Morgan DeBaun was born in 1990 in St. Louis, MO. While living in a predominantly White suburb, her family inculcated in her an appreciation for positive African American figures in American history. She learned about investing from her father at age 14.
She came up with the idea of Blavity while in college at Washington University. Black students often sat together at lunch where they supported each other. She called it Black Gravity, or Blavity.
DeBaun worked for Intuit initially but spent her nights and weekends working on Blavity. She committed to Blavity full-time because of the inadequate media coverage of Michael Brown’s death.
In 2014, DeBaun cofounded Blavity with Aaron Samuels and Jeff Nelson as a curated video newsletter/website that covered subjects, such as the Black Lives Matter movement and protests of the national anthem. According to Wikipedia, Blavity.com reaches 100 million people per month and affiliates with over 100 corporate partners per year, including Nike, Amazon, eBay, General Motors, and Lexus.
Blavity’s portfolio of brands includes Afro Tech, Travel Noire, Shadow & Act, 21 Ninety, and Blavity News. Afro Tech is the largest tech conference that includes 20,000+ Black tech innovators.
DeBaun founded Blavity.Org with the mission of driving Black economic advancement forward through entrepreneurial fellowship programs.
DeBaun has some success in venture capital; she raised $12 million for Blavity Inc..
DeBaun advises Disney, American Airlines, and Pandora Bridal. She is also the creator of Worksmart, a business podcast and small business advising program. She has a net worth of $1 billion.
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