Speaker 1: Afro Tech is a global gathering where inclusive tech companies
Speaker 1: meet innovators. It's the only tech event you.
Speaker 2: Need all year.
Speaker 1: Get ready for afro Tech twenty twenty three in Austin, Texas,
Speaker 1: November first through the fifth. We built a whole temper
Speaker 1: you can use to help you get your employer to
Speaker 1: sponsor your trip and enjoy experiences built for every stage
Speaker 1: your career. Whether you're a college student looking for your
Speaker 1: next internship, or if you work in avention capital looking
Speaker 1: for your next business to invest in, and if you're
Speaker 1: looking for a co founder, a people that's on your team,
Speaker 1: there's no better place to be. The massive corporate layoffs
Speaker 1: of twenty twenty two and twenty twenty three have affected
Speaker 1: our community in a big way. An Afrotech wants to
Speaker 1: help you get back on your feet with skill development,
Speaker 1: making it easier to switch industries. If that's your route.
Speaker 1: In an afro tech, you'll make connections to help you
Speaker 1: get your next opportunity. Visit afrotech dot com slash conference
Speaker 1: to learn more. This next conversation is a fireside the
Speaker 1: importance of investing in innovative fintech financial technology through investments
Speaker 1: in fintech, financial institutions and startups alike and harness technology
Speaker 1: to democratize access to financial services, reduced disparities, and promote
Speaker 1: wealth accumulation. Owen Douglas, who has been on this stage before,
Speaker 1: and win Memo Abbey will discuss the role of fintech
Speaker 1: in creating new avenues for wealth building and financial inclusion,
Speaker 1: highlighting how innovation can be a driving force behind sustainable
Speaker 1: financial growth. So when Memo Abbey is co founder of
Speaker 1: Asusuit as well as a three times social entrepreneur name
Speaker 1: to the Forbes thirty Under thirty list is not an
Speaker 1: easy list to get on, so he's the truth. Olin Douglas,
Speaker 1: CEO of Hanover Street Advisors is Prior to starting the
Speaker 1: consulting business, he was the founding and managing partner of
Speaker 1: Motley Fool Ventures, founded in twenty eighteen.
Speaker 2: He led the growth of the venture capital.
Speaker 1: Firm from zero zero dollars to two hundred and fifty
Speaker 1: million in five years. Please welcome to the stage. I
Speaker 1: moderated Olin Douglas and panelists with Mimo Abbey.
Speaker 2: That's you know what.
Speaker 3: Change I missed that, But hello everyone, it's a pleasure
Speaker 3: to be here. Thank you for afro Tech Investing. I'm
Speaker 3: an afro tech executive for inviting us and mimo. Welcome
Speaker 3: and welcome.
Speaker 2: How about you?
Speaker 4: How's everyone doing? Come on, man, this is church man.
Speaker 4: We got all black people off. How's everyone doing? Much better?
Speaker 4: Much better?
Speaker 2: Very good? Very good. Well, let's dive in. Just in
Speaker 2: the spirit of full disclosure.
Speaker 3: I've known this gentleman for about five or six years now,
Speaker 3: so we are more likely to not Man, We're gonna
Speaker 3: go off script a little bit, I'm sure, but let's
Speaker 3: start off for the audience. Can you tell us a
Speaker 3: little about what does Suzu do in What was the
Speaker 3: motivation for starting?
Speaker 4: Yeah, thanks a lot. It Sushu really stems from my
Speaker 4: personal experience and my co founder sameir For me particularly,
Speaker 4: I grew up on the slums of Legos, Nigeria. I
Speaker 4: lost my dad at the age of two, and I
Speaker 4: was raised by my mom and two very spirited sisters.
