Good morning, Broadsheet readers! Kim Kardashian’s private equity firm is slow to raise funds, the Supreme Court considers emergency abortions, and Alexis Ohanian backs another women’s sport. Have a wonderful Wednesday!
– Race is on. Investor and Angel City owner Alexis Ohanian’s latest bet is on another sport: women’s track. The Reddit cofounder, who invests in early-stage startups through his firm Seven Seven Six, is backing female runners with a commitment to build a new kind of U.S.-based competition.
The 776 Invitational will be a new (for now, one-time) competition with a record purse: $60,000 for first place finishers, $25,000 for second place, and $10,000 for third place in each event. (The current largest first-place prize in the U.S. is $30,000.) Seven Seven Six says the size of the total investment will reach at least $500,000, with the exact total to be confirmed as all events are announced.
Ohanian’s investment is inspired, in some ways, by his investment in the Los Angeles-based women’s soccer team Angel City. Like women’s soccer, women’s track is a sport where the players aren’t competing for resources and attention against better-known American male athletes. While the WNBA often gets compared to the NBA on everything from ticket sales to salaries, track and U.S. soccer are two sports that can grow without the pressure of that comparison.
At the Business of Women’s Sports Summit in New York yesterday, Ohanian told me he realized in 2019, before founding Angel City, that he couldn’t “think of American soccer greatness without thinking of women.” “That was why women’s soccer was so attractive,” he added. “And it’s similarly why doing a track event in America makes so much sense. Because we know that audience is hungry.”
Ohanian started paying close attention to women’s track around a year ago. “The emotional roller coaster happens in seconds,” he said of the sport’s appeal.
In partnership with Olympian Gabby Thomas, Ohanian envisioned a track event that would attract people outside of the Olympics every four years—and not only for the competition on the track. The 776 Invitational will have music and DJs and a focus on the attendee experience. He compares it to the Kentucky Derby: “I realized people go all over the world to see little dudes on horses that don’t even care outside of that one day because of the vibes. Because they want to drink mint juleps and vibe…So what if we created an event that if they weren’t into running, they would want to go to just because it’s fun?”
Ohanian has been a major booster of women’s sports over the past few years, from his investment in Angel City to his public support of his wife, tennis legend Serena Williams. This week, his firm also announced an investment in Portland-based women’s sports bar the Sports Bra, which will pursue a nationwide expansion.
“I felt the same way with starting Angel City,” Ohanian said of his track investment. “I can market greatness all day long to America.”
Emma Hinchliffe
emma.hinchliffe@fortune.com
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ALSO IN THE HEADLINES
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- Noncompete no more. In a busy week for Khan, the FTC also voted to ban almost all non competes for U.S. workers. The agency says the ban will increase wages and help employees leave abusive workplaces. The U.S. Chamber of Commerce shared plans to sue the FTC to block the rule, saying the decision will set a “dangerous precedent” for government micromanagement. NPR
- Crisis on the quad. Problems continue to mount for Columbia University president Minouche Shafik after the school made all classes hybrid for the rest of the academic year on Tuesday. The decision came as pro-Palestinian protesters demand Shafik resign for asking the police to quell demonstrations last week. Others who criticize the protests as antisemitic are calling for Shafik to protect the safety of Jewish students and bring the police back. Fortune
- Abortion cases, cont’d. The Supreme Court will hear arguments on Wednesday to determine whether the Biden Administration can penalize federally-funded hospitals for refusing to provide emergency abortions to patients in states with abortion bans. The administration claims the procedures are covered by the Emergency Medical Treatment and Labor Act that requires hospitals to provide care in emergencies. Lawyers on the other side say the law does not mention abortion and that the administration is prescribing care that should be determined by hospitals. Washington Post
- ARK exodus. Investors have pulled $2.2 billion from the six ETFs actively managed by Cathie Wood's ARK Investment Management firm since the year started. That’s a 30% cut that leaves the firm's assets under management at $11.1 billion, far from its 2021 peak of $59 billion that reflected Wood’s winning bets on tech companies like Tesla and Zoom. Wall Street Journal
- SKKY's the limit? SKKY Partners, the private equity firm cofounded by Kim Kardashian, is moving slowly to raise the $1 billion to $2 billion it marketed pre-launch. The private equity market is sluggish, especially for consumer-focused firms like SKKY, but investors also could be wary of Kardashian's stacked schedule that leaves little time to tend to the business. Axios
ON MY RADAR
Padma Lakshmi walks into a bar The New Yorker
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PARTING WORDS
“The stigma and misconception is that people who wear wigs don’t have long and healthy hair.”
— Beyoncé in a video that showed her getting her hair washed, which put to rest questions about her natural hair length and beat back stereotypes about Black women’s hair
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