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Speaker 1: Enjoying Black Tech Green Money. It would mean a lot

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Speaker 1: if you rate us five stars on Apple Podcast or

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Speaker 1: Google Play. The way the algorithm works. The more you

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Speaker 1: rate and say nice things, they'll introduce black Tech Green

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Speaker 1: Money to more people, and more of us need this content.

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Speaker 1: So thank you for rating this podcast five stars. Today

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Speaker 1: Afro Tech ten, San Francisco, California, Brandon Nicholson, who's the

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Speaker 1: founder of the Hidding Genius Project, is in an Afro

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Speaker 1: Tech lounge with Love E j. E. Jones and Beverley

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Speaker 1: Jackson and talking about taking risks. He shares some wisdom

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Speaker 1: from an o g he learned along the way of

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Speaker 1: his journey. One of the best guidances I got along

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Speaker 1: the way is that it's so important for us, it's

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Speaker 1: black people, especially when you think about what it took

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Speaker 1: for us to get into this room. And it took

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Speaker 1: a lot of hard work and doing all the right

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Speaker 1: things and playing by the rules and taking our vitamins

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Speaker 1: and eating our vegetables and all that stuff. But that's

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Speaker 1: scaffolding that we have to break down. And he was saying,

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Speaker 1: you know, it's so hard as a black man in America.

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Speaker 1: You want to get in line, stay in line, stand

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Speaker 1: in line, stay on track. He's like, what the problem

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Speaker 1: is and if you excuse my friends, that's what he said.

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Speaker 1: He said, but it ain't no line in the history

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Speaker 1: of lines has ever been made for a black man

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Speaker 1: to be in the front of that. Motherfucker said, You're

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Speaker 1: gonna have to step out of the line right sometimes,

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Speaker 1: And I mean they're line, but odsitive lines, right. So

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Speaker 1: so that really stuck with me, which was, you know,

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Speaker 1: at some point we gotta stay on track to what

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Speaker 1: we gotta do. Then we gotta break out. And and

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Speaker 1: because it's not as o we're being tracked or on

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Speaker 1: a path to really elevate our our greatness, we have

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Speaker 1: to take a risk. And I'm Will Lucas and this

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Speaker 1: is Black Tech, Green Money. I'm gonna introduce you to

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Speaker 1: some of the biggest names, some of the brightest minds

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Speaker 1: and brilliant ideas. If you're black in building but simply

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Speaker 1: using tech to secure your back, this podcast is for you.

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Speaker 1: Well right, Rama murder is def give you direct your

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Speaker 1: President Biden's National Economic Council. He usually served as a

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Speaker 1: member of the Congressional Oversight Commission for the cares AT

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Speaker 1: and that managing director of the Corporate Power Program at

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Speaker 1: the Roosevelt Institute as bat about the need to reimagine

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Speaker 1: the future of our world. You know, almost any case,

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Speaker 1: any coffee shop, any grocery store you go in, or

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Speaker 1: even just walking down the street, you hear people say

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Speaker 1: things like, I can't wait till things get back to normal.

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Speaker 1: But do we want that old thing back? How is

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Speaker 1: the Biden administration reimagining what the future could be versus

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Speaker 1: going back to what was pre COVID? What core opportunities

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Speaker 1: does this new playing field create for black entrepreneurs, technologists,

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Speaker 1: and creatives that may not have been there pre pandemic.

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Speaker 1: I think what you're getting at is pretty fundamental to

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Speaker 1: what the presidents Built Back Better agenda is getting at.

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Speaker 1: The reason he used that phrase built back better is

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Speaker 1: his view that we needed to do something right away

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Speaker 1: to address the pandemic and the public health aspects of

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Speaker 1: it and the economic aspects of it. But it wasn't

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Speaker 1: good enough to just get back to the way things

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Speaker 1: were before the pan Emmick. There are some deep structural

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Speaker 1: problems with the economy that needs to be addressed, and

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Speaker 1: that's the heart of what the president is trying to accomplish.

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Speaker 1: With this American Jobs Plan. Uh. You know, one area

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Speaker 1: which I think is particularly problematic is the disparities between

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Speaker 1: the opportunities available to white entrepreneurs and entrepreneurs of color.

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Speaker 1: You just look at the data. A lot of small

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Speaker 1: businesses start based on family wealth, right that your friends

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Speaker 1: and family kicking a little bit of money to give

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Speaker 1: you that startup capital that you need to to start

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Speaker 1: a business. And then you look at the data and

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Speaker 1: the massive disparity and family wealth between the typical black

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Speaker 1: family the typical white family, and you get to this

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Speaker 1: point where of the population the United States is black,

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Speaker 1: but only two percent of small business owners are black.