Speaker 4: And one thing my mother fundamentally believed in was just
Speaker 4: importance of education. My mom used to work at the
Speaker 4: National Post Office in Nigeria for twenty one years and
Speaker 4: I spent over sixty percent of our salary to afford
Speaker 4: my education back on in Nigeria. So that education is
Speaker 4: what led me to the United States. I immigrated from
Speaker 4: eighty degree weather in any Nigerians in the room, we're
Speaker 4: always everywhere there we go. I only say in Nigerians
Speaker 4: were like the Chinese of Africa or where everywhere. So
Speaker 4: immigrated from eighty degree weather in Legos to negative twenty
Speaker 4: two degrees in Minnesota. It was real, man, my people
Speaker 4: living in a reason I don't get it. But during
Speaker 4: that transition something happened. My mom and I did not
Speaker 4: have a credit score. We walked into one of the
Speaker 4: biggest financial institutions to borrow money and were turned away
Speaker 4: and had to go borrow money from a predatory lend
Speaker 4: at over four hundred percent interest rate. In addition to that,
Speaker 4: my mother sold my dad's wedding rink. We brought money
Speaker 4: from church members, and that's how we got started in America.
Speaker 4: So really inspired by that experience, having had distinct in
Speaker 4: wall streets and big consults and firms across the country,
Speaker 4: my co founder and I started a SUSU on three
Speaker 4: core premises. No matter where you come from, the color
Speaker 4: of your skin and particularly your financial identities shouldn't determine
Speaker 4: where you end up in the wealthiest nation the world
Speaker 4: is ever sin and what we do at is susy simple.
Speaker 4: Did you know that renters send roughly one point four
Speaker 4: trillion dollars to their landlords every year and less than
Speaker 4: ten percent of that data it's factored into their credit score.
Speaker 4: And who are the people that are rent It's predominantly
Speaker 4: people of color. So we created the technology to capture
Speaker 4: rental data, transform it and report it into the consumer
Speaker 4: rights and agencies. So when you pay your rent, it
Speaker 4: shows up on your credit score, and one day, when
Speaker 4: you want to go get a home or a order loan,
Speaker 4: you can do that with a good credit score and
Speaker 4: being excluded. And then when people can afford to parents,
Speaker 4: we give them zero interest loans so they are not
Speaker 4: evicted because as a society we shouldn't mis solving eviction backwards.
Speaker 4: So today ISSUSU is in roughly five million rental units
Speaker 4: or fifty state. We see over one hundred billion dollars
Speaker 4: in rental volume. And because of this man and a
Speaker 4: lot of the things he has done since day zero,
Speaker 4: it SUSU is valued add a billion dollars and we've
Speaker 4: raised over one hundred and forty five million.
Speaker 3: Yes, a powerful story. Every time I hear it's amazing.
Speaker 3: So like you and I both come from humble beginnings.
Speaker 3: You're from Lego Stagierias, from the inner city Baltimore, Maryland.
Speaker 3: When you think about financial inclusion, like you know, I
Speaker 3: know what you know the general means, but how do
Speaker 3: you internalize that and how do you keep that spirit
Speaker 3: of financial clusion going through the business?
Speaker 4: Absolutely, Atisusu. We did something that was unapologetic. We came
Speaker 4: out and said we're going to start a start up
Speaker 4: with a vision which is to leverage data to breach
Speaker 4: the racial world gap. And when people yeah that, ayre
Speaker 4: like is this a nonprofit? Like, no, we're adventure backed company.
Speaker 4: But one of the things that's important to me is
Speaker 4: this matter of proximity. When you think about it, the
Speaker 4: average white family as ten times as much wealth than
Speaker 4: the average black family in the United States. Number two,
Speaker 4: there are over forty five million people that do not
Speaker 4: have a credit score in this country. The average debt
Speaker 4: in America is ninety one thousand dollars. If you do
Speaker 4: that math, forty five million times ninety one thousand, you
Speaker 4: can unlock over six trillion dollars in capital that in
Speaker 4: and of itself is not only good for the US economy, right,
Speaker 4: it's good for even businesses that could let folks participate
Speaker 4: more in the American financial system. And that's been a
Speaker 4: thesis or in when we started, and you believed in
Speaker 4: us since day zero, it's always been about that thesis
Speaker 4: of we need to make sure not be rhetoric, you know,
Speaker 4: math and lit. The King got a dream, but I
Speaker 4: have a plan, and the plan is very very simple.
