Harlem Capital

Visible Hands is a venture capital firm on a mission to highlight and invest in the limitless potential of overlooked founders. We envision a world where talent and execution - not race or gender - are the key predictors for success. Our Manifesto Our world is changing. Our communities are changing - they are becoming stronger and more vibrant in their diversity, and face fresh possibilities and challenges as a new generation looks increasingly different from the last. We believe that as new opportunities arise, anyone should have the chance to seize them. The best solutions come from those closest to the problem - as our problems evolve, so should the problem-solvers. We believe that investing in women, people of color, and other underrepresented groups is key to creating a more prosperous and equitable future for everyone. We celebrate the bold, the curious, and the irrational. We applaud those with big dreams, and who choose the harder, riskier path in relentless pursuit of pushing forward what is possible. We also acknowledge that being a risk-taker often comes from a position of privilege - opportunity and wealth gaps persist along racial and gender lines, and access to financial and social capital too often determines which ideas are nurtured to grow. We believe that we must first acknowledge that the playing field was built to be unequal in order to change it. We know that we must change it. High-growth entrepreneurship should not be reserved for the privileged few. We need to shine a light inwards on our collective blindspots, and cast out a wider and more inclusive net to find and support existing talent. Instead of relying on unseen market forces, we’re taking matters into our own hands. No one should have to look a certain way to be deemed deserving; great entrepreneurs are all around us but we must choose to see them. By sharing our privileges with those not born into it and manufacturing fairness where it doesn’t yet exist, we can fundamentally change access to wealth and opportunity in this generation. This is our open call for anyone who feels stuck on the outside looking in: We see you. We value you. We need you. Your perspective is unique, your lived experience is invaluable, and your potential is limitless. Never doubt that your voice matters and that you deserve to be heard, even if it can feel like it doesn’t. We believe that good ideas, regardless of who or where they come from, should rise to the top, and we will fight alongside you to get them there.

New York Ventures supports high-growth companies and their partners to use technology to solve important challenges in areas of strategic interest and importance. We actively look to provide greater access to venture capital for regions, industries and individuals, including women and minority entrepreneurs and fund managers. Our goal is to build a robust startup ecosystem across New York State, leveraging public and private sector assets. New York Ventures is actively deploying over $300 million of capital through equity programs for both direct and indirect investment. In 2022, New York was awarded funds via the U.S. Department of Treasury State Small Business Credit Initiative, which helps us to support our several programs. Venture Capital Program Funds Pre-seed and Seed Matching Fund: $30 million fund for investing in venture backable start-ups at the early stages of their development NYS Innovation Venture Capital Fund: $135+ million fund for investing in venture-backable startups from Seed through Series B Emerging and Regional Partner Fund: $102 million fund for investing in diverse and emerging venture fund managers or managers who invest in undercapitalized regions in NYS Community and Regional Partner Fund: $52 million fund for investing in venture fund managers who operate or partner with mentor-based programs like accelerators Impact NY Ventures programs and companies create impact in numerous ways, but we are proud of the range and diversity of companies and managers that all our programs have supported since 2011. 224 companies: More than 55% located outside of New York City $135M+ invested by NYS, matched by $900M+ from the private sector 43.3% portfolio companies started and/or led by women or minorities Team The New York Ventures team has extensive experience as investors and entrepreneurs, with offices in New York City, the Southern Tier, Western NY and the Capital Region. In addition, we regularly collaborate with our partners within the Small Business and Technology Development Division who help entrepreneurs at all stages of growth and development. Jennifer Tegan - Managing Director Silvia Garcia Codony - Assistant Vice President Karan Mehta - Senior Director Ryoko Nozawa - Senior Director Josh Nelson - Director Zack Pecenak - Director Audrey Chisholm - Assistant Director Elaine Chen - Operations Associate Thomas Halpin - Project Associate

At GingerBread Capital, we invest in women founders leading high-growth-potential businesses, and in emerging funds led by women and underrepresented managers. We help them gain access to the knowledge, networks and capital they need to build and scale successful enterprises, and we encourage others to do the same. What We Look For Exceptional Founders + Funders: Visionary, dynamic founders and funders with excellent execution skills who possess high conviction, passion, grit, and drive Differentiated Business Model: A great concept and an irresistible business model that clearly demonstrate a true need, an identifiable market and a competitive advantage Technology Enabled: Technology-enabled, where automation, AI and data analytics propel the brand, revenues and customer satisfaction Scalability: A go-to-market approach that builds customers today and has the potential to be much, much larger in the future Why we invest in women. We invest in female founders and in emerging funds because it’s great for the economy, for business (theirs and ours), and for building a better future.

