Serving up aces: Serena Williams’ “play to win” strategy helps 14 startups reach unicorn status

US tennis star Serena Williams has been no stranger to success, but now, she is helping other women and people of colour “play to win” in the business world.

The 23-time grand slam champion retired from the game in September 2022 and is now focusing on what she describes as her “Plan B”: her venture capital fund, Serena Ventures.

The organisation was founded in 2014 when Williams discovered how significantly underfunded women, people of colour and underrepresented founders are as entrepreneurs.

“Somewhere along the line I learned that less than 2% of VC money went to women,” Williams said in a TikTok video last month.

“When I first heard that, I actually thought that was a misquote – I thought, that can’t be real.

“When I first started investing, I learned that that was true, and that was actually something that was happening, and so I knew right then and there that one day I wanted to raise a fund or raise money and invest in women.”

@serena

My mission after tennis is investing in us! Women, people of color and diversity. But it did not start after tennis. It started during. I just do it full time now. Here is how I started. #foryou #fyp #makeup #business #investing #venturecapital #serenawilliams #serenaventures #momsoftiktok

♬ original sound – Serenawilliams

Serena Ventures primarily invests in women, people of colour and underrepresented groups who have founded a startup. Of the 85 companies Serena Ventures has invested in, 79% are underrepresented founders, 54% are women, 47% are Black and 11% are Latinx.

In her TikTok video, Williams revealed 14 companies that Serena Ventures has invested in have reached unicorn status, meaning the company is now worth over US$1 billion.

“A lot of times when you do invest in these companies… (they) tend to do just as well, if not better, because it’s a woman or it’s led by a person of colour,” Williams said.

“When people are talking about diversity, that really means everyone having a seat at the table, everyone having an opportunity to win. And that’s what I like to focus on.”

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Williams said that as a Black woman, investing in women-led and POC-led businesses means a lot to her.

“Growing up in Compton, we were all entrepreneurs. You had to be to survive. We weren’t always afforded the same opportunities that other people were afforded,” Williams said.

“I feel like women and people of colour actually have an advantage because we often have to work harder to get to where we need to go. We also have to fight harder, because we’re not given those same advantages that other people are given.”

The underfunding of women founders and other underrepresented groups in the United States is a similar story to Australia. In 2023, according to figures from the State of Australian Start-up Funding Report, startups founded by women secured just 4% of the $3.5 billion in startup funding in Australia, with all-male teams taking the vast majority of the 413 investment deals done.

Recent data from Australia’s first student-led VC fund, NextGen Ventures, revealed just 3.9% of VC funding for student startups in Australia went to women-only founders in the last decade. Mixed-gender startups received 1.8% of funding. The rest – 94.3% – went to all-male founders.

This article was first published by Women’s Agenda.