Speaker 4: How can we unlock quality financial products for our people?
Speaker 4: The cheaper in America? The easiest thing to get, what
Speaker 4: this nation is built on is cheap debt. Go back
Speaker 4: to the institution of slavery, go back to what happened
Speaker 4: during you know, the New Deal. Think about FHA loans
Speaker 4: for families to essentially get a leg up. And that's
Speaker 4: what we're trying to do. And I'm proud to say
Speaker 4: through our walk establishing and building credit scores for people
Speaker 4: and we measure what they've gone on to do. Eventually
Speaker 4: we've unlocked over that ten billion dollars in capital for
Speaker 4: folks that didn't have it. That's something we're really proud of.
Speaker 2: Very good, thank you.
Speaker 3: So we're in a room of executives here in this
Speaker 3: acro tech executive. Part of the wealth creation certainly is
Speaker 3: creating wealth for the founders and other folks in the world.
Speaker 3: Tell us a little bit about well, tell us the
Speaker 3: parts about the fundraising journey that you want that you want.
Speaker 2: To talk about.
Speaker 4: Give us a little bit of a Can we keep
Speaker 4: it real? Are we on a record? Yeah, okay, we're
Speaker 4: not gonna do it like we're not gonna throw the
Speaker 4: kitchen think, yeah, okay, we'll keep it pig. Raising money
Speaker 4: was hard. When we started a SUSU, three hundred and
Speaker 4: twenty six investors said no to us. And one of
Speaker 4: the tough first period of this journey was my co
Speaker 4: founder and I just closed that first contract, you know,
Speaker 4: at my alma mater in Minnesota. They're like, yo, we're
Speaker 4: just gonna give him a chance. This idea and we
Speaker 4: had put all that money into a SUSU because we
Speaker 4: couldn't raise money and we were one hundred thousand dollars
Speaker 4: in credit card debt. We had a great idea. The
Speaker 4: idea was how about and we couldn't afford an hotel
Speaker 4: room we had to stay overnight. We're like, how about
Speaker 4: we go to Denny's get the Grand Slam walk all
Speaker 4: nights because we just you know, and then take the
Speaker 4: next flight eilding the morning to go raise money in
Speaker 4: San Francisco. Great idea, so we we decided to do that.
Speaker 4: But unfortunately, because when I perpetual motion machines, we started
Speaker 4: falling asleep in that Dennis And unfortunately the restaurant manager
Speaker 4: came and to guys, you know, got to kick you
Speaker 4: guys out because I'm going to get fired. He knew
Speaker 4: what we were trying to do. And that was one
Speaker 4: of the darkest periods of this journey because I had
Speaker 4: walked that big financial institutions had run deals and with
Speaker 4: multi billion dollars from inception through execution, But why was
Speaker 4: folks not just going to bet on us? We got
Speaker 4: to break eventually, We got to break because of people
Speaker 4: like all In. I met all In, you know, at
Speaker 4: a conference for leadership developments, and we had this idea
Speaker 4: and Olin was like, wait, you got to really focus
Speaker 4: on certain things, and you have to think about this
Speaker 4: idea and if you do abc things, I would invest
Speaker 4: in the company. And you know, we're like, great, We
Speaker 4: took his word for it, held him accountable, held us accountable.
Speaker 4: And when the time was right. Olin came in invested
Speaker 4: in US when it was on sex its invest in
Speaker 4: a company like US. Ellie On led US Series D
Speaker 4: around the finance and at ten million dollars we raised
Speaker 4: ten point six million dollars, give us a very good
Speaker 4: valuation when people were trying to, like undercord Us put
Speaker 4: founders first. You know, there's a lot of folks when
Speaker 4: you raise money, there's a lot of interesting things that happened.
