Black women in Tech are leading the way in their industry and supporting successful brands through continuous hard work and dedication! With unwavering determination, they are not only carving out their own space but also propelling thriving brands forward through their relentless hard work and dedication.
Today, we shine a spotlight on nine exceptional Black women who are making significant strides in the tech industry with their visionary companies and groundbreaking apps. Join us as we celebrate their achievements and explore the impact they are creating in this exciting realm of innovation and possibilities.
Get ready to be inspired by their remarkable journeys and the footprints they are leaving in the tech landscape
1. Black Women Talk Tech founded by Esosa Ighodaro and Regina Gwen
Join your fellow Black women on the road to a successful, money-making entrepreneurship journey with the help of Black Women Talk Tech! Regina Gwen and Esosa Ighodaro founded Black Women Talk Tech to give Black women entrepreneurs the safe space to learn how to grow a billion-dollar brand. By joining the Black Women Talk Tech community and enrolling in their Roadmap to Billions program, which hosts annual conferences across the country, you will have the opportunity to showcase the brilliance that black women offer in any industry.
In addition, you will join conversations based on your firsthand experiences in your industry, foster deep connections, and gain exclusive funding opportunities.
2. Helping hands founded by Janelle Hinds
Janelle Hinds is the founder of Helping Hands, a platform that matches Ontario students with volunteer opportunities for local organizations in need of help.
The platform allows students to give back, obtain community hours needed to graduate, and have new experiences, while allowing charities to serve their communities better. According to DMZ Ryerson, Hinds also volunteers as a program coordinator with local Toronto shelters where she delivers workshops to newcomers and racialized youth to build leadership skills and ensure all youth are active citizens.
3. Dot Health founded by Huda Idress
Huda Idrees is the founder and CEO of Dot Health, a health data platform, providing Canadians access to their personal health records. The goal is “empowering Canadians to easily request, access, and manage their own health information.”
Since graduating from the University of Toronto in industrial engineering, Idrees has helped promote women in tech during her time at TechGirls Canada and is currently serving on the OntarioMD Board of Directors to help physicians adopt electronic medical records into their practice.
4. Hervest founded by Sola Akinpeleu
Solape is the founder and CEO of HerVest, a women-focused and inclusive fintech platform for the underserved and excluded women in Africa.
HerVest enables women to participate in savings, impact investments and credit, particularly for smallholder women farmers in Nigeria. As a financial feminist, Solape is pro SDG5 and SDG10 who believes in achieving gender equality and reducing inequality through financial literacy, technology, and access to capital.
In September 2021, Solape’s led HerVest was chosen from thousands of applicants to present at the world’s number one startup launch competition at TechCrunch Disrupt. Besides, HerVest is the only Nigerian startup selected to pitch alongside 19 other global stars.
Solape is the Nigeria chapter director of Women in Tech Global, an international organisation with a double mission: to close the gender gap and help women embrace technology, present in over 100 countries with growing members of over 70,000.
5. Herconomy founded by Ife Durosinmi-Etti
Ifedayo Durosinmi-Etti is the founder and CEO of Herconomy, a female-focused fintech startup dedicated to creating financial resources for women.
Herconomy is Nigeria’s first digital platform of female entrepreneurs and professionals focusing on empowering women and connecting women to each other and opportunities, such as grants, fellowships, scholarships, jobs, and much more. She is also an author, entrepreneur and young global leader with over 10 years of management and leadership experience working in the fashion, marketing and manufacturing, and, most recently, the tech industry.
She was recently appointed as a Youth Advisory Group Member for Solutions for Youth Employment (S4YE), a global coalition formed by the World Bank to provide catalytic support to employment and productive work for 150 million youths by 2030. She was also named a Peace Scholar by the Dutch Ministry of Foreign Affairs.
Durosinmi-Etti has recently broken several glass ceilings by being part of the Africa Startup Initiative (ASIP) Accelerator Programme and becoming the first recruitment partner in Nigeria with Amazon.
In 2019, she was listed as one of the 52 women who made an impact.
6. Toronto Women In Data Science founded by Kishawna Peck
Kishawna Peck is the executive director of Toronto Womxn in Data Science, which showcases women in data science who share their career journeys and their expertise in technical skills, business strategy, and ethics.
Peck’s goals are “to diversify the talent pipeline in data” and to “inspire and empower a million data-literate womxn.” Peck has been a data professional for five years, working in non-profits, fintech, and advertising in Product, Finance, and BI teams. She is currently a manager of Data Analytics at HomeStars.
7. Digitalundivided founded by Kathryn Finney
Black women are building brands from the ground up and establishing high revenue in all global industries. As a self-made tech pioneer and entrepreneur, Kathryn Finney knows the ins and outs of growing and setting up a brand and business. Digitalundivided is helping black women break into over five figures worth of revenue under programs such as She Runs It, BIG, and Do You Fellowship.
They supply the best way to reach global audiences, business tactics from other successful entrepreneurs, and resources essential to business growth. In addition, they will have you pitch your business plans to various industry leaders.
8. Black Girls Code founded by Kimberly Bryant
Black women and girls have shaped the tech industry by becoming successful builders and creators. With communities like Black Girls Code, founded by Kimberly Bryant, black women learn and lead in computer programming and other technology-based fields.
Black Girls Code offers online and in-person programs in web design, game design, mobile app design, coding, and robotics. Black Girls Code includes seven U.S. chapters, with plans to launch eight more chapters soon.
9. Unstack founded by Adaora Nwodo
Adora Nwodo is a software engineer currently building Mixed Reality on the Cloud. In 2018, she created adorahack.com, sharing articles on software engineering, productivity and career growth. The next year, she created a YouTube channel called AdoraHack, where she shares stories on tech and her experience as a software engineer.
She is the co-founder of unStack Africa, an open source-based conference for tech talents in Africa and beyond, focusing on hands-on workshops and world-class talks that empower people to learn by doing. She is also Vice President of the Nigerian chapter for the VRAR Association, where she’s focused on getting people excited about building Mixed Reality technologies in the region.
In February 2021, Adora won the Young CISO Network Excellence in Disruptive Technology, Cloud and Embedded Device Security Award for her work in building and advocating for Disruptive Technology on the Cloud.
In October 2021, she released her first book, “Cloud Engineering for Beginners,” which introduces people to the concept of cloud computing, viable career paths in cloud engineering, and how to navigate a cloud engineering career. She is also a published author, public speaker, and tech content creator.
