Clear gender disparities in Britain’s high-growth entrepreneurship ecosystem are holding back progress and preventing women from realizing their full potential in driving innovation and economic growth, a new report reveals. .
This report comes from a task force led by: Ann Bordenfounder of sterling bankadvocates a major reassessment of investment strategies, as only 6 percent of high-growth companies are wholly or majority led by women.
of Women-Led High Growth Enterprises Task Force; Since its founding in May 2022, it has been chaired by Borden and has worked with entrepreneurs, campaign organizations and the investment community to collect data and identify key barriers for women in starting and scaling high-growth companies. I did.
funding
Central to the report’s findings is the identification of persistent barriers that prevent women entrepreneurs from accessing essential capital. Despite recent progress, the report highlights that only a small proportion of equity investment in the UK goes to companies founded entirely by women.
Women receive less than 2% of venture capital funding annually, highlighting the alarming gender disparity in the investment landscape.
To increase the amount of money invested in women-founded businesses, the task force recommends:
- Investment firms should publish the percentage of senior investment professionals they hire in conjunction with their goals, as female investment professionals are more likely to support businesses founded and led by women.
- The investment company Investing in feminine norms, signatories are more likely to be women-led businesses (35% vs. 27%). However, the number of signatories has increased by 40% since 2022 to 204.
Diversity
Women-led companies often encounter obstacles related to workforce diversity, leadership representation, access to networks, and more. The task force found that even after securing investment, women entrepreneurs face challenges in building diverse teams and accessing the networks essential to growing and expanding their businesses.
Only 18 percent of high-growth companies have at least one woman on their founding team, but 82 percent of high-growth companies have all-male founding teams.
Improving diversity in senior investment roles is a key driver for strengthening the funding pipeline for women-led high-growth companies.
- Task force members agreed that gender-balanced investors provide a broader range of perspectives and experiences, enriching the decision-making process and reducing groupthink.
Regional differences
Almost 45 per cent of the UK’s high growth businesses are located in London, and given that only 13 per cent of the UK population lives in London, this represents an imbalance of high growth businesses. The report highlights the importance of building tailored support networks and resources for women entrepreneurs, especially those living outside traditional technology hubs like London.
To increase the number of women-led high-growth businesses outside of London, the taskforce recommends:
- Establishment of a community-based female founder growth committee that brings together local stakeholders from the public and private sectors.
economic revitalization
“As this report shows, the number of high-growth companies with at least one female founder is incredibly low, and the situation is even worse for all-female teams,” he says. maria caulfield, Minister of Women. “This represents a shocking waste of talent and innovation, and understanding the issues and barriers behind it was something I particularly wanted to understand.”
“We know that women have the skills and ambition to run successful businesses and we want to give them every opportunity to do so. We want to harness this untapped potential to boost the UK economy. I welcome the results of the taskforce’s work, which will help achieve the Government’s target of halving the number of women entrepreneurs (to around 600,000).
Entrepreneur – by 2030. ”
Borden’s vision
In his report’s conclusion, Mr Bowden said: Our recommendations are ambitious, but we make no apologies for them. The dial doesn’t move when you make small incremental changes. We’ve been talking about this being a challenge for a very long time. Now we need to take a big step forward.
“Building on the work of the Task Force is in the interest of everyone, regardless of gender. The timing is right, the opportunity is there and women entrepreneurs can achieve truly exceptional highs.” So is the will to help growing businesses successfully grow. Like everyone involved in this report, I too am excited to see what women entrepreneurs can achieve when these barriers are removed. I’m excited about that.”