Speaker 4: Fought for us on apologetically, and then six months later,
Speaker 4: you know, we became a billion dollar company and raised
Speaker 4: one hundred and forty five million dollars and are just
Speaker 4: really really grateful, And it's more exciting because it's someone
Speaker 4: like him that invested in US and believed in US.
Speaker 4: And when we started off, it's not only Olin, it's
Speaker 4: people like Sean Mandy are concrete rows seventy five percent
Speaker 4: of our cap table. So the folks that invested in
Speaker 4: the company are either women or people of color. And
Speaker 4: when we met them, they probably had combined one hundred
Speaker 4: and twenty million dollars on their management. And today the
Speaker 4: companies they've been able to invest in now they've been
Speaker 4: able to raise over billion dollars and that's the true
Speaker 4: impact of what we're trying to do, and it takes
Speaker 4: investment because of people like you that make it up
Speaker 4: and so thank you so much.
Speaker 2: They're great. That's very nice.
Speaker 3: So in the Spirit's convers I'm gonna tell the other
Speaker 3: side of that story.
Speaker 4: Olin is also a board members.
Speaker 1: Afro Tech is a global gathering where inclusive tech companies
Speaker 1: meet innovators. It's the only tech event you.
Speaker 2: Need all year.
Speaker 1: Get ready for afro Tech twenty twenty three in Austin, Texas,
Speaker 1: November first through the fifth. We built a whole temper
Speaker 1: you can use to help you get your employer to
Speaker 1: sponsor your trip and enjoy experiences built for every stage
Speaker 1: your career. Whether you're a college student looking for your
Speaker 1: next internship, or if you work in avention capital looking
Speaker 1: for your next business to invest in, and if you're
Speaker 1: looking for a co founder of people that's on your team,
Speaker 1: there's no better place to be. The massive corporate layoffs
Speaker 1: of twenty twenty two and twenty twenty three have affected
Speaker 1: our community in a big way. An afro Tech wants
Speaker 1: to help you get back on your feet with skill development,
Speaker 1: making it easier to switch industries. If that's your route
Speaker 1: in an afro tech You'll make connections to help you
Speaker 1: get your next opportunity. Visit afrotech dot com slash conference
Speaker 1: to learn more.
Speaker 4: So nice.
Speaker 3: So we met at the conference. He was in an
Speaker 3: accelerator program. The person say, hey, I had this entrepreneur.
Speaker 3: I really would love you to be an executive ventor
Speaker 3: for him to do it. I don't know sure, right,
Speaker 3: So I meet this guy and like everyone loved him
Speaker 3: right away he told.
Speaker 2: Me his idea. I was like, dude, man, that's jankie.
Speaker 2: I'm not doing that right.
Speaker 3: So and he was like what And I was like, yes,
Speaker 3: we talked, but he was he was actually.
Speaker 2: Ahead of it. And he was like, yeah, I know,
Speaker 2: we have another idea. It's like this, and he pitched
Speaker 2: it again.
Speaker 3: So all those three hundred and twenty six investors and said, no,
Speaker 3: I was two of those, right.
Speaker 2: He came the second time the idea. I was like,
Speaker 2: I still love it. I said, no, you're not.
Speaker 3: You're not ready for the stage where I am. But
Speaker 3: what I am going to commit to do is help you, right.
Speaker 3: And so I can't give you my money yet because
Speaker 3: it's not my money, it's somebody else's money, and it's
Speaker 3: for ducer responsibilities, but I can show you the path
Speaker 3: to get there, and I think that's something a lot
Speaker 3: of bass don't do today. And so, to his credit,
Speaker 3: as you might imagine, laid out the roadmap, say do
Speaker 3: these things, and I'm there. They were ridiculous, impossible.
