The main problem with this article that meritocracies are a mythological construct and not something that empirically exist. This probably shouldn't be much of a surprise, considering that merit is literally a religious concept.
Try replacing every instance of the word merit with the word Jesus, and you'll see there is essentially no loss of meaning.
Figuring out how to reduce bias in startup funding is important, but really it's only a small part of the larger problem of identifying talent in general.
"I attempt to hire based on merit in order to increase the probability that my startup will succeed and make me rich."
"I attempt to hire based on Jesus in order to increase the probability that my startup will succeed and make me rich." <- Huh?
"The guy I hired based on merit has certainly brought my startup closer to success - he's built several useful apps, caught plenty of bugs, and has kept our India operation running smoothly in my absence."
"The guy I hired based on Jesus has certainly brought my startup closer to success - he's built several useful apps, caught plenty of bugs, and has kept our India operation running smoothly in my absence." <- Doesn't make so much sense. What does Jesus have to do with building useful apps, fixing bugs and keeping our worker's pipelines full?
Try replacing every instance of the word merit with the word Jesus, and you'll see there is essentially no loss of meaning.
Figuring out how to reduce bias in startup funding is important, but really it's only a small part of the larger problem of identifying talent in general.