January Ventures is a VC fund focused on angel/pre-seed in the US & Europe. We are replacing the friends & family round and re-writing the networks in venture. We believe the founders of the next decade will look fundamentally different: more female, more diverse and more distributed. We back founders based on their tenacity and ambition, not their pedigrees or who they know. Our vision is an equal opportunity tech ecosystem. Our firm is built on the principles of transparency and access, and we back founders based on their tenacity and ambition, not their pedigrees or who they know.

We believe Latinx founders bring remarkable ingenuity, incredible determination, and rich life experiences to their startup companies - yet they receive a tiny fraction of the funding and opportunities available to other groups. Inicio Ventures was formed to help close that gap by ensuring that Latinx founders can build equity and wealth in the startup economy. To complement our investment work, we build and manage Latinx startup ecosystem programs, including our pitch competition series focused on growing the talent pipeline, a Venture Fellows program for grad students interested in being the next generation of Latinx investors and an industry convening and collaboration that creates opportunities for Latinx leaders and their organizations to work together.

In 2007, I was working as a junior trader at Lehman Brothers. I hated it - the dehumanizing culture, lack of creativity, and singular focus on transactions and money left me feeling uninspired and lost. I didn’t know it then, but Lehman’s bankruptcy in ‘08 was a gift, and I left in search of a calling. I spent a few years meandering - writing, working odd jobs, grad school in Hong Kong - ultimately ending up back in NYC in 2009, having stumbled upon a young, passionate group of misfits that folks were calling “founders.” These founders felt more like artists than assets, more obsessives than executives. They were avant garde, they were building the things they wanted to see in the world, and to my surprise, people called venture capitalists gave them money to pursue their dreams. I was in love with their fringe eccentricity, extraordinary craftsmanship, and wild ambition. I was in love with the beautiful new works of art they called startups. For the next 15 years, I dedicated my life to working with founders – first at betaworks, and then over three funds at Notation with my partner Alex Lines. A lot has changed. The venture ecosystem went from cottage industry outsider to institutional insider – from a nascent practice to a consensus component of institutional portfolios. The result has been the industrialization–and bankerization–of venture. Firms that make dozens or even hundreds of investments per year, relentlessly focused on assets under management, using the same copy-paste transactional language, all drowning in a sea of sameness. Similarly, what was once a risky leap of faith has become a credentialing factory: accelerators churn out 1,000s of startups per year and fundraising rounds are the new requisite bullets in Linkedin resumes. The environment today feels eerily similar to the one I left on Wall Street so many years ago. Into the Asylum I’ve always believed the best early-stage founders are artists – they're obsessive about new and unusual things, they feel compelled to bring creation into the world, and they are often misunderstood for long periods of time–even lifetimes. Building businesses is their art. The good news is that as the new “banks” in venture continue to expand their tentacles, they also enable new alternatives. What if we treated founders like artists, instead of like assets? We plan to spend the next decade trying to answer this question. We think it means: A firm that’s small by design, that makes a handful of investments per year, and that eschews board seats and administrative control. A small team of partners moving mountains to help when asked and otherwise getting out of the way. A place for founders to tune out the noise and focus on making something truly great. A source of calm, trust, and support for founders who are manifesting beauty through one of the hardest things you can do: starting a company. The path forward We believe there are exceptional founders who, like us, want to win their own way, who want to work with VCs who care more about them and their companies than assets under management. If this sounds appealing to you, please get in touch. Whether you're a founder or in between things, we’d love for you to come visit us at our studio in Brooklyn. And if you would like to join a small team dedicated to the art of venture rather than the business of banking, contact us at hiring@asylum.vc.