In 2017, the Eastern Bank Charitable Foundation launched the Foundation for Business Equity (FBE) and its inaugural program, the Business Equity Initiative (BEI). The program is earmarked, in part, to address troubling statistics about wealth and income inequality in Boston, as evidenced in a 2016 Brookings Institution report and research from the Federal Reserve.

BEI is addressing this issue by offering end-to-end business growth acceleration for Black and Latinx businesses ready to scale but frustrated by structural barriers to reach their full growth potential. It is recruiting such enterprises positioned to grow in Eastern Massachusetts, Southern New Hampshire, and Rhode Island to participate in the initiative. Each business is provided with experienced strategic advisors, tools, and a holistic, customized approach that focuses on capacity building, supplier partnerships, access to growth capital, and community transformative development. The envisioned impact of BEI includes stronger balance sheets, expanded and deeper supplier relationships between these enterprises and anchor institutions, job creation for residents of color, and the potential for greater civic engagement by the owners of color and their workforce.