Serena Williams is widely regarded as one of the best tennis players ever. During her prime, she balanced her tennis career with commercial ventures. She founded Serena Ventures, a venture capital fund, in 2014 after over a decade of investment expertise.
Serena Ventures has invested in several startups, some of which have achieved unicorn status. According to its LinkedIn profile, Serena Ventures seeks to support women and minority founders.
“I invest in a lot of companies, especially early stage companies, and I’ve always done this,” Williams said in a TikTok video last month, as reported by AfroTech. “I’ve been investing for over 14 years and was just an entrepreneur while playing tennis. It’s critical for me to devise a backup plan while executing my primary strategy.”
She stated that she was driven to work in venture capital because of the difficulties that black and female entrepreneurs face while seeking finance. Because of the targeted nature of her funding, her company’s portfolio includes 79% underrepresented entrepreneurs, 54% female founders, 47% Black founders, and 11% Latino founders.
“I discovered that less than 2% of all VC funding went to women. And when I originally heard that, I assumed it was a misquote. I thought, ‘Well, they can’t be real.’ We’re talking trillions of dollars here, and less than 2% of it goes to women.…When I initially began investing, I discovered that this was true and was happening. And so I knew right then and there that one day I wanted to start a fund or generate money to invest in women,” she explained.
“I also discovered that considerably fewer went to individuals of race. So I thought, “My goodness.” I’m a Black woman, and if my name isn’t Serena Williams, or if I haven’t had a career, that means I’d have less than, well, not even less than 2%, a fraction of a chance to acquire money if I wanted to start a business,” she continued.
She has invested in over 80 firms, including Impossible Foods and MasterClass, an edutech platform valued at $2.75 billion by 2021. She also estimates that 14 of her portfolio companies have achieved unicorn status.
“I’ve invested, in my personal portfolio, in over 85 companies [maybe], and I also have about 14 unicorns,” Williams stated on TikTok.