Speaker 2: He did him. And then I didn't got to him
Speaker 2: and I was like, oh the God did it? You know?
Speaker 2: So I think I'm in right.
Speaker 4: There's a saying if you anger around the barber shops
Speaker 4: soon or later, you're going to get to air quarts.
Speaker 2: Yes.
Speaker 3: And then and then the part he doesn't tell is
Speaker 3: so I did lead day round.
Speaker 2: We have a really great relationship. But when it.
Speaker 3: Came time to do the big round, there were a
Speaker 3: lot of people that wanted to get it, a lot
Speaker 3: of people that wanted want it in. He actually took
Speaker 3: a haircut on his valuation so that people like me
Speaker 3: and some others could have an.
Speaker 2: Opportunity to continue to invest in his fund.
Speaker 3: Like that's the part that doesn't come out. That's part
Speaker 3: of the means. And he and his co founder didn't hesitate,
Speaker 3: you know, negotiations to get there, to get tight and
Speaker 3: he was like, look if it means a little bit
Speaker 3: less for me.
Speaker 2: I'm going to do that. So we appreciate you for that.
Speaker 3: I've told him I'm with him until the end, no
Speaker 3: matter what that end is.
Speaker 4: We just we just you know, we just life.
Speaker 2: Good.
Speaker 3: So I know I got the hand signals. So we're
Speaker 3: gonna kind of wrap this up and leave a little
Speaker 3: bit of time for Q and A. But so I
Speaker 3: would leave it to you if you reflect on this
Speaker 3: conversation even changes, maybe it's this other one, like it's
Speaker 3: hard work what you're doing. I mean, it's really really tough,
Speaker 3: and as you think about what you can share with founders,
Speaker 3: like what's the anchor that keeps you steady, Like what
Speaker 3: keeps you going when everything inside of you saying like
Speaker 3: this is just too much.
Speaker 4: This journey is very lonely. I think everyone sees you know,
Speaker 4: you're raising one forty five, you're value added billion. I
Speaker 4: think the billion does the muggage and doing well is
Speaker 4: the premium that proves the billion does. What keeps me
Speaker 4: up at night is really the fight when it's this
Speaker 4: Entry was built on the back of black people and
Speaker 4: a bunch of folks that have imaginalized and I'm sick
Speaker 4: and tired of all the talk. I just want to
Speaker 4: roll up my sleeves and do the walk. She's there.
Speaker 4: I think given the things that people have gone through,
Speaker 4: were indestructible, won't breakable. And you know, I just want
Speaker 4: to see a ward whereby my children can grow up
Speaker 4: in this country or anywhere in the world and just
Speaker 4: say I am enough. And you know, like what this
Speaker 4: reminds me of something really messed up, not messed up,
Speaker 4: this kind of comical happened when we raised that around.
Speaker 4: I called my mom. She just sacrificed everything. You know,
Speaker 4: when I told her I was leaving Corporate America. I
Speaker 4: used to pay my mother's rent, by the way. She's like,
Speaker 4: oh my god, I thought we made it. And I'm like, oh,
Speaker 4: I'm going to go co found Distant called Susan. She's like,
Speaker 4: oh man, this is rough. So I'm like, hey, mom,
Speaker 4: you know, we just raised one hundred and forty five million,
Speaker 4: and you know the company's valued at a billion. You
Speaker 4: know what my mother said, I was like, ah, I'm
Speaker 4: so proud of you, but I was the wedding planning going.
Speaker 4: She just doesn't get it. But what that matters is
Speaker 4: it's proximity, right, my mother cannot necessarily comprehend what that means,
Speaker 4: the economics of what that means, and how I could
Speaker 4: fundamentally change our lives. And there are many of us
Speaker 4: that have imaginalized by the system. And what I want
Speaker 4: to do and wake up like gets me out of bed.
