Page 52 - Powerlist 2020

IMPACT X
INVESTING

FOR IMPACT

Impact X is doing something very simple and very radical.
And they’re going to change the world.

hen you have a founding Paula Groves, a former Wall Street So, Impact X wants to hear from
team that consists of the analyst and an investor with 30 years’ you if you have game-changing ideas
Wfirst black woman to be a experience, is an Impact X General in the digital and technology, health,
CEO of a Fortune 500 company, a chair Partner. She spent the bulk of her career education, lifestyle or media and
who runs a £12bn private equity fund, a in Silicon Valley and has seen first-hand entertainment sectors.
Dame, a Sir, professors and investment how the money is awarded. But be warned, don’t turn up to your
bankers, not to mention members who “Unfortunately, Silicon Valley likes to pitch unless you have a thoroughly
have 500 years’ worth of investment invest in its own, in entrepreneurs that thought-out, budgeted business plan –
and management experience between look like each other. That has led to and be prepared to feel like you’re
them, you know you’re dealing with entrepreneurs who didn’t come from in an episode of Dragon’s Den meets
something special. Add in the fact that the same backgrounds as people in The Apprentice. Because this is not a
this company is 100 percent black- Silicon Valley being overlooked. charity. They are robust.
owned and black led, and you know “We’re looking for individuals who
you’re onto something pretty incredible. have done their research, not only
Welcome to Impact X, a first-of- about what they want to do but how to
its-kind venture capital firm, set up to get it done. So by the time they come to
do what Silicon Valley and the rest of us, they should have the answer,” says
the VC industry doesn’t do – invest in Not only will Collins. “Don’t come and ask potential
black, female and under-represented funders to clarify what you should do.
entrepreneurs in Britain and Europe. we have global You should be telling us why we should
Headquartered in London, the firm be investing in your idea.”
is a double bottom line fund whose impacts, but we So is the Impact X threshold for
strategy is to deliver both returns to will also generate investing in a business particularly
investors and positive social impact. high? Groves agrees it is, but says that’s
Their initial investment of £100m will, outsized returns simply a necessity of the industry.
they believe, impact 100 million lives. “A threshold for any venture capital
The statistics on VC investing make investing is pretty high,” she says.
depressing reading. Women account “We believe that by focusing on “In order to generate the types of
for only 4% of investment while communities that aren’t in the Silicon returns that are demanded by our
black businesses get an abysmal 1%. Valley portfolio, we’re going to find investors, we have to have a very
The overwhelming majority of the huge opportunities and solutions that rigorous investment process.
investment, which in the US alone can change the way the world works.” You know some of the feedback that
is around $130bn, goes to white, “We want to bring the next we’ve received in the marketplace is
university-educated men. generation of entrepreneurs into the we’re too rigorous, we ask for too much
But where many see this as a problem light so that they can create innovative information, our quantitative analysis
which will take decades to fix, Impact X solutions for society. And by doing so, is too intense. But we all know what it
sees only opportunity. not only will we have global impacts, takes to be successful. We at Impact X
Its CEO Eric Collins says that he and but we will also generate outsized have a high bar, as does the industry,
his fellow co-founders believe that a returns for our investors.” but I think by doing so, we inspire our
“for-us-by-us” approach alleviates the Ambitious Groves doesn’t pull any entrepreneurs to greatness.”
need to “constantly persuade money punches when she says, “We are trying “My grandmother used to always
gatekeepers and their custodians that to create the Black Silicon Valley. If you tell me that as a black person you have
investing in black innovation was part of look at how Silicon Valley has changed to be twice as good and as a black
a virtuous empowerment circle.” society, we want to do the same.” female you have to be four times as

52 Powerlist 2020