Women's Equality Day 2024: The Transformational Journey from Submissive to Authoritative

Women VC Marking Exceptional Excellence

In the past, female-led startups were often passed over by investors due to societal stigmas and outdated patriarchal beliefs. However, this trend has been shifted, as there is a rise of specialized funds geared towards supporting women entrepreneurs along with an increase in representation amongst VC & PE firms which have successfully dismantled these traditional obstacles. Today, we have many women investors and VCs backing the young startups that have potential to do wonders and to boost our economy.

Padmaja Ruparel is one of the pioneer investor who founded Indian Angel Network. She has collaborated with IAN Fund, a seed and early-stage venture fund and has invested in certain sectors like healthcare, education, fintech, and agritech. She believes that, promoting gender diversity within VC firms is essential not only for fostering a fair and inclusive investment landscape but to give adequate support to the women entrepreneurs.

“Initiatives focused on supporting and promoting women entrepreneurship, such as dedicated funding programs and accelerators, have played a role in driving higher funding levels in 2023 compared to previous years.”

Ankita Vasistha is one of dark horse of the investment industry, who is the CEO of Saha Fund. This is India’s first-of-its-kind venture capital fund for promoting women’s talent. She is the managing director of StrongHer which is a funding platform aims to create a global billion-dollar venture fund for women. In last 4 years this platform has 46 companies, out of which 67% of companies are from India.

“I am looking forward to set up a $10 million fund investing in US and India and the idea was through our capital and platform we’re able to empower more women as entrepreneurs, employees, and as powerful consumers.”

Pearl Agarwal is one of the youngest venture capitalist. She has earned a decade of experience in financial sectors and worked in Austin, New York, and London. Pearl has an extensive personal portfolio consisting of 10 companies spread across diverse sectors such as edtech, fintech, gaming, and more. As an active angel investor, she retains a significant interest in these ventures.

“There is a dire need of for women to become equal participants in the ecosystem to wipe out the accessibility gaps by giving precedence to female founders.”