Former Microsoft CEO and billionaire Steve Ballmer reveals he will invest $400 million in private-fund ventures to support Black entrepreneurs - Fortune

Steve Ballmer, billionaire proprietor of the LA Clippers NBA squad and erstwhile CEO of Microsoft, has been a large philanthropist for years. Now, he’s investing $400 cardinal to enactment Black-owned businesses.

Ballmer, on with his woman Connie Ballmer, volition spouse with established backstage equity firms and concern banks to assistance code the systemic radical inequities that person hindered concern into these businesses successful the past, the mates wrote successful a blog station Wednesday.

“Our extremity is to provender that request for task start-up superior that is missing successful the African American community,” Ballmer said live connected the TODAY amusement connected Wednesday. He explained that the concern would spell to Black concern money managers, who would beryllium required to put astatine slightest 30% of that magnitude into Black-led businesses.

“This is an unthinkable accidental to put successful an undercapitalized market,” Ballmer said successful a statement. “We anticipation it volition awesome to different investors the worth successful giving Black concern managers entree to capital.”

This isn’t the archetypal clip the Ballmers are committing hundreds of millions supporting communities of color. They made a azygous concern of $200 cardinal successful a backstage equity money called Project Black, managed by Ariel Investments’ alternate arm, the Wall Street Journal reported. Ariel Alternatives is 1 of the largest black-owned asset managers successful the country.

Ballmer served arsenic Microsoft’s CEO for 14 years, succeeding laminitis Bill Gates. He stepped down successful 2014. His nett worthy is $85.1 billion, per the Bloomberg Billionaires Index, of which a immense bulk remains tied to Microsoft’s shares. 

The Ballmer Group has been progressive successful respective different philanthropic projects successful the past, focusing connected economical mobility wrong underserved communities. They connection grants for initiatives, specified arsenic education, nonrecreational improvement and ineligible services for those from low-income backgrounds. In 2021, the Group had fixed implicit $420 million successful specified grants.

Ballmer says their astir caller concern volition beryllium antithetic due to the fact that its economical interaction volition beryllium “self-perpetuating,” but successful lockstep with their different efforts.

“We haven’t traditionally focused connected investments and backstage equity, but we are conscionable incredibly excited to instrumentality this approach,” Ballmer said. 

Goldman Sachs, Fairview Capital, JPMorgan Chase, Ariel Investment and GCM Grosvenor were named arsenic the partners moving with the Ballmer’s multi-million dollar investment.