Jewel Burks Solomon

Jewel Burks Solomon is revolutionizing the way underrepresented entrepreneurs find the funding and resources to thrive. Born into a family of entrepreneurs, Solomon developed a passion for business, innovation and hard work at home. The Howard alum worked as an Entrepreneur In Residence from 2014 to 2016 at Google, where she also helped other marginalized entrepreneurs leverage the tech firm's resources to grow their businesses. In 2020, Google named Solomon to the newly created role of Head of Google for Startups to continue this work. Solomon oversees the $5 million Black Founders Fund to provide mentorship, resources, and funding to 76 founders as part of Google's $175 million racial equity efforts. She founded Collab Capital in 2018 with fellow 2021 The Root 100 honorees Justin Dawkins and Barry Givens to address the specific ways Black founders are disadvantaged financially, socially and geographically in the tech ecosystem. The trio started with $2 million in capital and set a goal of raising $50 million. In May, Collab announced it had achieved its goal, with the backing of heavy hitters like Apple, Google and Goldman Sach. "We're excited to be able to support founders anywhere in the United States, but we're really focused on cities that have a high concentration of Black innovators and a lower concentration of capital," she told TechCrunch.