Alfredo Mathew III, visionary leader and co-founder of ESO Ventures, is on a mission to redefine entrepreneurial ecosystem building. As the founder of SPCC.1, the world's first Special Purpose Community Corporation, and the driving force behind the newly launched ESO Foundation, he is committed to supporting innovative economic models that benefit communities. Though a native New Yorker, Alfredo has called the Bay Area home for many years, recognizing its distinctive approach to community economics. With a deep belief in the power of collaboration, he’s passionate about bringing people together to unlock the transformative potential of entrepreneurial ecosystems, beyond just the well-known Silicon Valley narrative. 

We’re excited that Alfredo and his team at ESO Foundation are the hosts of our Fall 2024 Summit in the Bay Area! Alfredo is no stranger to SCN, having spoken at the Fort Worth Summit in 2022 and then again sharing the stage with the entire ESO Ventures leadership team at our first Policy Summit in DC in June 2023. 

Supporting Small Businesses in Oakland

Oakland is special for Alfredo because that is where ESO Ventures started and grew. It was the early days of the pandemic - in 2020 when everyone was ordered to shelter in place and no one knew what to expect. 

"When everyone went home, everyone started to create businesses," Alfredo explains. The pandemic forced many to rethink their purpose, sparking a wave of home-based businesses and entrepreneurial endeavors. It was in this atmosphere that ESO Ventures came to life, starting with a simple $5,000 contract to help activate the McArthur Corridor in East Oakland—a project funded by Merritt College and the City of Oakland.

Alfredo partnered with Ben Wanzo and Martha Hernandez, two successful entrepreneurs from East Oakland who bootstrapped their business and are powerhouses in the Oakland community.

“We just started meeting weekly and never stopped. We put a virtual incubator together and recruited about 35 Black and Brown entrepreneurs from East Oakland. We had nothing, no curriculum, nothing. We just started meeting,” Alfredo said.

Before they knew it, they had a regular Tuesday morning and Thursday night group. Alfredo’s focus was on business development, getting more resources and funding for ESO Ventures to take off. After securing some funding they wrote legislation - the California Entrepreneurship Capital in the Community Act, which was endorsed by the City of Oakland and supported by State Senator Nancy Skinner. 

That first contract with Merritt College grew into a regional joint venture, expanding ESO’s incubator program to six local community colleges. As part of the post-pandemic racial reckoning, philanthropic organizations like the Irvine Foundation took notice of the importance of entrepreneurship to close the racial wealth gap and made an early investment to strategically plan for the growth of the ESO Capital in the Community Fund.

“In the last four years, we've incubated over 400 Black and Brown business owners. We ended up getting $18 million from the state with two different legislative bill passes, budget allocations, and we've deployed over $4.8 million to 94 business owners. There's so much to be done because small business entrepreneurial ecosystems are struggling. But there is a creative spirit in Oakland, and there's a spirit of resilience,” explains Alfredo.

Supporting the Ecosystem as a Foundation 

Many businesses doing community work struggle with the question: Is this a nonprofit or for-profit? That’s a question Alfredo asked himself of ESO Ventures.

“If you are a business, you cannot sacrifice your economic vitality to do social change work. I think that's where a lot of entrepreneurial ecosystem builders and small businesses struggle. You need a business model that can really generate revenue. Social benefit needs to be on top of that. But a lot of times people focus more on the social benefit than the economic vitality,” says Alfredo. “That’s why change doesn't happen and why ecosystem builders get burnt out.”

This is how the ESO Foundation was born.  

“I definitely want to support the great work of ESO Ventures and the team, but we need to be supporting the field as a whole. When I look at the field as a whole, I don’t see an economic model. Most cities don't even adequately support their small business ecosystems. The banks certainly don’t. Who is going to provide the resources to help ESOs cover their costs and do their work?” 

Through the ESO Foundation, Alfredo is looking to support ecosystem building work across the siloes by investing in 4P partnerships: public, private, philanthropic, and people. This means working at the intersection between local economic development, CDFIs, larger banks and lenders, capital providers, K-16 education, and ESOs. 

“This is systemic work, but it doesn't neatly fit into any one group. I'm looking to raise money and allocate resources to figure out how we strengthen this ecosystem work,” he says.

Building Community Power

Do you see a theme in Alfredo’s work yet? That’s the theme he’s woven into the Summit: building community power. But what does that mean to Alfredo?

“We really focus on building community power because over the last four years, and really, my whole life. If we don't figure out how to work together, we are not going to be successful. I've been doing entrepreneurial ecosystem building for 10 years, but before that, for 20 years, I worked with young people, I worked with communities, and I did youth development education.

What I've seen in my 30 years of work is if you're fragmented, you're weak. We need to figure out how to get fragmented and siloed groups of people to work together as a larger entity. 

This is the crux of this Summit. How do we get people doing great work connected and pooling resources? How do we advocate for more resources from the federal government, from our state governments, from our local governments? How do we actually work as a group with JP Morgan Chase and get some actual funding that can be systemic and long-term to actually grow small businesses? I think we have to create a space where we can all win together,” says Alfredo.

What to expect at the Bay Area Summit

When Alfredo first moved to the Bay Area in his mid-thirties, he quickly realized that Silicon Valley was only one piece of a much larger and more complex regional puzzle. "Before Silicon Valley, there was this counterculture movement. You wouldn't have Silicon Valley without this mix of counterculture and the military-industrial complex." The Bay Area, with its history of post-World War II migration and economic booms, has always been a unique breeding ground for innovation. From workers' movements and the Black Panthers to cutting-edge technology, Alfredo believes the region represents the convergence of two powerful forces: industrial development and community-driven change.

Attendees of the upcoming Bay Area Summit are in for a firsthand experience of this dynamic convergence. "What you can expect coming to this Summit," Alfredo explains, "is the confluence of these two worlds—the tech innovation world with this community economics, community power world." The Summit won’t involve tours of Silicon Valley’s corporate campuses; instead, it will take participants through three downtown communities—Richmond, San Francisco, and Oakland—all connected by public transit. "The Bay Area is micro-climates and micro-ecosystems. We're going to visit three counties because we can't do the whole thing," he explains. These three areas represent diverse entrepreneurial ecosystems that are crucial to understanding the Bay Area’s unique economic landscape.

During the Summit, attendees will visit key locations that embody the Bay Area’s entrepreneurial spirit. In Richmond, they'll explore CoBiz Richmond, a hub for Black entrepreneurship and local business growth. In San Francisco, the NASDAQ Entrepreneurial Center will offer a glimpse into the heart of the tech world. And in Oakland, participants will see the new tech energy at Block and the community-driven innovation at Oakstop. "You're gonna get a real nice slice of what's happening in Richmond, San Francisco, and Oakland," Alfredo shares. With a diverse range of ecosystem builders, including CDFIs, banks, and community organizations, the Summit promises to be a dynamic gathering that showcases the unique power of the Bay Area's entrepreneurial landscape.

Do you have your tickets to join us? Peruse the agenda and grab them here.