Apple program boosts Atlanta minority businesses

ATLANTA, Ga. (Atlanta News First) - Aid from an international tech company has helped small minority-owned businesses foster a positive impact in Atlanta neighborhoods.

Aquagenuity CEO Doll Avant said Apple’s Impact Accelerator program pushed her company lightyears ahead of where it would be without the extra resources.

“That opens doors for a company like me,” said Avant.

The Impact Accelerator helps Black, Hispanic or Latinx, and Indigenous-owned businesses by providing “next-generation innovations in clean energy and green technologies.”

Aquagenuity, a minority-owned business, is at the forefront of the fight for clean drinking water.

“We make it simple for you to answer the question, what is in your water?” said Avant.

Avant said her concept is like a Google search for water quality. It determines the safety of a person’s tap water with an “aquascore,” an algorithm Avant developed using data from the Environmental Protection Agency, public utilities, and the CDC.

“What do you do when you have to wake up and cook and bathe your kids, and you don’t know if your water is safe?” she explained. “This is happening to people not only in developing countries, but all over the United States right now.”

Aquagenuity, only in its fifth year, attributes part of its success to Apple’s Impact Accelerator. The program is part of Apple’s racial equity and justice initiative focused on addressing systemic barriers to opportunity.

Aquagenuity is especially vital as toxic tap water seeps into communities.

“From Flint, Michigan to Jackson, Mississippi, to the train derailment in Ohio,” Avant explained. “These things are leeching into the ground getting into the ground water, and its coming out of our taps and people get really scared.”

Avant called Apple’s Impact Accelerator “21st-century activism.” The program has brought her resources and mentorship, helping her pour positivity back into her community.

“Now the types of investments you can make in that community, that tax base in your community, that changes how policing happens, how education happens, how access to food happens,” she said. “That’s the way to change the community.”

Applications for Apple’s Impact Accelerator close May 1, 2023. You can learn more about the opportunity here.

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