Earlier this month, DigitalunDivided (DID) released their #ProjectDiane report on the state of black women in tech entrepreneurship.
The findings are damning: black women are the fastest growing group of entrepreneurs in the United States – in less than two decades, their numbers have risen by 322% – but those who enter the tech industry are continuing to fight an uphill battle against prejudice.
On average, black women founders are raising $36,000 in venture capital, about a third of the industry standard. Overall, they make up .04% of all women-led startups, and comprised .002% of all venture deals between 2012-2014.
It’s not a surprise; the tech industry is well known for having diversity issues. At Facebook, less than 2% of all employees are black, as is the case with latinos. The numbers are similar at companies like Google and Twitter.
Kathryn Finney, co-author of the report and founder/Managing Director of DID, says that while there’s progress to be made on all levels of the issue, real change has to start at the top. In an interview with ebony.com, she said “(Venture capitalists) are not going to lead change. The people who can lead change are their limited partners. So the pension funds of New York and California and Ohio and the endowments of large foundations like the Ford Foundation and the Rockefeller Foundation, those are the people who can make some real structural changes. So we call on civic institutions to divest from funds that are not supporting diverse founders.”
While DigitalunDivided have already helped secure $12 million in funding for minority tech founders, there’s a long way to go before these intelligent, innovative women are given the credit, and funding, they deserve.
If you are a black or latino woman with a tech startup, we’d love to hear from you on this issue, and potentially feature your story on our website. You can contact us here.
The #ProjectDiane report can be viewed in full here.