Coverage from WWMT, published 2024-09-24.
Kalamazoo Forward Ventures debuted on Tuesday, Sept. 24, 2024, billed by WWMT News Channel 3 as Southwest Michigan’s first Black-owned venture capital firm, with a $50 million capital commitment. Seven Michigan men formed the firm and said they would deploy money raised from limited partners into startups, innovators and founders historically shut out of capital, in Kalamazoo and elsewhere in the state. Eric L. Wimbley, who leads First Line Risk Management and KZFV’s venture arm, said the fund grew as the partners’ ambitions grew.
General partner Jamauri A. Bogan of Bogan Developments framed the group’s task as moving capital to people who have never had access to it. Other partners quoted included Von H. Washington Jr. of Hugo Consulting, Daniel S. Jefferies of Newmind Group, former city commissioner Eric B. Cunningham and former mayor Bobby J. Hopewell.
The firm operates three pillars, venture capital, real estate and main street funds, and stressed it makes investments rather than donations. The report cited Glidance, an AI-powered mobility aid for people with vision loss co-founded by Amos Miller and Kyle Buzzard, as the kind of company the partners have in mind.
