Lawrence Watkins

Excited to join Blackout Tuesday # 18 at LocalGlobe this coming Tuesday centered around the theme: 'Increasing Venture-backed Black Founders: Journey from Seed to Series A and Beyond'. This event will focus on the challenges Black founders face when scaling startups and provide insights on navigating growth stages from Pre-seed to Series A. After a panel of founders sharing their experiences, the breakout session will dive into practical strategies for scaling. ✏ Register here: https://lnkd.in/eHZpMDN2 Launched in 2020, Blackout Tuesday aims to: 1. Increase Black representation in VCs 2. Boost venture funding for Black founders 3. Elevate Black employees in venture-backed companies 4. Support Black GPs 5. Increase Black or Black-aligned LP representation Balderton Capital Phoenix Court Blackout Tuesday

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This Juneteenth, I’m celebrating progress and reflecting on the long road ahead for true freedom and equity for Black founders. Here are the stats: - Black-founded startups received less than 0.5% of the $140.4 billion in venture funding all U.S.-based startups received last year. - Funding for black founders has declined every year since 2021 - a 86% drop. - The statistics are even more abysmal for women: less than 0.1% went to Black and Latino women founders. Of the total capital under management by Black VCs, Black women only managed 0.03%. - Unfortunately the story isn’t any better in the impact investment world. A Village Capital study found that only 10% of capital in East Africa went to startups with local founders, with the majority of dollars going to expats. Here is what it all means: - I’ve seen the consequences of statistics play out in our community - particularly among my Black women founder friends. These statistics translate to high rates of burnout. - They mean unique, world-changing ideas and community programs aren’t realized. - They mean better-for-you and better-for-the-planet products don't reach enough store shelves. - In short, when we underinvest in Black founders, we all lose. What can you do? - Investors: Hire and promote more Black (particularly Black women) decision makers to deploy and manage capital. Reach out to Black founders for recommendations of underrepresented founders who deserve investment dollars. - Customers and Retail Buyers: Continue to support Black founders and seek out Black brands long after the trend has passed. - Business Leaders: Leverage your network and customer relationships to support Black founders with social capital. As a 2023 report from McKinsey put it “Underrepresented founders are often tokenized; they tend to be offered a barrage of programs to mentor or support them, but don’t provide meaningful help, connections, or long-term contracts.” With Love, Kwami Williams Co-Founder & CEO, True Moringa

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In a recent episode of H/L Ventures' For Starters, we pointed out that 70% of unicorns have at least one founder from an underrepresented group. As we said then, it highlights how having diverse viewpoints involved can spark innovation and growth. Despite this, new research shows a major funding gap for diverse women and minorities. Racially diverse, all-female startup founding teams with minorities spent the longest time fundraising in 2023 at an average of 25 weeks, a 67% increase from 2022. By comparison, all-male teams secured more funding and at a faster pace. What can be done to address this gap? #Investing #Diversity #Startups

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🚀 Demystifying Venture: Pathways to More Money and Power 🚀 Last week, I had the honor to be invited to the Lesbians Who Tech & Allies Summit, gathering 4000 tech, business and media leaders from all over the country. One of the highlights of the conference was a fireside chat about the VC industry featuring Candice Morgan, Partner at GV (Google Ventures) and Jana Rich Founder at Rich Talent Group. They shared some invaluable insights on how to break into venture capital and investing. Here are the highlights: 💡 Diversity in Venture: There are multiple ways to participate—angel investing, working at a VC firm, or making smarter decisions about your equity. The key? Access to information is power. 💸 True Wealth = Equity: The biggest driver of wealth in venture is through equity. Understand the risks, follow the founder’s journey, and get excited about areas you care about. 🔑 Investment Pathways: Platforms like Republic and Portfolia are making crowdfunding accessible to more diverse investors. These are great tools for those new to venture. 🎓 Educational Resources: organizations like All Raise and BLCK VC are excellent resources for anyone wanting to dive deeper into venture and investing. Thanks Gemma Allen and Anni Lundy for the invitation! #entrepreneurship #VC

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It was great to chat with Garnet S. Heraman, Aperture® Venture Capital, and one of their impressive portfolio company founders, TJ Ademiluyi, CEO, Alaffia Health. *Links to full convo in comments. We discussed a few things including: 1. Their career journeys  2. The startup/funding landscape 3. TJ's heathcare fintech venture 4. Garnet's fund/thesis 5. Trends, challenges and opportunities re new ventures and funding Garnet Heraman is a serial entrepreneur and investor with 25 years experience at the intersection of innovation technology. Originally from the island nation of Trinidad & Tobago, he was educated at Columbia University (BA), NYU (MBA) and The London School of Economics. As a dotcom entrepreneur Garnet had 3 exits, 1 of which was to a publicly traded company. As an investor, he is co-founder and managing partner of Aperture® Venture Capital, a seed stage fintech fund backed by 7 different Fortune 500 corporations. He is also an LP in other VC funds such as NY InsurTech Fund II and the Berkeley Skydeck Fund, as well as a prolific angel investor. Garnet is highly sought after as a startup technology expert, appearing in over 30 business publications and at events on 5 continents. He is currently finishing his first book, due out in early 2025. ---- TJ Ademiluyi is the CEO & Co-Founder of Alaffia Health, a healthtech company that uses AI to detect overcharges in health insurance claims. After gaining first-hand insight from working at his family's medical billing company, TJ is striving to reduce healthcare costs by tackling a $300 billion medical billing error and waste problem. TJ has led Alaffia to save its clients nearly $40M to date, and due to his achievements, was named a Forbes 30 under 30 honoree. #podcast #AFewThingsPodcast

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🧬 This week's Austin Bio Health Roundup highlights significant data trends, my stance on covering funding announcements, new partnerships, and action across the Texas Bio Triangle. 🧬 💰 Funding: The Way I Plan to Cover Funding Announcements You may have seen reports of a local Bio & Health startup’s funding round through an SEC report filing. While some outlets have covered this, my position is not to. I prefer to support our builders directly rather than trolling the filings for scoops. There is plenty of real investigative journalism that our city would be well served by if that is where they focused. Remember I am not a journalist and I am not the media. When the company is ready to announce their round officially, I’ll gladly shout it to the rooftops. 📊 Data Peter Walker at Carta reports that in 2017, Biopharma and Medical Devices captured just under 10% of all VC dollars. By 2023, this figure rose to 17.7%, and in Q1 2024, it reached 24%. The overarching tailwinds favor our sector and region with trends towards Bio & Health and the physical & digital intersection. Energy and hardware, two other sector blossoming in Central Texas, also saw similar share gains. 🤝 M&A and Partnerships Sensi.AI, a 24/7 senior care intelligence agent, is partnering with Caring Senior Service to deploy SensiAI’s platform in Caring’s 50 locations across the US. This partnership allows seniors a better opportunity to age gracefully in their homes. 🚩 Texas Bio Triangle BioMedSA is hosting an event called Women in Bioscience, Thursday June 20th. It’s designed to connect and empower women in the bioscience industry across Central Texas, and features Randi Brosterman Hutchens discussing "Building your Personal Board." Find the link to the event in the comments. Houston-based Lokum, a staffing solution to connect clinicians and clinical staff to health care facilities, has raised a $700K pre-seed round. Congrats Ayoade (Joy) Ademuyewo on the raise. What’s Next? #AustinNext #LifeSciences #Healthcare #Biotechnology

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