Investment
Kelauni Jasmyn’s BTN.vc Raises $25M to Invest in Black-Led Tech Startups By Ngozi Nwanji
NAVIGATING THE TECH SPACE as a Black entrepreneur requires a certain level of perseverance to ultimately see their innovative ideas turn into reality. It’s this relentless determination that took Kelauni Jasmyn’s paper napkin idea to recently closing in on $25 million for her national technology venture fund — Black Tech Nation Ventures (BTN.vc) — in under a year.
that and apply my personal knowledge to our future portfolio company is probably what I’m most excited about,” Jasmyn told AfroTech. “To be able to use all of the literal blood, sweat, and tears to then hopefully make it a little easier for the next entrepreneur who looks like me.”
Founding Black Tech Nation
Paying It Forward
Before becoming a founding partner of BTN. vc, Jasmyn created Black Tech Nation (BTN), a Pittsburgh-based nonprofit organization dedicated to helping provide Black technologists and entrepreneurs with education, digital media, employment, and funding. Fast forwarding from its launch in 2017 to 2021, the organization merged with Birchmere Ventures, a seed-stage venture fund, to birth BTN.vc with co-founders and general partners David Motley and Sean Sebastian, as previously reported by AfroTech. BTN.vc’s mission is to invest in Black and diverse-led startups across the nation. “I’ve done every single part of building a company [with BTN], so now to be able to take
Coming from a neighborhood right outside of Chicago that has faced tragedies due to gun violence, the Illinois native believes it would be a disservice to not lend a helping hand to innovators that have walked in similar shoes. “I realized my blessing and privilege in this position and I don’t take it lightly,” Jasmyn shared. “I realized that my trajectory is not normal. What kind of person would I be coming from that type of neighborhood and background to not pay it forward. To not make sure that people who come from places like where I come from have an opportunity. Who would I be if I didn’t make sure that I was creating space. For me it’s all about paying it forward and using what I’ve gotten to open doors for other people.”
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January-February 2022
Kelauni Jasmyn
DAWN
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