Fearless Fund has made a new investment, following a court victory.
Fearless Fund is more than one month removed from the settlement of a major court battle that centered its Strivers Grant program, which allocated $20,000 in funding to Black-woman-owned businesses.
As AFROTECH™ previously reported, a lawsuit had been filed by the American Alliance for Equal Rights group as it claimed the program operated with “explicit racial exclusion.” The case has been settled between the parties, resulting in the grant program’s closure.
However, the move was viewed as a victory by Fearless Fund, which only had one grant left to disperse from the program, and the final decision allowed the firm to “strategically” avoid a Supreme Court ruling — something that could have impacted the greater population of Black business owners seeking funding.
“This is a WIN and positive outcome for the Fearless Fund and our community,” Fearless Fund stated on AFROTECH™’s Instagram at the time. “We strategically avoided a Supreme Court ruling (the deadline to appeal our appeal has passed) because a ruling not in our favor at the Supreme Court would’ve ended minority based funding across the country and that would not be wise.”
Fearless Fund had remained in operation in the midst of litigation, and the firm has announced its latest investment in e-commerce platform Zimi, founded in 2023 by Stanford University alumni Audrey Djiya (CEO) and Peter Nsaka (chief technology officer).
TechCrunch reports Zimi has received a seven-figure commitment from the firm’s second fund, which is supported through a multi-million-dollar investment from Bank of America, Costco, and MasterCard in June 2023.
Zimi, which officially launching in August 2023, helps businesses in developing markets to sell their products internationally, offering the following services:
- Discounted cross-border logistics
- Inventory handling and storage
- Inventory and order management
- 2-day shipping
- D2C fulfillment
- Wholesale fulfillment
Zimi boasts 100% accuracy and on time shipping, as well as a 40% savings on cost and time, per its company website. Since launching this year, the company has earned $1 million in revenue and counting. Now, with the help of Fearless Fund as an investor, the founders hope to scale their company internationally.
“Further, Fearless’ experience with working with consumer brands, who we’re building for, and international presence, will be helpful to Zimi in the long run,” Djiya mentioned, according to TechCrunch. “We also really love the team.”
The investment will support plans for expanding Zimi’s team, which currently includes Serge Bertaine (fulfillment lead) and Danielle Gnibus (technical team), as well as grow operations and engineering and integrate artificial intelligence (AI).
For Fearless Fund, Zimi fufills its benchmark of “investing in companies and continuing our mission of funding entrepreneurs,” Founding Partner and Fearless Fund CEO Arian Simone commented to TechCrunch.
She also mentioned Fearless Fund has closed “multiple investments this year and is actively diligencing numerous opportunities.” Those include a $200 million debt fund through a partnership with CDFI, which will provide loans between $5,000 and $250,000 to under-resourced founders.
