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Birmingham

Alabama

Community Lead

J.W. Carpenter

Executive Director at Prosper Birmingham

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Lead Community Organization

Prosper Birmingham

Launched in 2021, Prosper Birmingham is a nonprofit with a vision to build the most inclusive and thriving economy in the Southeast. Prosper works to align the region and accelerate progress towards a shared vision for transformational inclusive economic growth by incubating ideas, aligning missions and efforts, securing and investing capital, and convening entities. Prosper’s initiatives are focused on three key areas: jobs creation, job preparation and job access.

In 2022, the Magic City Match, funded by Prosper, initiative provided 13 Birmingham Black-owned business with the capital, connections and coaching necessary to grow their businesses.

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Birmingham Community Lead

Headshot of J.W. Carpenter, Executive Director at Prosper Birmingham.

J.W. Carpenter

President at Prosper Birmingham

J.W. Carpenter serves as President of Prosper Birmingham. Launched in 2021, Prosper Birmingham is an effort to align existing initiatives, supplement them with select new opportunities, and scale a collaborative civic agenda. 

Learn More About Prosper Birmingham

History of Birmingham, Alabama

The city of Birmingham was founded in 1871 and became a hub for limestone, coal and iron ore mining and steel manufacturing in the American South. Birmingham was renowned for its rapid industrialization and urbanization in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries.

Birmingham played a critical role in the American Civil Rights Movement of the 1950s and 1960s – it is where Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. wrote his famous “Letter from a Birmingham Jail” and where the Southern Christian Leadership Conference organized the Birmingham Campaign to protest segregation.  

In the decades since the 1964 Civil Rights Act, the Black community has endeavored to reverse the effects of segregation and economic exclusion, but additional investment is needed to racial inequities in the Birmingham Metropolitan Region.

A recent Brookings Institution study reveals that the Birmingham area is creating fewer quality jobs and less access to economic resources than its peer cities.

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Historic Alabama Theater sign in downtown Birmingham

Racial Inequities in Birmingham

Black people make up 30% of the population, but Black businesses only represent approximately 4% of businesses and approximately 2% of revenues.
MBE Entrepreneurship and Supplier Diversity
To start or scale businesses, Black entrepreneurs often cite access to capital as one of their greatest challenges
Access to Capital (CDFI/MDI)
Black people are about 1.7 times less likely as white people to hold a college degree and Black households earn approximately 56% of what white households earn
Education/HBCU and Workforce Development
About 14% of all Birmingham area households are without internet access, and Black families are disproportionately impacted, limiting access to remote work, education, telehealth, etc.
Digital Access
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Racial Equity Priorities

Click to explore a priority in detail.

Minority Business Enterprise (MBE) Entrepreneurship and Supplier Diversity

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Access to Capital (CDFIs/MDI)

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HBCU and Workforce Development

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Digital Access

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Community Snapshot

Explore the dashboard to view demographic stats and key racial equity metrics.

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Southern Communities Initiative is a consortium of companies with a single mission: to advance racial parity in six Southern U.S. communities.

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Birmingham, Alabama

Racial Equity Priorities

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Minority Business Enterprise (MBE) Entrepreneurship and Supplier Diversity

Creating and Scaling Black-owned Businesses

Black people make up 30% of the population but Black businesses only represent approximately 4% of businesses and approximately 2% of revenues.

Additionally, small businesses in primarily Black communities tend to have lower profit margins and concentrate in industries with less potential for growth.

Black entrepreneurs often face many barriers, including a lack of access to capital, technical assistance, procurement opportunities and more.

Creating and scaling a greater number of Black-owned businesses is crucial to generating employment opportunities for people of color and increasing wealth in the community and economy.

A Black barber adjusts a smock on a young Black boy sitting in a barber chair.

OUR AMBITION

Fund Startups and Give Access to Investor Network – $70M:

Grow the Prosper Health Tech Fund – powered by Gener8tor – and offer venture capital technical assistance to scale 50+ startups from <$1M to $5M+ in annual revenue; near-term priority is to secure $4M in venture investment by end of May 2022.

Fund Technical Assistance – $25M:

Fund Prosper Birmingham, Magic City Match, and Birmingham Business Alliance to establish/expand business advisory programs, renovate and subsidize retail/office space for MBEs and scale coaches and support services (e.g., digital footprint, B2C platforms, accounting and bookkeeping, recruitment, etc.) to help 100+ MBEs scale from <$1M to $5M+ in annual revenue.

Estimated Impact (Of All Initiatives): 3X Increase in Annual MBE Revenue and 8K+ New Jobs, Boosting Black Community’s Net Worth by ~$2B+.

Birmingham, Alabama

Racial Equity Priorities

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Access to Capital (CDFIs/MDI)

Modernizing and Building Capacity for Local CDFIs & MDIs

In Birmingham, 42% of Black households are unbanked or underbanked. 

