Wray Forward Celebrates Black-Owned Business Innovations

Wray & Nephew held their Wray Forward Pitch Night this week featuring a number of Black-owned businesses from AI music sampling to the world’s first Nigerian tapas restaurant in London.

Wray Forward 

The Wray Forward Pitch Night saw six Black founders take to the stage to showcase their businesses and pitch to a panel of expert judges to secure grants to help their businesses grow.

Part of the brand’s ongoing Wray Forward activity is in partnership with Foundervine – a program supporting Black businesses through funding, educational workshops, mentorship and networking events.

The event saw three early stage businesses, TwoShot, Eco Swap and ColorBlend Makeup London and three growth stage businesses, Runnel, Chuku’s and Malka London, have five minutes to pitch their ideas.

The prizes up for grabs included £3000 for the Growth Stage Business winner, £1.5K for the Early Stage Business winner, or £500 for the People’s Choice Winner.

From AI To Social Media Presence

TwoShot founder Tobi Akinyemi told POCIT that with the number of barriers to entry for music creation, such as cost, skill and access to equipment, his business aims to address these issues.

TwoShot, which officially launched in January 2023, uses AI to allow users to create and remix their own music.

Although AI has come under scrutiny at times in the music industry, Akinyemi confirmed that anyone providing their music catalogue to train the models get recognition.

“Everyone gets a fair share remuneration as well as attribution. We are also focused on enhancing the creative process without stripping control from the user or the musician,” he told POCIT.

“We provide the ultimate control over the creative process.”

Winners of the Growth Stage Business category, Chuku’s is the world’s first Nigerian tapas restaurant in London with aims to open their second restaurant in the city next year.

Malka London founder Sashaa Ismael, who created her business during lockdown and launched “The Crown” spoke of the power of social media in growing her audience and brand.

“It’s how everything started. I was doing a lot of blogs, talking to my phone and sharing what I was doing. I was purely myself and connected with so many people,” Ismael told POCIT.

“I just love social media. I have one video that has now over 600,000 views on Instagram. It’s just crazy.”

As described on their website, Malka London is making Crowns accessible by providing easy-to-tie headwraps handmade in London that are gentle on hair and scalp for women who wish to cover their head elegantly.

As the night continued in London’s Campari House, the judges went to deliberate, deciding who would take away the three prizes.

Anthony Gutsa, founder of Eco Swap took the win for the Early Stage Business category, Nigerian brother and sister duo Emeka and Ifeyinwa Frederick, took the Growth Stage Business category and Kesha Williams, founder of ColorBlend Makeup won the People’s Choice category.

Feature Image Credit: Chino Vantage Photography