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BET+ and Braze to Provide 1:1 Mentorship Guidance in Branding, Email Advertising, and Engagement Strategies to Select Companies through First-ever Partnership In 2023, startups founded by Black entrepreneurs in the US received less than 0.5% of venture funding, and woman-founded startups just 2.2% . To help address this imbalance, Braze, a leading customer engagement platform, has developed Tech for an Equitable Future, a product grant program. The initiative is designed to help underrepresented founders accelerate their company’s growth with the use of Braze technology, increasing their chances at securing future VC funding. The innovative initiative selects 20 startups from APAC, EMEA, and North America with founders from underrepresented backgrounds—including Black and women entrepreneurs. These businesses will receive 12 months of free access to Braze technology, as well as a range of supporting resources aimed at driving business growth and scalability. Each company will...
Circle and SeedInvest have launched a collaborative effort to support underrepresented founders. According to a press release, the Community Pitch Competition will be underway on June 1, 2022. The event will provide participants access to capital, networking, and business-building tools in hopes of propelling their business forward. What’s more, the competition will be free to enter. In the end, three founders will take home a prize pool of $5,000, $10,000, or $25,000 coupled with the option to secure funding on SeedInvest with $10,000 in fees waived. Plus, the winners may be in contention to secure bonus prizes from Ramp, Braze, and EY to bolster their business, with the stipulation that they meet additional outlined prize partner qualifications, according to the press release. “Underrepresented founders still do not have the same access to capital and economic opportunity, especially at the critical early stages of a startup,” said Rod McLeod, VP of Social Impact at Braze,...
Several Marketing-Technology firms have decided to take practical steps toward empowering Black entrepreneurs. Executives from Amplitude, Branch, Braze, mParticle, and Radar have joined forces to offer their technologies free-of-charge to Black-founded businesses that have bootstrapped or raised less than $30 million in VC funding, and employ less than 150 people. Will Crocker, VP, Customer and Partner Marketing at Braze told MarTech Today that mParticle’s CEO Michael Katz reached out to him with the idea in early June 2020. “We wanted to figure out what we could do within our expertise to give back to the larger community,” Crocker told MarTech Today. “Our mission is to create an eco-system that provides technology to empower these Black entrepreneurs, and we just want to level the playing field.” In their announcement on Braze’s website, Myles Kleeger, the President & Chief Customer Officer at Braze said: “Before Braze can make an impact on the world, we have to first start by...