelman, to train young entrepreneurs to be good business people.

The good news is, entrepreneurship is alive and well in the black community. “If you look at the last 5 years, it’s been growing about 34% on average, the fastest growing sector of the economy for new business formation. But they need more capital and training and access to these relationships,” said Phillips.

Warner noted that one of the fastest-growing segments of entrepreneurship are businesses owned by Black women.

Sexism Still Prevails

Shernaz Daver, Chief Marketing Officer at Khosla Ventures and a 35year veteran of the tech industry, said the playing field is not level for women who want to start up and grow businesses. Daver relayed some of the experiences her acquaintances shared with her as they were trying to raise funding. “’I went to fundraise and was not taken seriously because I was a sole woman founder until I found a male co-founder.’ That probably resonates with a few of you,” she told reporters, many of whom had founded their news outlet.

“I went to get venture funding and I was asked when I was going to have kids. No guy was ever asked that. I was told I was too aggressive in my financial projections, yet when my male partner presented it, he was seen as confident,” Daver said, sharing the experiences of her acquaintances.

Importance of STEM

Education

“I have been in the industry for over 35 years and I heard the same thing 35 years ago. So it’s kind of bad. And if you’re black or Hispanic, it gets worse,” said Daver, noting that only 2% of VC dollars go into women-led founders. “It needs to change. Access to capital is key,” she said.

A lot of women are starting up their own investment firms, focusing on funding businesses that support women’s needs, said Daver. She noted that a lot of womenled startups are coming out of the biotech industry. “If you have the ability or the inclination to get into STEM or into biology, do it.”

“I have to believe the world is changing and we will continue to change it if we all do it as a community. And I think if we do that, we can have our own woman Steve Jobs or our own woman Jack Ma,” said Daver.

LIFT Act

Warner also spoke about the LIFT Act he had introduced a day earlier. The legislation would help first-time, first-generation home buyers — predominantly Americans of color — build wealth much more rapidly by offering a 20-year mortgage for roughly the same monthly payment as a traditional 30-year loan. “This effectively doubles the amount of equity that you accumulate in the first 10 years,” said Warner, noting that, for most Americans, their biggest asset is their home.

Continued

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