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Starling founder Anne Boden has called for time for ‘men in vests’ to dominate investing as she looks to push more cash towards female founders.
The Welsh businessman, who set up the online bank in 2014, said women are still at a “huge disadvantage” because “people invest in people who look and sound like themselves”.
Launching a government-backed taskforce to get more funding for women-led businesses, Boden, 64, told the Mail: “I believe passionately that it’s not about fixing women but about fixing the system.”
Currently, female founders receive just 2 per cent of all venture capital funding in the UK.
Venture capital is one of the main ways entrepreneurs can raise money for early-stage companies. The industry generally invests in ideas that they consider high growth.
Passionate: Starling founder Anne Boden leads new government-backed task force to boost investment
And Boden largely blames this gender gap on systemic problems lurking beneath the surface.
Drawing on his own experience fundraising for Starling, Boden said: “I know very well that when I walked into a room, I was met with a row of men in their 30s wearing vests and all looking and sounding the same.
‘He had a big disadvantage. People invest in people who look and sound like themselves.’
She said the task force, of which she is chair, hopes to “change that dynamic.” Recommendations include encouraging investment firms to collect and publish data on their own gender balance, as “female investment professionals are more likely to back companies founded and led by women.”
Research by the British Private Equity and Venture Capital Association has found that only 11 per cent of senior investment roles are held by women and 13 per cent of companies lack a single woman on their investment teams. investment.
Boden, who resigned as Starling’s CEO last June but still has a nearly 5 percent stake and a seat on the board, held more than 300 meetings before she was able to raise capital.
“Women have a lot of confidence, what they don’t have is investment,” she said.
However, the report does not implement mandatory targets that investment firms must meet, meaning its ambitions could fall on deaf ears.
Boden maintains that the task force must tread a sensible line so as not to discourage foreign investors, who may feel alienated by strict quotas.
She said: ‘In general, I believe in difficult goals. But on this issue, we must be very careful to continue attracting external investment to the UK.
“If we have specific objectives, the funding will go to another country and not to the United Kingdom.”
The task force emphasizes that it is not just female founders who will feel the benefits of a more level playing field.
The Rose Review – an independent, state-backed initiative – found that up to £250 billion could be added to the economy if women started and expanded new businesses at the same rate as men.
The Government also plans to conduct ongoing research into how financing works in high-growth companies run by women. The taskforce was set up in 2022 by Liz Truss when she was Minister for Women and Equalities.
Members also include Sam Smith, founder and former CEO of FinnCap, a brokerage firm, and June Angelides, investor at Samos, a venture capital investor.