Speaker 4: This journey is hard, you know, I went to bed
Speaker 4: at three thirty am this morning. It's not sexy. There's
Speaker 4: a bunch of issues you have to deal with on
Speaker 4: this journey. Knowing what I know now, would I do
Speaker 4: it again? You know, maybe yes, but I won't recommend
Speaker 4: it for everyone. That's just the truth. There's a lot
Speaker 4: of things that you carry. If I do well at
Speaker 4: a SUSU, there's a good chance my marriage is suffering.
Speaker 4: So there's a lot of things you have to juggle.
Speaker 4: And I'm not here to give people bullshit. I'm just
Speaker 4: here to tell people the truth. So for me, it's
Speaker 4: just the walk, man. I just I wake up to
Speaker 4: every time. I know I want to walk tirelessly to
Speaker 4: bridge the ratio walth gap. And one day, when my
Speaker 4: least expires in this construct called life, when I am transitioning,
Speaker 4: I want to know no regrets. I did everything to
Speaker 4: narrow that gap, and that's what gets me up every day.
Speaker 1: I can't.
Speaker 3: I think that's a great comment to stop on. I
Speaker 3: don't know if we have a time for a couple
Speaker 3: of qunit questions.
Speaker 1: I'm for too, maybe three questions depending on how fast
Speaker 1: they are, So listen, let's chop.
Speaker 2: These uf NO six part questions.
Speaker 3: Hi.
Speaker 2: My name is Dan Green.
Speaker 5: I'm one with from Midley, and my question for you is,
Speaker 5: I've noticed an uptick in certain social media areas encouraging
Speaker 5: specifically young black men and women to forego school because
Speaker 5: of the debt and inequalities that I can accumulate. And
Speaker 5: that influence also is saying that it's better to work
Speaker 5: with your hands rather than trying to go to school.
Speaker 5: And I'm curious because personally, for me, I'm kind of
Speaker 5: torn on that. I understand that it's very difficult to
Speaker 5: go to school and accumulate that debt and it's not.
Speaker 2: Very easy to get that access.
Speaker 5: But on the other side, you know, we worked with
Speaker 5: our hands already, and so I'm kind of torn, and
Speaker 5: I'm curious with your experience, what would you say to
Speaker 5: that influence, especially to very young and impressionable minds of
Speaker 5: that age, we spend a lot of time on social
Speaker 5: media hearing these things and what that would mean for
Speaker 5: the future.
Speaker 4: And just to make sure I got your question, you're saying,
Speaker 4: what's the importance of education? School now.
Speaker 5: Towards the influence towards young black men and women are
Speaker 5: saying school isn't worth it.
Speaker 2: It's better to work with your hands in this day
Speaker 2: and age.
Speaker 4: Look for me, I can speak for myself, and education
Speaker 4: changed my life. You know, when I was growing up
Speaker 4: in the slums and I was going to school with
Speaker 4: the minister skids or like the former president's kid, and
Speaker 4: when I was the best econstudent literally in the entire university,
Speaker 4: it gave me a sense of worth that I'm like, Wow,
Speaker 4: you know, might be living in a place where we
Speaker 4: don't have functioning toilets, or we don't have constant electricity,
Speaker 4: but there's something I could do very well. And then
Speaker 4: when I came to the United States, right like when
Speaker 4: I found out that you guys pay people to essentially
Speaker 4: teach other people at the Academic Assistance Center, I'm like, man,
Speaker 4: people who paid me to be smart? That's like game changing.
Speaker 4: And then the network I got when I went to
Speaker 4: graduate school just down the street at NYU opened up
Speaker 4: my mind and that's where I even met my co founder,
Speaker 4: like over ten years ago. Right, So, I think what
Speaker 4: education does, in my opinion, it expands your intellectual frame
Speaker 4: of reference. Right, you see things from different walks of life.