Community Development Financial Institutions (CDFI) and Minority Depository Institutions (MDI) are often viewed as the backbone of community lending and offer favorable terms for low-to-moderate income communities.

However, in order to scale their operations and economic impact, corporations and foundations have a key role in addressing common challenges for CDFIs and MDIs:

  • Outdated systems and technology infrastructure 
  • A lack of talent and workforce development tools
  • Other barriers to enhancing their capacity


Ensuring access to capital for individuals and businesses can spur economic growth and set a strong foundation for wealth accumulation.

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OUR AMBITION

Fund Modernization and Capacity-Building and Provide In-Kind Subject Matter Experts – $30M:

Help 4-5 CDFIs/MDIs* over five years modernize their core systems, hire and train staff, expand marketing and standup SWAT teams to conduct needs diagnostic, implement tech solution and provide technical assistance.

  • Systems and technology modernization – $10M-15M: Add/upgrade core banking systems, hardware and productivity tools, train frontline workforce on new systems and technology and hire engineering specialists to support customization and news systems rollout – over five years
  • Talent and workforce – $10M: Hire and train additional frontline lending staff and invest in recruiting, training, compensation & benefits and retention to increase in-house expertise and loan capacity – over five years
  • Other capacity-building and outreach – $8M: Hire additional staff to increase custom borrower and technical assistance (e.g., credit building, MBE financing options, etc.) and increase community outreach to drive regional awareness and new pipeline projects – over five years

* In partnership with National Bankers Association and Appalachian Community Capital; CDFIs/MDIs being considered include: First Bancshares, Sabre Finance, Commonwealth National Bank, TruFund, Bronze Valley, etc.

Estimated Impact (Of All Initiatives): ~$330M in Additional Loans per Year to Support ~30K MBEs.

Charlotte, North Carolina

Racial Equity Priorities

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Minority Business Enterprise (MBE) Entrepreneurship and Supplier Diversity

Creating and Scaling Black-owned Businesses

Southern Communities Initiative focuses on increasing the number and value of MBEs in the region. Southern Communities Initiative specifically aims at raising the economic weight of Black-owned businesses from 2% to 6% of the aggregated value of all businesses in the region.  

Additionally, small businesses in primarily Black communities tend to have lower profit margins and concentrate in industries with less potential for growth.

Black entrepreneurs often face many barriers, including a lack of access to capital, technical assistance, procurement opportunities and more.

Creating and scaling a greater number of Black-owned businesses is crucial to generating employment opportunities for people of color and increasing wealth in the community and economy.

A Black barber adjusts a smock on a young Black boy sitting in a barber chair.

OUR AMBITION

Offer In-Kind FTEs for Supplier Diversity:

Offer 2-5 FTEs to Charlotte Regional Business Alliance (CRBA) over 5 years to convene corporate partners, assess their MBE spend, develop pipeline to increase MBE spend to 5-10%+.

Offer Technical Assistance Expertise:

Partner with CRBA to advise/mentor ~200 MBEs on capital/loan access to help them scale from <$10M to $50M+.

Commit to Supplier Diversity:

Increase MBE spend to 5-10%+.

Estimated Impact (Of All Initiatives): 3X Increase in MBE Value and ~13K New Jobs, Boosting Black Community’s Net Worth by ~$2B+.

Charlotte, North Carolina

Racial Equity Priorities

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Digital Access

Increasing Access, Affordability and Adoption to Broadband

Digital access is vital for any community to thrive in today’s world. Southern Communities Initiative’s ambition is to increase access to high-speed internet and its affordability for underserved communities. Currently 10% of households in the Charlotte area are without Internet access.

An African American man sits beside a young Black boy while sitting at a table and doing schoolwork.

OUR AMBITION

Support Center for Digital Equity – $25M:

Secure $25M over 4 years for Center for Digital Equity’s longitudinal project on digital access to enhance health efficacy and agency in the health experience lifecycle.

Raise Community Awareness and Adoption of Emergency Broadband Benefit:

Increase door-to-door and community outreach in low-income neighborhoods to get households onto EBB to help connect ~35K unconnected households.

Drive Affordable Connectivity Program (ACP) Adoption:

Secure $1-3M (donations or in kind) to drive door to door and community outreach in low income focus zip codes to get ~12K households onto Affordable Connectivity Program (ACP) subsidies in Charlotte.

Provide Digital Access and Technical Assistance for Charlotte Households:

Provide 20K laptops, internet subs and broadband for ~35K households + grant writing support and internet adoption centers.

Support Efforts to Increase Digital Access:

Secure $2.2M for ~4K routers, switches and internet backhaul connections for ~80 bldgs.

Estimated Impact (Of All Initiatives): ~35K Households Get Connected to High-Speed Internet to Unlock ~$700M in Economic Potential for Charlotte.

Charlotte, North Carolina

Racial Equity Priorities

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HBCU and Workforce Development

Increasing Bachelors Degrees and Reducing Student Debt