Braze Launches Call for Applications to Nearly Double “Tech for Black Founders” Grants
February 08 2022 - 8:00AM
Business Wire
By providing free technology, community, and
mentorship, Braze aims to address social and fiscal inequity in the
tech industry.
Braze (Nasdaq: BRZE), the comprehensive customer engagement
platform that powers interactions between consumers and the brands
they love, today announced an open call for applications to its
product grant through the Tech for Black Founders program. The
grant will provide 15 recipients with a year of free Braze
technology and resources to help Black founders and support their
company’s early growth. Eligible and interested Black-led
businesses in the U.S. and EMEA can apply here, starting today.
Tech for Black Founders is a first-of-its-kind collaboration
established in June 2020 to support and invest in underrepresented
entrepreneurs and technologists. Today, only 1% of founders backed
by venture capital in the United States are Black. Braze co-founded
this joint initiative in partnership with Amplitude, Branch,
mParticle, and Radar to offer Black founders access to valuable
technology to help scale their businesses. Since its inception, the
network has grown to over 43 partners, including Airtable, AWS,
Greenhouse, Notion, and Stripe.
“By enabling greater access to tech resources, Braze is
committed to promoting diverse industry representation and
opportunity. We’re proud of how the program has grown, and we look
forward to further expanding our Tech for Black Founders
community,” said Rod McLeod, VP of Social Impact at Braze. “As a
technology leader, we will remain accountable for increasing
diversity, equity, and inclusion in our industry and plan to
further expand efforts supporting underserved and underrepresented
communities in the year ahead.”
Last year, Braze provided grants to 16 Black-founded businesses
in the U.S. For example, Plain Sight, a social platform dedicated
to facilitating networking in virtual spaces, leveraged Braze’s
technology to drive personalized communications, optimize user
experiences and increase retention.
“By leveraging Braze technology, we’ve been able to scale
personalized engagements and create more curated connections
between our users,” said James Chapman, Founder and CEO at Plain
Sight. “The Tech for Black Founders program has provided valuable
technology and people resources, and I’ve been impressed by the
support of the Braze team welcoming us as a truly integrated and a
valued member of their community.”
Grant Details and Process
To be eligible for the grant program, applicants must meet
certain criteria including:
- Identify as a Black founder in the U.S. or EMEA
- Bootstrapped business or less than $30M in VC funding
- Have fewer than 100 employees
For the 15 businesses selected to participate, the program will
offer:
- Platform access and education including a free Growth
package for 12 months, with onboarding services and over 25 hours
of educational content in Braze LABs.
- Customer Engagement capabilities including unlimited
push notifications, webhooks, and in-app/in-browser messaging for
up to 250,000 monthly active users; email costs covered up to 10M
emails and two IP addresses.
For more information on eligibility and the application process,
visit the website here.
About Braze Braze is a leading comprehensive customer
engagement platform that powers interactions between consumers and
brands they love. With Braze, global brands can ingest and process
customer data in real time, orchestrate and optimize contextually
relevant, cross-channel marketing campaigns and continuously evolve
their customer engagement strategies. Braze has been recognized as
one of Fortune's 2021 Best Workplaces in New York, Fortune's 2021
Best Workplace for Millennials, and 2021 UK Best Workplaces for
Women by Great Place to Work. The company is headquartered in New
York with offices in Austin, Berlin, Chicago, London, San
Francisco, Singapore, and Tokyo. Learn more at braze.com.
Forward-Looking Statements This press release may contain
“forward-looking statements” within the meaning of the “safe
harbor” provisions of the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act
of 1995, including but not limited to, statements regarding the
anticipated growth and benefits of Braze’s social programs. These
forward-looking statements are based on Braze’s current
assumptions, expectations and beliefs, and are subject to
substantial risks, uncertainties, assumptions and changes in
circumstances that may cause Braze’s actual results, performance or
achievements to be materially different from any future results,
performance or achievements expressed or implied by the
forward-looking statements. Further information on potential
factors that could affect Braze’s results is included in Braze’s
Quarterly Report on Form 10-Q for the fiscal quarter ended October
31, 2021 filed with the U.S. Securities and Exchange on December
21, 2021. The forward-looking statements included in this press
release represent Braze’s views only as of the date of this press
release, and Braze assumes no obligation, and does not intend to
update these forward-looking statements, except as required by
law.
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version on businesswire.com: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20220208005291/en/
Press: Quincy Zhai quincy.zhai@braze.com
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