Education, Mentors, Money: How to Boost Black Tech Entrepreneurs

Don Charlton learned early on to steel himself against double takes about his race in technology circles while he built his recruiting-software business, the Resumator. “Unless they researched me, they had no idea I was a black guy,” says Charlton, who founded the Pittsburgh business in 2009. “So I was always prepared to surprise people when I walked through the door. That’s a shock to the system that I had to fight through in order to get trust.”

Investors were skeptical about mainstream appeal for the content on Delmond Newton’s entertainment site, UrbanClout, despite his assurance it would attract viewers across racial and ethnic lines. The Philadelphia entrepreneur launched it last year, using an investment from his father. “African Americans have to go an extra mile in every industry,” he says. “Once we build it and turn it into a $100 million company, with 10 million followers, that’s when Hollywood will say, ‘We want in.’”