Worldwide, one in three businesses is led by a woman—a rapidly growing number. From 2019 to 2023, the number of women-owned businesses increased at nearly double the rate of those owned by men.
Despite dramatic growth, women-founded startups remain drastically underfunded. According to the World Economic Forum, in 2023, female-led businesses accounted for 2 percent or less of venture capital funding.
This inequity is especially glaring in India, the world’s third-largest startup ecosystem. The country boasts over 100 unicorn startups, 26 of which are women-led and receive just a fraction of available funding.
She Capital, an India-based venture capital fund founded by serial entrepreneur Anisha Singh, is working hard to change this. The Fund backs early-stage startups founded by women seeking to scale their businesses and, in the process, close the gender gap in entrepreneurship.
Since 2018, She Capital’s VC fund has invested in 14 diverse teams across India, including the science-tech company BrainSightAI and Yuva Kabaddi, a sports tech startup, and one of the largest exits in the fashion space with its portfolio company Clovia being acquired by Reliance. It has also grown and nurtured its community into a network of 8000+ female founders, the largest in India.
“We need to create more role models at the top, especially for female founders,” says Singh. “It gives them a blueprint to follow. I believe this is what we need to do to close the gender gap and advance equality in business.”
Singh, who successfully founded and led two companies before launching She Capital, was drawn to venture capitalism by its potential for impact.
From 2009 to 2018, Singh founded and ran Mydala, a local services marketing platform that offers consumers deals at businesses in 200+ cities, and the digital content company Kinis. She relished her life as a founder and wanted to equip women with the means to pursue this path, too.
“I did feel limited in terms of the impact I was having,” says Singh.