Minority Entrepreneurs Receive More Than $1 Billion From Inner City Capital Program

The crowd favorite was HDM Systems, a power solutions firms that designs and manufactures battery-based mobile and renewable energy applications.  The company was founded by Aileen Liu, who had a background in automotive chemistry; she saw that HDM was poised for growth by expanding her products beyond major trucking companies and the automotive industry into the military sector.  HDM was seeking a little over $2 million to further its expansion into new markets.

While the panel of investors made a fictitious offer during the exercise, as part of the Initiative for a Competitive Inner City, ICCC does indeed connect small business owners to high-profile capital investors. In fact, HDM came to ICCC in order to find more sources for funding and after participating in the program was able to procure a loan to propel her expansion.

According to ICCC’s 2014 Impact Report, the group helped over 677 participating companies across 39 states and 189 cities. Around 74% of the businesses are minority owned and 50% have been in business 11 or more years. More than one-third, 39%, are in business services, construction, and consumers goods and services, with revenues of $5 million or more for 23% of the businesses.

After participating in ICCC, entrepreneurs raised $1.2 billion in capital: $371 million in equity from investors and $853 million in debt—bank loans.

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *