Access to capital is crucial in order to take a dream and turn it into a business, create wealth and build a future full of opportunities. Today’s show focuses on the impact access to capital (or lack thereof) has on a Black business owner’s ability to create wealth through equity in a business. Rachel Wilson and Elliott Holland from Collab Capital share why and how they raised $50 million to invest in Black entrepreneurs—with backers such as Apple, Goldman Sachs, Google, The Andrew W. Mellon Foundation, Mailchimp and PayPal—as their debut move, making it one of the largest funds closed from an entirely Black-led firm solely committed to Black founders.

Rachel and Elliott debunk the scarce Black tech founder myth, plus share the investment strategy that increases Collab Capital’s investors’ IRR while hitting the company’s goal to establish a path to economic parity for Black communities by giving Black entrepreneurs access to capital and establishing generational wealth in a community that has historically been denied it. Learn the biggest challenges faced entering the market as an investment firm, as well as the individual barriers Rachel and Elliott had to overcome — and how that compares to what their parents faced not so long ago. Be ready to be inspired by industry disrupters working to bring about real change at a crucial juncture.

What You Will Learn In Today's Podcast Interview

• The generational impact of compounding equity and access to capital has
• The great benefits capitalism can have when aligned with the right mission
• How home ownership is similar to owning a business when it comes to growing wealth
• What equality really looks like in the business world
• Stories to better understand the underlying causes of inequity in the market (and society)
• The unintentionally negative impact a ‘core group’ of people who control access to capital can have
• How solving the equity issue is going to require purposeful use and allocation of capital
• Why Black investors are more likely to have to go to friends and family to fund raise and what Collab Capital is doing to rectify this
• What impact recent social unrest has had on the market and Collab Capital
• The fallacy of uncorrelated, outsized returns
• What a shared profit and collaborative endorsement agreement is and how it can help grow a business
• What it was like for Elliott’s dad as a Black financial consultant and what has (and has not) changed since the ‘60s
• How focusing on lifestyle businesses allows Collab Capital to avoid the typical churn-and-burn of the industry
• Why Collab Capital’s return on investment is good for both the companies they invest in and their investors
• When celebrities and influencers can improve your business
• Where private equity overlaps with a portion of profit model
• How Collab Capital finds companies to invest in

Are You Growing The Value of Your Business

Take The 2-Minute Assessment To Get Your Intentional Growth Score™ And 1-Page Vision Board.

• Are your company's current initiatives intentionally designed to increase the value of the business?
• Do you know what you want from your business long term and why?
• Do you know what your company is worth?
• Do you know the differences between Management, Family Transitions, PE Firms, ESOPs and Strategic Buyers?
• Does the business have a written strategic plan on how to achieve the desired normalized EBITDA and valuation?

About the Guest:

Rachel Wilson