Jasper Kuria launches Black Owned Business as Northwest employers form coalition to back Black-owned firms amid COVID losses

Jasper Kuria launched Black Owned Business, a Seattle-area platform connecting nearly 80 Black-owned professional-service vendors with companies, and is partnering with SurveyMonkey to get firms like Intuit, Zoom and Slack to consider Black-owned vendors. Nearly 60 Northwest employers — including Microsoft, Boeing, Expedia, Nintendo, Zillow, Vulcan, PATH and the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation — formed Washington Employers for Racial Equity and released data showing Black-owned businesses have been disproportionately harmed by COVID-19.