Speaker 4: But that's not the only way, right, you can folks
Speaker 4: have all the alternative. But for me, it fundamentally transformed
Speaker 4: my life and the experience as you gain in those institutions,
Speaker 4: my life changing.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 3: One thing I would add to that is what you
Speaker 3: said in the way you almost answered it. Let's separate
Speaker 3: school from education. Everybody needs to educate their minds. They
Speaker 3: need to open themselves up to possibility. They need to
Speaker 3: learn and they need to grow. And anybody who's not
Speaker 3: doing that is going to be replaced by machine before
Speaker 3: they know it. You have to go to college, Do
Speaker 3: you have to go to IVY League? Do you have
Speaker 3: to go somewhere else to get those that educational mindset.
Speaker 3: I don't think that's necessary.
Speaker 2: And more and more you see that where particularly in
Speaker 2: technical field, where they just want to see that you
Speaker 2: can do the work.
Speaker 3: And so for those folks out there, separate school versus
Speaker 3: that school, trade school, versus technical school, you know, or
Speaker 3: academic versus education. We cannot let go of the idea
Speaker 3: that we need to educate ourselves.
Speaker 4: How we do that.
Speaker 6: My name is Masa. I'm from Minneapolis, Minnesota. First, I
Speaker 6: want to really thank you both for a very inspiring
Speaker 6: first side chat and to you with me more, I
Speaker 6: want to really thank you for being very authentic. Your
Speaker 6: story come across very uniquely and it's very inspiring to
Speaker 6: people in our community. You too, You both have had
Speaker 6: a very interesting change about entrepreneurs preparedness, especially when approaching
Speaker 6: a VC. So to you, Allen, I would really appreciate
Speaker 6: if you can share with us because myself I'm a
Speaker 6: founder working on an AI start up and also looking
Speaker 6: towards taking the journey of fundraising and things like that.
Speaker 6: I would like to learn from you as a VC
Speaker 6: what you look for in aspiring founders before getting that
Speaker 6: interest in funding them. What kind of traits do you
Speaker 6: look in them to see in order for you to
Speaker 6: have that interest to fund them, And secondly, what are
Speaker 6: the key value props you look in your ideas to
Speaker 6: validate them whether you fund them or not.
Speaker 2: That's a big question.
Speaker 3: I'm going to shorten that what I would say is
Speaker 3: first and foremost and head if I do my job correctly,
Speaker 3: the first thing I do when I've been out or
Speaker 3: to try to talk them out of venture capital.
Speaker 2: It is not for everyone.
Speaker 3: You've got to be clear about the world that you're
Speaker 3: getting into, the game that you're getting in, and no
Speaker 3: matter how much you think you know what you're getting into, it's.
Speaker 2: It's worse.
Speaker 3: So the thing that remember about venture capital is that
Speaker 3: you're talking about one percent of one percent of the
Speaker 3: businesses just to get venture capital, and then there's one
Speaker 3: percent of those that are actually kind of successful. So
Speaker 3: it's a really, really hard We're talking about the tippy
Speaker 3: tippy top of all businesses in the US, thirty three
Speaker 3: million of them small businesses.
Speaker 2: I think there's only you know, maybe ten.
Speaker 3: Twenty thousand dollars venture back twenty thousand a venture back.
Speaker 3: But generally speaking, you go through that hurdle. And this
Speaker 3: is something that as a as a culture, we are
Speaker 3: learning this. We're relatively new to venture really impressing that
Speaker 3: the idea has to be big.
Speaker 2: You have to have something about you that can make someone.
Speaker 3: Believe that you can execute on this big idea, and
Speaker 3: you have to bring some skills that are important, whether
Speaker 3: it's the ability to have people follow you, or you
Speaker 3: have some technical skills, or you need something that makes
Speaker 3: you be that one in a million that we thinking
Speaker 3: the idea, and I think part of the challenges and
Speaker 3: this is, you know, working with me MOO is the
Speaker 3: same thing where there's some basic things that we need
Speaker 3: to find people that just teach us.
Speaker 2: They're easy, totally learnable.
