Crunchbase is expanding its tagging options in Europe to start tracking how much enterprise capital funding goes to minority founders on the continent.
Diversity Spotlight is a feature in Crunchbase that permits businesses to add tags to their profiles to mark themselves. For example, a company may agree to label itself as Black-owned or women-led. Crunchbase now offers this feature in Europe.
I³ Investing, a company focused on queer and migrant founders, was the exclusive launch partner for this feature in the UK and Europe. Other partners include Founders, Tech Nation, Black Tech Fest and Colorintech.
Crunchbase initially launched Diversity Spotlight in 2020 and expanded it to include the LGBTQ+ tag last 12 months. Hopefully, if this feature is widely used across Europe, it is going to fill some of the gaps in the data landscape and make it easier to find up-to-date information on how much enterprise capital funding goes to ethnic minorities.
IN post on a blog on Tuesday morning, Ryan Husk, director of business development and partnerships at Crunchbase, said the goal is to “address systemic underfunding and discrimination based on race, ethnicity and gender” in addition to “foster a more inclusive and equitable startup ecosystem.” ups.”
The latest data on minority enterprise capital funding in the UK shows similar patterns to the US: Black founders in the UK receive lower than 1% of the total enterprise capital invested in the country, according to a report by Extend Ventures. Moreover, in some countries, akin to France and Germany, it is quite difficult to track ethnicity and race, which suggests that there is often no information on how much ethnic minorities actually receive in enterprise investments.
Meanwhile, women around the world often receive lower than 2% enterprise capital funds around the world. There have been some efforts in European countries to change this, for example some French firms have committed to joining the SISTA charter, but it is no secret that there is still a lot of labor to be done.
The startup ecosystem in Europe seems excited about this feature. Vigile Hoareau, the French founding father of the startup Crowdaa, said that any attempt to bring transparency to the market is excellent news. “This will help measure bias in the investment landscape and also help some minority founders position their companies and value them based on facts and metrics,” he said.
More than 70,000 U.S. firms have already added a diversity tag to their Crunchbase profiles. Those interested in following suit can do so Here.