BCNA Honors Immigrant Entrepreneurs
BCNA Honors Immigrant Entrepreneurs
We were very excited to commemorate New York’s Immigrant Heritage Week this year with BCNA’s first Outstanding Immigrant Entrepreneur Awards.
On Friday, April 20th, over 100 friends and clients gathered at BCNA’s headquarters at 120 Broadway to recognize three inspiring immigrant entrepreneurs, as well as to hear an expert panel discuss how technology can help entrepreneurs boost their business’ bottom line.
We were honored to be joined by Harriet Joynes, BCNA’s Board Chair, and Commissioner Fatima Shama, from the Mayor’s Office of Immigrant Affairs, who presented the following awards:
The Boot Strap Entrepreneur Award, to Guadalupe Galicia, owner of Guadalupe’s Tamales, who is proof that you can start a thriving business without a large amount of start-up capital. Learn more about Guadalupe in this interview in the Daily News.
The New Yorker Job Creator Award which was awarded to Hui Ping Liu, owner of LH Human Resources Inc., a home health care agency, who started her business with a BCNA loan and who has to date created over one hundred jobs. World Journal provides more details in this article.
New Beginning Award which was awarded to Dr. Leonid Isakov, a refugee from the Former Soviet Union, who used his BCNA Individual Development Account (IDA) Program savings and matching grant to be re-certified as a pediatrician, then a BCNA loan of $35,000 to establish his clinic, Ocean Medical PC.
Also joining us for an inspiring talk was Belay Embaye, Microentreprise, Program Manager at the Office of Refugee Resettlement, whose generous financial and technical assistance support through the ORR funded Microenterprise Development and Individual Development programs has been invaluable to BCNA and its clients.
To open the event, Foulis Peacock of Immpreneur and Chuck Roberts of Durobi LLC lead a thought-provoking panel discussion on how small businesses and startups can use technology to market themselves, featuring panel members Karen Seiger of Sirene Media Works; Sean Basinski of the Street Vendor Project; Adam Sobel of The Cinnamon Snail; and Deepti Sharma Kapur of foodtoeat.com.
Our three awardees are inspiring examples of the enterprising spirit shown by the thousands of immigrants who come to New York City each year, armed with tenacity and the desire to achieve the American Dream. We owe much to them and were pleased to honor them this past week.