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Speaker 1: And I think a lot of it comes back to

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Speaker 1: that fundamental problem. So what the President is trying to

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Speaker 1: do is try and correct some of those disparities that

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Speaker 1: exist to make sure that any small business person with

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Speaker 1: a good idea actually has access to capital and access

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Speaker 1: to the other opportunities they need in order to to

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Speaker 1: start and grow that business. To just give you one example,

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Speaker 1: on the very first day that the President was in office,

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Speaker 1: he signed an executive order that directed the government to

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Speaker 1: look at all of the barriers that exist to business

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Speaker 1: owners of color getting access to federal contracting opportunities. You know,

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Speaker 1: there are tens hundreds of billions of dollars to go

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Speaker 1: out of the federal government each year two businesses across

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Speaker 1: the country, and those represent real chances for entrepreneurs of

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Speaker 1: color to start and grow a business. But it only

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Speaker 1: works if if black business owners have the same opportunities

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Speaker 1: as everybody else. And so the President and the rest

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Speaker 1: of the government is hard at work trying to implement

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Speaker 1: that executive order. The job's planned that the President put

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Speaker 1: out recently also includes, for example, billions of dollars going

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Speaker 1: to partnerships with h HBCUs so that um UH black

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Speaker 1: UH students in areas stam fields, for example, have access

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Speaker 1: to more resources so that that great idea that they

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Speaker 1: have can actually turn into a business after they graduate.

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Speaker 1: And the plan also includes money for um incubators that

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Speaker 1: would be set up all across the country where a

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Speaker 1: business owner with an idea could go in and get

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Speaker 1: help writing a business plan, getting access to capital, networking

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Speaker 1: with other businesses in the area, and getting all that

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Speaker 1: support that may exist in some parts of the country

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Speaker 1: but really should be available all across the country. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: I mean, you talked about some of those core infrastructural

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Speaker 1: things that weren't you know, together before the pandemic. So

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Speaker 1: let's talk about that at the same time. You know,

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Speaker 1: black infrastructure companies, construction companies, and etcetera. Are still few

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Speaker 1: and far between. We don't have a lot of them

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Speaker 1: in our community. We have some, but not a lot.

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Speaker 1: Not Let's talk about the investments this administration is planning

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Speaker 1: to making how black people can best position ourselves to

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Speaker 1: contribute and when some of these contracts. Yeah, absolutely so. Obviously,

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Speaker 1: the heart of this investment plan is significant money going

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Speaker 1: out the door to address long standing infrastructure needs, whether

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Speaker 1: it's UH mixing roads and bridges, building and preserving more

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Speaker 1: than a million affordable housing units across the country, deploying

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Speaker 1: broadband to the millions of people who don't have access

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Speaker 1: to broadband internet right now. All of that is good,

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Speaker 1: high quality, high paying jobs, and we want to make

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Speaker 1: sure that black business owners have an opportunity to get

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Speaker 1: access to those projects as well. So, as I mentioned earlier,

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Speaker 1: there's the President's executive order to make sure that barriers

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Speaker 1: that exist right now to black owned companies getting access

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Speaker 1: to contracting opportunities are addressed. There are further investments to

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Speaker 1: make sure that business owners of color are getting access

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Speaker 1: to some of the money set aside for manufacturing. For example, UM,

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Speaker 1: there is uh A a real longstanding history of black

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Speaker 1: entrepreneurs and black workers working in the manufacturing sector. And

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Speaker 1: one of the things that the President has focused on

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Speaker 1: is that a lot of manufacturing jobs over the few

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Speaker 1: decades have have left American communities and gone overseas UM,

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Speaker 1: and so trying to revive manufacturing in America, a lot

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Speaker 1: of that comes back to making sure that black owned

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Speaker 1: manufacturing companies get get funding, can get off the ground,

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Speaker 1: get access to direct contracting and subcontracting opportunities, and so UM.

