Black-Owned Brown Venture Group Announces Major Bank of America Investment in Inaugural Fund

“Bank of America was one of the very first Fortune 500 companies to recognize the enormous upside potential and multigenerational impact this type of investment will have on communities of color,” said Paul campbell, co-founder and managing partner of Brown Venture Group.

“Their financial commitment to our inaugural fund brings us considerably closer to our goal of fundraising. $ 50 million and demonstrates a shared vision to accelerate racial equality by creating a capital injection into underserved BIPOC tech startups in Minnesota and across the country. “

Brown Venture Group, which was founded in 2018, launched its efforts to increase $ 50 million for its inaugural fund in 2020. Details of Bank of America’s financial investment will not be made public.

According to Katie simpson, President of the Bank of America, Twin towns, Brown Venture Group brings important new ideas and solutions to the challenges of pervasive inequality.

“The flow of capital has an important role to play in promoting racial equality,” said Simpson. “By investing in Brown Venture Group, we are helping to increase their investment in more underfunded Black, Hispanic-Latino and minority businesses and entrepreneurs, by working together to support the untapped potential of our local Color entrepreneurs, by nurturing innovation, by developing job growth. and create generational wealth in Minnesota and beyond.”

As part of Bank of America’s $ 1.25 billion, five-year commitment to advance racial equality and economic opportunity, the company is committed to investing $ 350 million across the United States to support equity investments in minority and women-owned entrepreneurs, businesses and funds to help provide growth capital and invest in programs that encourage future entrepreneurs.

Brown Venture Group will finalize investments for nearly a dozen BIPOC-led tech startups by the end of the year. Additionally, Brown Venture Group recently forged an ongoing relationship with NASA’s technology transfer office to encourage BIPOC entrepreneurs to bring their technologies to market.

“The amount of support and momentum that Brown Venture Group has received in the past year alone has been phenomenal,” said Campbell. “Plus, our waterways are quickly filling up with entrepreneurs who finally have the chance to make their ideas heard through a cultural context lens.”

Pierre Frosch, Chairman and CEO of GREATER MSP who helped facilitate an introduction between Bank of America and Brown Venture Group, supports the latest development in more inclusive economic growth in the Minneapolis-St. Paul region and he invited others Minnesota business leaders and investors to help move towards this new narrative.

“GREATER MSP is delighted to facilitate introductions among local visionaries who can connect capital to entrepreneurs. Capital is power, ”said Frosch. “The mission of Brown Venture Group is to put the power in the hands of black and brown entrepreneurs to drive innovation in our economy and wealth creation in BIPOC communities. Bank of America’s significant investments will help advance racial equity by expanding access to venture capital. Venture capital is a system and that is how systemic change begins. Our community is ready for a new path forward that requires us all to work together. “

About Brown Venture Group
Launched in 2018, Brown Venture Group, LLC, is a venture capital firm exclusively for Black, Latin and Indigenous tech startups. Brown Venture Group is writing a new playbook for those looking to launch a minority-owned tech startup and those looking to invest in new technology. For more information, visit brownventuregroup.com.