Studies show that race, gender and orientation have an impact on the ability of a start-up to get funded and how much funding it will receive. Increasingly, affinity investors provide investment, networks and business guidance to founders based on a personal affinity (e.g., minority community, alma mater, gender, LGBT, etc.). Given the growing reliance on early stage investors for support from money to mentorship, we’ll look at how affinity investors play an ever larger role in supporting founders who would otherwise be outside the mainstream, including the case for affinity investing and how it provides a successful model for the future of angel investing.