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Speaker 1: A lot of that's going to come down to the

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Speaker 1: federal government sets procurement goals every year for a percentage

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Speaker 1: of of of contracting dollars that go to specific types

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Speaker 1: of companies. We are in the process of looking through

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Speaker 1: those goals for this year, UM, and the President is

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Speaker 1: committed and campaigned on making changes and improvements to that

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Speaker 1: so a greater percentage of the money goes out the

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Speaker 1: door to black, black owned businesses. So so to that point,

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Speaker 1: is the federal government, the administration working with states to

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Speaker 1: do this, or is this, you know, be direct federal contracts,

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Speaker 1: so we know where to go to get in line

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Speaker 1: for this. Yeah, this is so what I just described

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Speaker 1: about the procurement goals. Those are going to be for

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Speaker 1: federal contracts only. But there's a lot that we can

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Speaker 1: do to work with state level and local local governments

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Speaker 1: to push them in a better direction as well. So,

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Speaker 1: for example, as part of the previous bill, the American

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Speaker 1: Rescue Plan, the President created a ten billion dollars Small

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Speaker 1: Business Opportunity Fund. And the way that works is that

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Speaker 1: the federal government provides that money, but it's distributed through

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Speaker 1: state and local governments and it's supposed to leverage private

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Speaker 1: dollars to provide investments in small companies across the country. Um.

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Speaker 1: And if you look back, uh, this is a reincarnation

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Speaker 1: of an earlier version of this program that was set

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Speaker 1: up post financial crisis in two thousan eight two thousand nine.

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Speaker 1: That program was remarkably good at working with state and

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Speaker 1: local governments to provide that working capital to business owners

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Speaker 1: of color in particular. That was a real point of emphasis,

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Speaker 1: and I think in reviving that program now, we're trying

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Speaker 1: to achieve that same goal. So when we think about things.

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Speaker 1: You talk about infrastructure, these you know, rail service, public

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Speaker 1: transit roles, and bridges. We don't always cansider the engineering

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Speaker 1: or technical aspects of these things. We just see people

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Speaker 1: when we drive down the street working on the road, right,

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Speaker 1: And so, where is this space for innovation here that technologist,

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Speaker 1: black technologies, black entrepreneurs should be considering solutions for Yeah,

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Speaker 1: I think a core part of this plan is to

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Speaker 1: promote American innovation and ingenuity. And there uh, we are

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Speaker 1: one of the few countries in the world where our

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Speaker 1: investments in basic research and development at the federal level

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Speaker 1: are actually have to coloss over the last twenty five years,

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Speaker 1: you know, while other countries are increasing those investments, and

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Speaker 1: it's threatening to put us behind in developing the kinds

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Speaker 1: of technologies that we need for the next thirty fifty years.

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Speaker 1: And so core part of the Presidence Plan is a

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Speaker 1: d eighty billion dollar commitment to federal research and development investment. Again,

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Speaker 1: a lot of that is going to involve partnering with

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Speaker 1: for example, HBCUs to develop research opportunities at located at HBCUs.

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Speaker 1: So a business owner located in the community nearby an

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Speaker 1: HBCU can go in work with Work, Work with the HPCU,

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Speaker 1: leverage some of those federal dollars and benefit from the

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Speaker 1: innovation that's taking place at the university to build out

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Speaker 1: a company. You know, you see, the reason that Silicon Valley,

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Speaker 1: for example, UH is a hub of innovation is because

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Speaker 1: there are Stanford and other grade schools locally that get

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Speaker 1: a lot of research dollars, and a lot of those

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Speaker 1: research dollars end up benefiting the broader community because it

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Speaker 1: creates new businesses. We want to make sure that that's

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Speaker 1: not just a West Coast Silicon Valley thing, that those

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Speaker 1: types of opportunities are available across the country, including at HBCUs.

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Speaker 1: So is there really a space though for entrepreneurship in

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Speaker 1: these areas, because when I think about all, so many

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Speaker 1: initiatives from an entrepreneur perspectives require a lot of upfront capital,

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Speaker 1: a lot of investment capital. And you know, it's not

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Speaker 1: like we're hacking together, you know, an app in the

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Speaker 1: garage and throwing on the app store. Um. But with

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Speaker 1: so many black startups receiving so little capital to start companies,

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Speaker 1: how does this administration ensure that black entrepreneurs who want

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Speaker 1: to get in from an entrepreneurial perspective can get in.

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Speaker 1: I mean, you're right. Look, it's a it's an ecosystem, right.

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Speaker 1: You need to make sure that people have access to funding,

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Speaker 1: to capital right at the beginning so they can get

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Speaker 1: their business off the ground. You want to make sure

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Speaker 1: that they have resources and support so that they can

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Speaker 1: their businesses can survive. You know, one of the data

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Speaker 1: points that I've seen is that, unfortunately, the failure rate

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Speaker 1: for black owned businesses is much higher than for other businesses.

