Collaboration Awaits: Blacktech Weekend aims to connect black innovators with a lasting network
October 31, 2019 | Anna Turnbull
The most important aspect of Blacktech Weekend’s return to Kansas City Friday: connecting individuals from different segments of the entrepreneur cityscape, said Denayja Reese.
“Across industries, we want them to collaborate with each other and continue to build community as well as bring in folks who are outside of the community into the fold,” said Reese, founder of Miami-based GWTLP, which organizes the one-day Blacktech Weekend in KC. “I hope that the people who attend the event learn things that they didn’t know before. Whether it be a funding resource or if they learn from someone else’s’ ideas.”
Blacktech Weekend 2018
Blacktech Weekend is entering its second annual Kansas City offering this week, having debuted during 2018’s Global Entrepreneurship Week. The program targets black entrepreneurs, innovators and “techies.”
Click here to read about the 2018 Blacktech Weekend conversation on tearing down walls built by exclusive startup lingo.
“Most of the time, [Blacktech Weekend’s] out of town [speakers] are dealing with many of the same issues as those [in Kansas City]. They are able to have conversations about how they are balancing it given their different circumstances,” Reese said, explaining the event. “It really gives the attendees an opportunity to learn from the people even if they are coming from different sides [of the issue].”
The Kansas City event is also set to feature a number of local voices, including Philip Gaskin, senior director of entrepreneurship at the Ewing Marion Kauffman Foundation; April Boyd-Noronha, chief engagement strategist for The STEM Broker; Bryan Shannon, founder and CEO of TicketRX; Dan Smith, co-founder of The Porter House KC; and Dell Gines, senior community development advisor at the Federal Reserve Bank of Kansas City.
Click here for more information on Blacktech Weekend, which begins 10 a.m. Friday at the Federal Reserve Bank of Kansas City.
Activities from a fireside chat and panel conversations to masterclass breakout sessions, Reese said.
This story is possible thanks to support from the Ewing Marion Kauffman Foundation, a private, nonpartisan foundation that works together with communities in education and entrepreneurship to create uncommon solutions and empower people to shape their futures and be successful.
For more information, visit www.kauffman.org and connect at www.twitter.com/kauffmanfdn and www.facebook.com/kauffmanfdn
Featured Business
2019 Startups to Watch
stats here
Related Posts on Startland News
Crema apprenticeship effort aims to decode a more inclusive talent pool
Crema’s recent growth means more than an additional Crossroads office space for the startup, said Gabby Brotherton. It provides bandwidth for the firm to supplement Kansas City’s tech talent with a new apprenticeship program. “[Crema is] very much a company that values collaboration and innovation learning,” said Brotherton, marketing specialist at the software development firm.…
Biopesticide AgTech building toward RNAissance with TechAccel cultivation
KC-based TechAccel endeavors to guide startups through “the valley of death” stage that emerges after ideation, but before traction, said Brad Fabbri, noting the firm’s new venture, RNAissance Ag, is expected to disrupt the ag tech industry with environmentally-safe biopesticides. “We try to find products and help develop them to make [farmers’] lives easier and…
Digital Sandbox charges three new startups with its proof-of-concept challenge
An effort to elevate Kansas City’s creative minds, Digital Sandbox KC is digging deeper in its sixth year of acceleration — adding three new startups to its portfolio, the proof-of-concept program announced this week. “Our initial goal was to find 10 early-stage concepts that had high-growth potential and help them secure follow-on funding,” said Jeff Shackelford,…
KCultivator Q&A: Donald Hawkins chews on sage advice, blood sausage, ‘circle of giving’
Editor’s note: KCultivators is a lighthearted profile series to highlight people who are meaningfully enriching Kansas City’s entrepreneurial ecosystem. Founders should rally around Kansas City’s startup ecosystem like fans rallied around the Chiefs, said Donald Hawkins. “If you look at a lot of the companies that have scaled — there’s a huge connection gap between…