Melinda Gates launches GET Cities to accelerate women in tech

Melinda Gates, Founder of Pivotal Ventures, today has announced a new initiative Gender Equality in Tech (GET) Cities, in a bid to make the tech sector more inclusive. It has been specifically created to accelerate the representation and leadership of women in tech by developing inclusive tech hubs across the US.

“My company, Pivotal Ventures, is committed to building new pathways into the innovation economy – including tech, entrepreneurship and investing – for women of all backgrounds. As part of that commitment, today, together with our partners Break Through Tech and SecondMuse, we are announcing the launch of Gender Equality in Tech (GET) Cities – a new initiative to develop inclusive tech hubs in US cities,” stated Gates.

EMERGING TECH HUBS

Rather than the continued focus on trying to make Silicon Valley more inclusive, this initiative focuses on emerging tech hubs instead. Thanks to the $50 million investment from Pivotal Ventures, the initiative will focus on three US cities over the next five years.  

“If  emerging tech hubs are supported to prioritise women’s representation and inclusion as they grow, they will be better positioned to tap into the full range of local talent, while also helping create a blueprint for closing the industry’s gender gap nationwide,” said Gates.  

The GET Cities initiative will bring together key stakeholders across academia, government, venture capital, business and the non-profit sector. By aligning resources, these stakeholders can advance shared goals like supporting women interested in computing to pursue degrees and career opportunities, helping companies and start-ups shape inclusive workplaces, and connecting female founders to local sources of capital. 

TECH GENDER GAP

 “It’s no secret that the technology sector is overwhelmingly white and male. Women graduate with only 19% of computing degrees, hold only 26% of roles in computing-related fields, and leave at rates twice as high as men.  Despite accounting for 16% of the general population, African American, Latinx and Native American women hold only around 4% of roles in the computing workforce.  Last year, only 2.8% of venture capital funding in the US went to companies started by all-women founding teams,” stated Gates.

So last year, she announced a plan to accelerate the pace of change for women by 2030 through advancing women’s power and influence in the US. As part of this commitment, Pivotal Ventures is focused on building pathways and putting women on the fast-track to enter into and advance in influential sectors, such as technology, entrepreneurship and investing, and this initiative is taking a city-specific lens to tackle that challenge. 

FIRST STOP: CHICAGO

GET Cities will kick off this month in Chicago, the Midwest destination for many large technology companies and home to an increasing number of VC firms, with the goal of refining a model there that can be replicated elsewhere.  “There is every reason to believe that the next innovation to sweep Silicon Valley could originate 2,000 miles away with a woman in America’s heartland. This is a chance to start investing in that woman today,” stated Gates.

Chicago is ideally suited for a collaborative stakeholder effort to advance women in tech alongside existing efforts like P33, a civic and social organisation dedicated to transforming Chicago into a tier one technology and innovation hub, and promoting inclusive economic growth. 

The selection of Chicago followed a rigorous analysis of emerging tech hubs in the US, according to Pivotal Ventures, which included factors such as current and future sources of diverse talent, computing degree programmes, access to capital, strength of local business and employer community, and the regulatory and political environment. Additional cities will be selected and announced over the next few years.

INCLUSIVE TECH ECOSYSTEM

Establishing an inclusive tech ecosystem requires a multi-faceted approach that aligns a cross-section of stakeholders that can influence a city’s growing tech industry. The partner-led approach will include:

• Building pathways into tech: Break Through Tech, a new national US programme launched at Cornell Tech,  will replicate its successful Women in Technology & Entrepreneurship New York (WiTNY) model in other higher education institutions. Starting with the University of Illinois in Chicago, the programme aims to increase the number of female computing graduates in select cities. With additional support from the Cognizant US Foundation and Verizon, programmes will focus on curriculum innovation; career development and expanded access to innovative internships with industry partners; and community development to connect female students to each other and to professionals. 

• Activating and aligning the tech and entrepreneurial ecosystem: Led by SecondMuse, a global innovation agency, GET Cities will engage local startups, venture firms, tech companies, nonprofits, and other players to organise ecosystem-building activities such as:
  • Developing a set of shared goals on hiring and retention of women.
  • Sharing best practices on workplace culture among companies.
  • Boosting representation of women in artificial intelligence jobs. 
  • Aligning and identifying sources of capital and funding for women entrepreneurs.

• Ensuring equal representation for all women: The approach in each city will be developed to open entry points for women of all backgrounds, particularly women of colour, into tech, innovation and entrepreneurship. Through partnerships with groups such as AI4ALL and digitalundivided, the effort will aim to increase diversity and inclusion in AI and support Black and Latinx women startup founders. The effort will also build upon Pivotal Ventures’ support of the Reboot Representation Tech Coalition, which has brought together large technology companies to double the number of Black, Latinx and Native American women graduating with computing degrees by 2025.

JUST THE BEGINNING

As the tech industry continues to grow beyond Silicon Valley, stakeholders must actively start shaping the cultures of these emerging tech hubs to be supportive of women from the start. By engaging early and activating both the supply side (academia, startups) and the demand side (industry, venture investment), emerging tech hubs can grow, while also creating more effective pathways for women in tech and entrepreneurship, according to Pivotal Ventures.

For more information on how to get involved with the initiative, click here.