My thanks go out to Andrea Guendelman and Fran Maier for taking the time to share their thoughts on an important subject: women entrepreneurs and startups. Here is the first of two articles I wrote as a result:
- See more at: http://www.feedthebeast.biz/blog/index.php/where-are-all-the-women-entrepreneurs/#sthash.OHFouvuu.dpuf
Building a business is never easy, but do women entrepreneurs have an extra hurdle to overcome?
"Only 8 per cent of venture backed companies are women-owned. Only 11 per cent of venture capital partners are female. Only 15 per cent of angel investors are female."By now, nearly everyone with a pulse knows the names Richard Branson, Steve Jobs, Mark Zuckerberg, Larry Page, Sergey Brin and Bill Gates. They’re not just entrepreneurs, they’re rock stars. They started their startups from the ground up, and out of their sandcastle dreams they managed to build an empire or two. But what about their female counterparts? Where are all the female rock stars?
Actually, they’re everywhere.
From Silicon Valley to Sydney; from Bahrain to Brazil; from Manchester
to Mumbai and everywhere in between, women entrepreneurs have been starting and
building multi-million dollar companies and doing so at a faster rate than men
over the past decade. Currently, there are more than 8.6 million women-owned
businesses in the United States alone, generating over $1.3 trillion in
revenue. So why does the public know so little about them? And why, in spite of
this rapid growth, are there still so many more male-run than female-run startups?
Only 8 per cent of venture backed companies are women-owned. Only 11 per cent of venture capital partners are female. Only 15 per cent of angel investors are female. And only 9 per cent of board members are female, which is even lower than the already low percentage of women on public boards (16 per cent).