Squire, Edlyft, Promise: The Journey, Challenges, & Impact

Song Laron says he and his co-founder saw that barbershops still relied on long waits and cash, despite software transforming other parts of daily life. Erica Hairston and Arnell Ansong started Edlyft to support students who are interested in computer science but lack the mentorship and academic help to continue.

Laron describes Squire as business management and point-of-sale software for barbershops. Hairston and Ansong explain that their own mentors helped them pursue computer science and become engineers at Facebook and Google. Phaedra Ellis-Lamkins describes Promise as a way for people to pay off government debt and says founders should reflect on what matters to them and what will build their confidence.

Hairston says a conversation with Ellis-Lamkins, a Black woman building a mission-driven company in the venture-backed startup world, helped quiet her doubts about starting a company. Ellis-Lamkins describes her own role as widening access to opportunity and drawing attention to people whose work might otherwise go unseen.

Edlyft’s co-founders considered how to reduce risk before leaving their jobs and looked at what successful startups had in common. They chose Y Combinator for its structure and deadlines, then found their first five to ten students by talking to people leaving large computer science classes. Squire’s founders carried a heavy barber chair to co-working spaces and brought barbers to customers when shops would not yet use the product.

Hairston says the YC community gave Edlyft people to contact when problems came up. The speakers argue that broader participation in technology can lead to more solutions for unmet problems, and that giving Black founders more opportunities and funding could help bridge the racial wealth gap. Ellis-Lamkins says her team wants to change an institution that will outlast the founders.