Wells Fargo Innovation Incubator announces partner awards to support diversity in cleantech ecosystem

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SAN FRANCISCO, Feb. 24 (Xinhua) -- The Wells Fargo Innovation Incubator, a 50-million-U.S.-dollar collaboration between the Wells Fargo Foundation and the U.S. Department of Energy's National Renewable Energy Laboratory, on Wednesday announced new winners of its Channel Partner Awards.

For the current awards round, it called for proposals that would provide entrepreneurial opportunities for historically underrepresented individuals in the cleantech industry.

Cleantech consistently ranks as one of the fastest-growing employment categories in the United States, but its workforce has historically lacked diversity. According to a 2019 report from the Solar Foundation, the nation's solar workforce at the time was 73 percent white, 17 percent Hispanic or Latino, 9 percent Asian and 8 percent Black.

Minority entrepreneurship in cleantech is even lower, as only 10 percent of minority-owned businesses are in the Professional, Scientific and Technology sectors, according to Wells Fargo.

A recent Wells Fargo Innovation Incubator whitepaper assessing the current cleantech landscape found that 78 percent of the surveyed cleantech startups maintain a predominantly white workforce, and 93 percent have a majority of male employees, further emphasizing the need for initiatives focused on diversifying the industry.

Following a call for submissions, nearly 50 percent of the company's Innovation Incubator Channel Partners applied for the Diversity, Equity and Inclusion-focused awards. Winners were selected on a competitive basis by evaluating their potential to support the trajectory of Black, African American, Latino, Asian American, American Indian, Alaska Native and women entrepreneurs in clean technology sectors.

"Diverse entrepreneur and business-owner participation in the cleantech ecosystem is essential to achieving our vision of an inclusive and sustainable economic recovery," said Jenny Flores, head of Small Business Growth Philanthropy at Wells Fargo.

The nationwide network of Wells Fargo Innovation Incubator Channel Partners includes 63 cleantech and agtech business incubators, accelerators, universities and industry experts. Since the inception of the awards program in 2016, 5 million dollars in competitive and non-competitive Channel Partner Awards have supported 48 Strategic Awards, 160 ecosystem awards and engaged all Channel Partners, the company said. Enditem

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