Kathryn Finney
Founder & CEO @ Genius Guild
Chicago, United States
Kathryn Finney is a seed investor at Genius Guild in Chicago focused on Health Care and Social Media. Kathryn Finney is named by Inc Magazine as one of the most influential women in tech, Kathryn Finney has made her mark as an entrepreneur, social media visionary, “women in” advocate, investor, and 3x published author.On the heels of the events of the Summer of 2020, Kathryn created Genius Guild, a business creation platform that uses theventure studio model (Lab & Venture Fund) to invest in Black entrepreneurs building scalable businesses that serve black communities and beyond. Pre-launch, Kathryn and Genius Guild raised over $5MM in investment from a number of partners including Pivotal Ventures, an investment and incubation company founded by Melinda Gates, Impact Seat, an investment company led by serial investor Barbara Clarke, First Close partners, led by former Surgeon General Regina Benjamin and Lowenstein Sadler partner Ed Zimmerman and individual investors such as Andrew Bosworth (Facebook).In April 2020, Kathryn founded The Doonie Fund with a $10,000 personal donation, to encourage other black women entrepreneurs to continue to build their businesses in the middle of the COVID-19 crisis. One Medium post, a few emails and 6 weeks later, the fund grew to over $150,000, providing micro investments to over 1500 Black women-owned businesses.Kathryn is the founder of digitalundivided, a groundbreaking social enterprise focused on creating a world where women own their work. Kathryn started digitalundivided after selling her company, The Budget Fashionista, the pioneering lifestyle media company. Her pioneering research, “#ProjectDiane”, drew widespread buzz for disrupting the dialogue around women of color and tech entrepreneurship. She grew the organization from a simple idea to a dynamic organization with a seven figure budget, 20+ staff, two offices (Newark and Atlanta) and partnerships with major institutions such as Pivotal Ventures, Microsoft for Startups, UBS, Surdna Foundation and JPMorgan Chase. After eight years as CEO, she stepped down to become the first black woman business author at Portfolio/Penguin Books.A Yale-trained Epidemiologist, Kathryn has received numerous honors and awards including the Echoing Green fellowship, Eisenhower Fellowship, Entrepreneurs Magazine’s “Woman to Watch”, Grace Hopper ABIE award, Marie Claire’s 10 Women to Watch, Ebony Power 100, Black Enterprise “40 under 40” list and more.A White House Champion of Change and a past member of the National Advisory Council on Innovation and Entrepreneurship (NACIE) appointed by the Obama Administration, Kathryn was honored by the Borough of Manhattan with the “Kathryn Finney Appreciation Day”. She has also received an Honorary Doctorate from Mount Holyoke College and was inducted into both the African-American Alumni Hall of Fame at Rutgers University and Spelman College’s “Game Changers Academy.”
- Total investments:
- 9
- Last investment:
- Lead investor:
- 0%
Last updated:
For AI agents: llms.txt
Industries Kathryn Finney invests in
Stages Kathryn Finney invests in
Countries Kathryn Finney invests in
Contacts
| Type | Contact | Validation |
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| Work email | ||
| Personal email | ||
| Work phone | ||
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Investment Focus
Industry
- Health Care 2 (22%)
- Social Media 2 (22%)
- Venture Capital 2 (22%)
- News 1 (11%)
- SaaS 1 (11%)
Stage
- Seed 4 (44%)
- Pre-Seed 2 (22%)
- Funding Round 2 (22%)
- Venture - Series Unknown 1 (11%)
Investments
| Company | Description | Round | Links |
|---|---|---|---|
| Youme Healthcare is a digital mental health company that focuses on youth, family behavioral, and mental healthcare. | Seed / Oct 12, 2022 | ||
| Stimulus is a relationship intelligence platform that uses data and analytics to help companies make better purchasing decisions. | $2.5M / Seed / Jul 13, 2022 | ||
| RareBreed Ventures is a pre-seed fund that invests in technology companies. It allows angel investors to become limited partners for larger funds down the line. RareBreed was founded in 2021 by McKeever "Mac" Conwell. | Venture - Series Unknown / Sep 21, 2021 | ||
| Refashiond invests in early-stage companies refashioning global supply chains. It was founded in 2019 and is headquartered in New York, United States. | Seed / Sep 21, 2021 | ||
| Health In Her HUE is a digital platform that connects Black women to Black and culturally competent healthcare providers, and offers evidence-based health content that centers Black women’s lived experiences. We strive to reduce racial health disparities by leveraging the power of technology, media and community to improve health outcomes for Blackwomen. | $1M / Pre-Seed / Aug 16, 2021 | ||
| QuirkChat is a community platform for all geeks that prioritizes people who are typically left out of geek fandom (women, POC, LGBTQIA+). QuirkChat is a one-stop for anyone exploring or creating the fandom industry. Its app is available on both iOS and Android. It was founded in 2017 and is headquartered in Durham, North Carolina. | Pre-Seed / Aug 13, 2021 | ||
| The Labz is a custom event platform focused on the creative needs of the immersive marketing and advertising industry. The Labz provides a drag and drop suite of tools that allows users to form curated conversations and experiences around content and products. With a subscription to the Labz software suite, marketers can uniquely present contentby mixing-&-matching media, guest activities, communication channels, games, and interactive VR/360. | $200K / Seed / Aug 01, 2021 | ||
| See all 9 investments → | |||
Co-Investors
About Genius Guild
Genius Guild is a business creation platform that supports market-driven innovations to end racism. Using a venture studio model, it invests in Black entrepreneurs building scalable businesses that serve black communities and beyond. The company applies an investment lens that actively addresses the ways in which capitalism and capitalist marketshave been manipulated to limit, exclude, and defraud black communities, creating 360 value for communities, investors, and entrepreneurs.Genius Guild was founded by Kathryn Finney, one of Inc. Magazine's "Most Influential Women in Tech'' and the visionary founder of The Doonie Fund, The Budget Fashionista, and digitalundivided and is headquartered in Atlanta, Georgia.
Genius Guild Contacts
| Name | Phone | Socials | |
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Kathryn Finney
Founder & CEO
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Brian Laung Aoaeh
Venture Capitalist in Residence
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Darlene Gillard Jones
Executive Producer at a business creation company that invests in brilliant Black Founders.
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Jennifer Van Dam
Director of Platform
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FAQ
What does Kathryn Finney invest in?
Kathryn Finney invests primarily in Health Care, Social Media and Venture Capital startups, most often at Seed and Pre-Seed stage. Most of the 9 investments tracked by Shizune back companies in United States. The Investment Focus section breaks down every industry, stage and country in the portfolio.
How do I contact Kathryn Finney?
Public channels for Kathryn Finney include LinkedIn, X (Twitter) and the website linked on this profile. For a verified work email and phone number, create a free Shizune account — contact data is searched across 20+ sources and validated before delivery, so your outreach lands in the right inbox.
When did Kathryn Finney last invest?
The most recent investment recorded for Kathryn Finney closed in Oct 2022. Shizune tracks 9 investments in total for this profile, including round sizes, stages and portfolio companies, all sourced from confirmed public funding rounds and refreshed monthly.
Is Shizune's investor data accurate?
Yes — every stat on this profile is calculated from confirmed public funding rounds monitored across hundreds of sources since 2020. This profile was last refreshed in Oct 2026 and is updated monthly. Spotted something off? Use the “Suggest an edit” link near the top of the page.
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