Black Founders Raise More Capital Than They Have Since 2022—but Funding Is Still Lagging
$942 million — or just 0.32% of total US venture funding went to companies with a Black founder or co-founder in 2025, according to Crunchbase data. The tide has turned slightly in 2025, with US-based startups founded or co-founded by a Black founder raising $643 million. Most of this funding was raised in the first […] The post Black Founders Raise More Capital Than They Have Since 2022—but Funding Is Still Lagging appeared first on POCIT. Telling the stories and thoughts of the underrepresented in tech..
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$942 million — or just 0.32% of total US venture funding went to companies with a Black founder or co-founder in 2025, according to Crunchbase data.
The tide has turned slightly in 2025, with US-based startups founded or co-founded by a Black founder raising $643 million. Most of this funding was raised in the first quarter of the year, marking it the most raised in a single quarter since Q2 2022, when $653 million was raised by a Black founder or co-founder.
However, Crunchbase highlights that this is still a small percentage of the the $252 billion raised by U.S.-based startups in 2026.
Black founders raised $643 million in the first quarter of 2025
The $643 million was primarily driven by the $350 million Series E raised by AI hardware company SambaNova; startup Noviq, which raised a $75 million Series B; and AI insurance platform Harper, which raised $47 million, according to TechCrunch.
Venture funding for Black founders on the decline
The total venture funding for Black founders in 2025 speaks to a decrease from the funding since 2021, after the death of George Floyd sparked a wave of racial justice. In 2021, Black startup founders received $5.2 billion of venture funding.
An HBCUvc report found that in 2024, Black-founded ventures received only $201 million in total venture capital funding, accounting for 0.4% of overall quarterly venture funding. Some top-funded industries included Artificial Intelligence (AI), Healthcare, and Fintech, which led investment activity among Black-led companies.
The report also found a gap in Series A funding: only 17% of Black-founded deals reached this stage, compared to 37.7% overall. Techstars, Latimer Ventures, Gaingels, Black Tech Nation, and Collab Capital were part of the active investors in Black-led startups.
Surge in funding in the wake of Black Lives Matter
Research from Cornell University found that during the height of the Black Lives Matter movement, investors were 36% more likely to fund Black-founded startups, and the share of venture capital going to Black-founded startups rose by 43%.
The main growth in funding was primarily among venture capitalists who had never previously invested in a single Black entrepreneur. They were also less likely to invest in more than one Black-founded startup and less likely to take a board seat.
Black entrepreneurs with stronger business track records were less likely to accept investments from “newcomer” investors after Floyd’s death, perhaps anticipating this “token” response.
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