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Speaker 1: And it's not because the ideas are any worse. It's

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Speaker 1: because you know, that second round of capital, that additional

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Speaker 1: support from friends and family, uh, the access to um

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Speaker 1: uh you know, traditional banking relationships, all of that UM

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Speaker 1: those are the key drivers there. And so what we're

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Speaker 1: trying to do is address each stage of the problem.

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Speaker 1: We want to make sure that there are there's capital

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Speaker 1: available for entrepreneurs to get started. We want to make

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Speaker 1: sure through these incubators, through the partnerships at HBCUs for example,

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Speaker 1: that there are these opportunities to build out a business

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Speaker 1: plan network with both access you know, uh, sources of capital,

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Speaker 1: but also you know other small businesses that may provide

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Speaker 1: useful synergy to build and to grow. Um, It's going

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Speaker 1: to take a little bit of time, but yes, I

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Speaker 1: think the short answer to your question is yes, it's

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Speaker 1: something that we're really focused on. Because, look, it's not

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Speaker 1: just good for the black community. It's not just good

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Speaker 1: for black entrepreneurs. We as a country are leaving a

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Speaker 1: lot of opportunities and a lot of growth and a

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Speaker 1: lot of innovation on on the table. If we are

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Speaker 1: not providing opportunities for folks to develop that really good

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Speaker 1: idea to grow it out, and if we're gonna be

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Speaker 1: putting out hundreds of billions of dollars in uh to manufacturing,

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Speaker 1: to affordable home construction, to broadband, to semiconductors, to building

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Speaker 1: out the US supply chain for all of these high

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Speaker 1: technology products, UM, we have to make sure that black

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Speaker 1: entrepreneurs and the Black community not just are are involved,

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Speaker 1: but are leading that effort. I think that's central to

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Speaker 1: the president and the Vice president's goals here. So we

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Speaker 1: seem to have a president who was excited about great,

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Speaker 1: big projects, you know, reimagining our economy and reimagining our

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Speaker 1: country in the way that we do things, And how

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Speaker 1: excited should we be about innovation and the ability to

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Speaker 1: create the future with a Biden inherce administration over the

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Speaker 1: next couple of years. Uh. Really excited, I hope, I mean,

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Speaker 1: I'm excited. I think that. Uh here's a couple of examples.

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Speaker 1: Right the President when he he put forward this new plan,

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Speaker 1: he talked about a couple of things. He talked about

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Speaker 1: the space race. Right that the fact that the President

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Speaker 1: stood and said, you know, we're going to put a

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Speaker 1: man on the moon. And at the time, we didn't

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Speaker 1: really have the faintest idea how what it was going

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Speaker 1: to take to put a put a man on the moon,

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Speaker 1: but it led to this incredible investment in research and development,

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Speaker 1: and all these products that we use today. GPS, for example,

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Speaker 1: came out of that commitment to research and development. You know,

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Speaker 1: before that, before the national highway system, it would take

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Speaker 1: more than two weeks to get across the country in

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Speaker 1: a car. But the President Eisenhour said, we're going to

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Speaker 1: connect one coast to the other and every place in

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Speaker 1: between with these highways. And to this day, the miles

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Speaker 1: that Americans drive each year on those highways that were

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Speaker 1: built sixty years ago. So you know, by making these

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Speaker 1: kinds of commitments, we are making a commitment to American ingenuity,

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Speaker 1: American innovation. And we can't sit here and say twenty

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Speaker 1: years from now, we're going to know exactly all of

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Speaker 1: the great products and innovations and improvements to our lives

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Speaker 1: that that emerged from this kind of investment. But I

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Speaker 1: but I think we should be excited and confident that

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Speaker 1: we are going to see those kinds of investments because

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Speaker 1: that's always traditionally what has happened when when the federal

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Speaker 1: government makes a big investment in American people. Black Tech

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Speaker 1: Green Money is a production of Blackty Afro Tech on

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Speaker 1: the Black Effect podcast network in My Heart Media. It's

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Speaker 1: produced by Morgan Dubon and me Well Lucas, with additional

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Speaker 1: production support by Love Beach and ravenal Board. Special thank

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Speaker 1: you to Michael Davis since the Cars of Van Yan

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Speaker 1: you know like the Wine. Yes that's his real name.

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Speaker 1: Learn more about my guests and other tech disruppreds and

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Speaker 1: innovatives at afro tech dot com. Go get your money,

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Speaker 1: Piece of Love,