Athena Technology Acquisition, a female-led special purpose acquisition company (SPAC) with Stacey Abrams on the board, made its public debut on Friday, raising $250 million in capital.
The SPAC, however, has no set plans to acquire a female-led company.
"Although we're not looking just for an all women-led company, we also hope that it creates the opportunity for those that would have never considered a SPAC as an alternative," Phyllis Newhouse, CEO of Athena Technology Acquisition, told Cheddar.
Rather, the company hopes to lead by example.
"Women founders seeing an all-women-led SPAC would have a sense of comfort in knowing that this is an opportunity or an alternative for them as well," Newhouse said.
As for the criteria it will be using to make its acquisition, Newhouse said the SPAC is looking into fintech, direct-to-consumer, and cybersecurity companies in particular.
Newhouse had previously founded the cybersecurity firm Xtreme Solutions after retiring from a 22-year career in the military.
The SPAC has 20 women in leadership and advising roles, including Abrams.
"When I reached out to Stacey about the SPAC, she was obviously very interested and understanding of how the economics work and why so many women were not involved, especially women of color, and we had a very good conversation around how we can create change," Newhouse said. "So she immediately said 'you know what, I want to be an investor.'"
Serving as chairman of the SPAC is Isabelle Freidheim, the co-founder of Starwood VC and Magnifi, a personal finance search engine.
Newhouse said the all-women group is working together to tap their networks to find the right fit for an acquisition.
"If you want to get something done, call up a couple of your girlfriends and say 'okay, who do you know, who do you know?' and trust me within 15 minutes, you'll have more people on the list," she said.
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A Michigan judge is putting sponges in the hands of shoplifters and ordering them to wash cars in a Walmart parking lot when spring weather arrives. Genesee County Judge Jeffrey Clothier hopes the unusual form of community service discourages people from stealing from Walmart. The judge also wants to reward shoppers with free car washes. Clothier says he began ordering “Walmart wash” sentences this week for shoplifting at the store in Grand Blanc Township. He believes 75 to 100 people eventually will be ordered to wash cars this spring. Clothier says he will be washing cars alongside them when the time comes.
The State Department had been in talks with Elon Musk’s Tesla company to buy armored electric vehicles, but the plans have been put on hold by the Trump administration after reports emerged about a potential $400 million purchase. A State Department spokesperson said the electric car company owned by Musk was the only one that expressed interest back in May 2024. The deal with Tesla was only in its planning phases but it was forecast to be the largest contract of the year. It shows how some of his wealth has come and was still expected to come from taxpayers.
At 100 years old, the Goodyear Blimp is an ageless star in the sky. The 246-foot-long airship will be in the background of the Daytona 500 — flying roughly 1,500 feet above Daytona International Speedway, actually — to celebrate its greatest anniversary tour. Even though remote camera technologies are improving regularly and changing the landscape of aerial footage, the blimp continues to carve out a niche. At Daytona, with the usual 40-car field racing around a 2½-mile superspeedway, views from the blimp aptly provide the scope of the event.
You'll just have to wait for interest rates (and prices) to go down. Plus, this deal's a steel, the big carmaker wedding is off, and bribery is back, baby!