Speaker 3: But what happens in today's environment is if someone doesn't
Speaker 3: know something that's very basic, they extrapolate that to me
Speaker 3: they don't know anything, and it's just not true. Really fast,
Speaker 3: short story, not going to my whole life to a
Speaker 3: computer science class in college.
Speaker 2: Industry failed that class. But it was a long time ago.
Speaker 2: I'm super old school. I don't want to go into that.
Speaker 2: But it was back at the time.
Speaker 3: I had never seen a computer before, staring at the computer,
Speaker 3: didn't know how to turn it on. Teacher was really upset.
Speaker 3: He thought I was lazy, thought I, you know, didn't
Speaker 3: know what I was doing. Thought I wasn't paying attention.
Speaker 3: That was back in the day when the on off
Speaker 3: button for the computer was in the.
Speaker 2: Back and to the left.
Speaker 3: Like I never said people who put the on off
Speaker 3: button back there just shit on and but like that
Speaker 3: that that little like once someone tells you once you
Speaker 3: know it forever. But instead of telling me, it's shame
Speaker 3: to me for not knowing something that, like when you
Speaker 3: talk about it now, like of course you didn't know
Speaker 3: it was why don't you know? And that's the kind
Speaker 3: of thing that happens in a venture all the time,
Speaker 3: where they're basic things that people would just need to
Speaker 3: tell tell others.
Speaker 2: Like we're just saying, like what are the things we're
Speaker 2: looking for so that people can understand.
Speaker 3: You all are bright, you all are smart, you get it,
Speaker 3: but you're not magicians, like you can't read minds. And
Speaker 3: I think a lot of what we need in venture
Speaker 3: capitals to move forward, it's just help people laying out
Speaker 3: the roadmap.
Speaker 2: I didn't make it easy for with memo no back is.
Speaker 3: I ran my fund as a black person run the
Speaker 3: fund and at that time one hundred and fifty million.
Speaker 2: That was the largest first time fund for a black person.
Speaker 3: There was a lot of pressure on me, like I
Speaker 3: can't go around for the sake of all of us,
Speaker 3: I can't go around doing favors when I gotta get
Speaker 3: I gotta hit some you know, I gotta hit man.
Speaker 3: And so I was like, I'm like, you know, like
Speaker 3: the dad with the son on the team, I'm like
Speaker 3: ripping it to this dude, man, because like, we gotta
Speaker 3: win together.
Speaker 2: It's not just about us.
Speaker 3: And so but I did lay out the roadmap and
Speaker 3: that's all that he needed, right, And I think for
Speaker 3: a lot of entrepreneurs and founders, and like I said,
Speaker 3: we just need to help lay out that roadmap for people.
Speaker 3: Stop playing the games, stop saying do this, and then
Speaker 3: move the goalposts and then we can kind of make
Speaker 3: that progress.
Speaker 4: The only thing I would say is just because I'm
Speaker 4: very practical, we created a how to raise money and
Speaker 4: the things you need when you talk to people like olin.
Speaker 4: So we have a guide that we created to just
Speaker 4: demmestify the process because what pisses me off the most
Speaker 4: is like when you try to raise money from people
Speaker 4: and they're like, oh, you know, like what's the addressable market?
Speaker 4: I'm like, what does that mean? Now? I know what
Speaker 4: it means. But so if you need specific information, you
Speaker 4: can find me on LinkedIn, reach out, or my email
Speaker 4: was sending to you. We created it to just cut
Speaker 4: out the bullshit out of the process.
Speaker 2: Y'all make some noise to them, make some noise.
Speaker 1: Thank you, thank you, thank you.
Speaker 2: Y'all could do better to that.
Speaker 3: I don't know.
Speaker 2: Is this masking overhelm me? If I go that, you
Speaker 2: go down with me? I mean, obaman, you know what
Speaker 2: I mean?
Speaker 4: You know what I mean.
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