Access All Event: Democratizing Access To Capital For All Founders

On 30^th September 2020 in London, Floww teamed up with Force Over Mass and Wayra UK to deliver a virtual event targeting founders from under-represented groups, with the mission to spotlight startups through merit rather than “the old boy’s network”. The chief aim of the event was to work towards democratizing access to capital.

Founders pitched their business propositions to notable VCs such as Amazon, Accenture, Microsoft for Startups, SpeedInvest, SoftBank, Playfair Capital and Downing Ventures.

The event was designed to address some of the key venture capital industry biases; 91% of all U.K VC fundraising go to teams with all-male founders, with black entrepreneurs only receiving 0.24% of capital. In total, just 5% of small businesses are led by an ethnic minority founder. There are incredible disparities within the industry’s statistics and the event is just one small step in enabling more diverse founders and subsequently, diverse businesses and propositions to thrive.

Floww’s accountant team workshopped business plans with founders to get them ready to pitch for investors. The day itself involved knowledge sharing, how to pitch to VCs, highlighting different investors within the corporate space and ways to find the right match for one’s startup. It also involved introducing founders to top tier investment opportunities. Forbes journalists joined the panel as judges, as well as Mike Butcher M.B.E, Editor-At-Large at TechCrunch.

CEO and Founder of Floww, Martijn De Wever stated: “With Access All, we rallied together in the startup community because we believe that the system needs change. Black, Asian and other ethnic minority founders, need to have fair access.”

Floww is a platform that connects startups and investors on one platform, with an all-in-one solution for investor reporting, data updates, funding opportunities and portfolio management. Within the last year, Floww introduced a diversity index into the platform, so that VCs can keep track of how diverse their investment pool is, understand where better representation is needed and work to ensure their portfolio is as inclusive as possible.

You can learn more about this feature and Floww’s data offerings here. You can also read more about the Access All event here.