The number of black women tech founders that have raised $1 million or more in outside funding is so small that they can all fit in one little room. And that's exactly what happened recently for a Vanity Fair photoshoot in a piece that appears in the fashion magazine's April 2018 issue.
The photograph features all 26 women tech founders of color who have raised $1 million or more in outside capital. Among the women is Chicago-based Star Cunningham, the founder of local healthcare technology startup 4D Healthware.
26 Women of Color Diversifying Entrepreneurship https://t.co/Jx3WirEpnz #FacesOfFounders @VanityFair pic.twitter.com/eYEDtUFg7I
— Steve Case (@SteveCase) March 28, 2018It's a photo, and an accomplishment, that leaves Cunningham with mixed feelings. On one hand, it's a powerful image highlighting some of the strongest and smartest women in the technology industry today. On the other hand, how can the list really be this small?
"There's a lot to be celebrated with hitting that milestone," Cunningham told me. "But think about it realistically. That number is so low that it's barely measurable. It's unfortunate that all of us can fit in a room."
Cunningham launched 4D Healthware in 2012 after a career at IBM, and the company has raised $2.2 million to date. 4D Healthware's software works with wearable devices to help patients and doctors monitor health conditions when the patient isn't face-to-face with their clinician. The startup's investors are private, Cunningham said, except for Esther Dyson, an angel investor and healthcare expert.
As more and more venture capital is pumped into the tech industry, with firms like Softbank, Sequoia and others raising mega funds worth multiple billions of dollars, women still only receive 2.7 percent of all VC funding. And black women see almost none of it, receiving just 0.2 percent of all funding.
One reason for this, Cunningham says, is that women of color often don't have access to the "friends and family" round of funding, which many startup founders use to get a $25,000 check here, or a $50,000 check there, to help initially fund the business before reaching out to angel investors and institutional VCs. This results in many black women having to fund their own "friends and family" round, leaving behind well-paying jobs and using savings to get their businesses going, she said.
"A lot of us are working up against our peers who have access to a lot more capital that we do," Cunningham said. "The good thing about that is when you invest in our companies, our products are so much further along; they’ve been tested in the market. You’re kind of getting a lot of value for your dollar because we have had to do so much with so little."
Vanity Fair, which worked with startup accelerator DigitalUndivided to identify all the women of color who've raised $1 million or more, used photographer Mark Seigler for the photoshoot. Seigler was previously the chief photographer for Rolling Stone, and has shot more than 100 covers for the magazine.
Cunningham said it was an emotional experience working with Vanity Fair and being with the other 25 women in that room, and it's something she'll take with her for the rest of her career.
"There's a lot going on in the room. The love, the support, the tears and the hugs—all of that. That really is hard to describe knowing that diverse founders have to overcome such incredible odds to get to that point. So there's a lot of emotion in the room."
