Black Lives Matter.
Congruent Ventures invests in next generation climate and sustainability entrepreneurs at the earliest stages of company formation: Pre-Seed, Seed, and Series A. As our friends in the venture and entrepreneurial ecosystem know, the data indicate that the probability of an investment is higher when companies are introduced by a trusted source. We acknowledge that our historical networks are predominantly white, educated at a small number of schools and generally located in a few coastal cities. We also recognize that the venture industry has consistently shown implicit structural bias. We must break this cycle deliberately and thoughtfully; words will only get us so far. One of the best digestible summaries of this problem was penned in a fantastic article by Del Johnson here.
It is tragic that it took the on-camera murder of George Floyd and the countless (and ongoing) acts of police brutality to focus attention on America’s culture of structural racism, and in turn, our attention on our own bias. Partly because of our own largely homogeneous network, we are part of the problem. We are taking two immediate steps at Congruent to begin addressing our own shortcomings related to investing in Black and underrepresented founders.
First, we are reaching out to organizations, universities, and institutions that are predominantly Black with the goal of permanently diversifying our trusted network. While this will be a firm-wide undertaking, we will be dedicating a person to focus on this effort.
Second, while we currently endeavor to review all inbound emails regardless of source, we will be actively working to meet with North America-based early stage climate and sustainability founders who are Black and people of color. Please email us at investors@congruentvc.com. Our entire investment and ops team is on this email.
This is admittedly a small step and we will continue to self-reflect on what we can and should be doing better. As always, we welcome constructive feedback.
Yours in Solidarity,
-The Congruent team
