Companies with male founders or co-founders obtain practically seven occasions extra funding on common than feminine owned companies, Startups.co.uk can solely reveal.
We collected knowledge from over 200 small companies as a part of our 2021 Startups 100 index, an annual rating of the 100 most disruptive UK small corporations.
Our outcomes present that, on common, a female-founded enterprise receives £644,000 in complete funding, in comparison with a staggering £4.34 million for a solely male-owned organisation.
The significance of a right-hand man
Virtually precisely one month after Worldwide Ladies’s Day, our findings paint a miserable image of sexism inside the UK’s enterprise capital neighborhood.
However the disparity is much more surprising when in comparison with companies with each male and feminine founders.
The Startups knowledge discovered that the typical quantity of funding acquired is £4.2m – nearly the identical common quantity raised by a solely male-founded firm.
This means that, whereas progress has been made in direction of gender variety in enterprise, a male founder continues to be required for feminine entrepreneurs to safe important early-stage funding.
| Common preliminary funding | |
|---|---|
| Feminine-owned startups | £643,863 |
| Male-owned startups | £4,340,252 |
| Male/female-owned startups | £4,270,708 |
Unbiased ladies
In addition to trying on the quantity of funding acquired primarily based on gender, Startups additionally investigated the proportion of companies that had been began with out any exterior funding.
We found that over half of feminine based companies are bootstrapped – or self-funded – in comparison with simply 26% of male organisations.
That is seemingly a consequence of the gender funding hole, with ladies extra prone to encounter obstacles to acquiring capital.
Bootstrapping is a standard entry route for brand new companies. Nonetheless, there are numerous disadvantages to self-financing.
Not receiving upfront cash from enterprise capitalists could provide you with extra enterprise management, however it could possibly shortly trigger money movement points in case your gross sales numbers don’t meet expectations.
Many startup house owners who’re bootstrapping additionally forgo a wage to start with months.
Feminine entrepreneurs having to bankroll their enterprise themselves not solely brings private monetary threat, but additionally will increase the prospect of startup failure.
Andrea Berchowitz, co-founder of Vira Well being, a digital well being platform to assist ladies throughout menopause, instructed Startups:
“I believe structurally the dearth of variety within the investor neighborhood is a much bigger drawback. Take an investor, they see 50 corporations, search for their conventional sample after which put money into the identical issues with the identical sort of individuals.
“They should maintain themselves accountable to put money into x many black founders, x many feminine founders. Until they set these objectives, equal funding is rarely going to occur.”
If you’re a feminine entrepreneur seeking to begin a brand new enterprise enterprise, it could be straightforward to really feel delay by our analysis. However don’t fret – the crew at Startups is right here to assist.
We’re the UK’s primary unbiased small enterprise on-line useful resource. You may learn any of our 1000’s of guides for info on every thing from the finest enterprise grants for ladies, how one can write a marketing strategy, and even inspirational entrepreneur success tales.
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