附近上门

It鈥檚 been a record year for women-led companies going public, but there鈥檚 still a lot of progress to made made if we want to achieve gender parity in the world of startups.

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became the youngest woman to take a company public when woman-centric dating app had its initial public offering earlier this year. Also in 2021, direct-to-consumer health care apparel maker became the first company founded by two women to go public. Most recently, , which was founded by and filed confidential paperwork to go public.聽

Business Insider published last year analyzing the record of woman-led startups to go public. They found that although hundreds of startups go public every year, only 20 currently traded companies were founded and led by women. Last year, of the 442 companies to go public by mid-December, only four were founded and led by women, the analysis found.聽

That got me thinking more about the subject, and I began to notice the number of companies founded by women that have filed to go public this year.聽

This year鈥檚 already on pace with last year, with Bumble and FIGS鈥� IPOs, along with 鈥檚 SPAC deal and Rent The Runway鈥檚 upcoming IPO. Video-sharing website also went public this year with as its CEO, and cannabis startup recently announced its plans to go public through a SPAC — Vimeo and Leafly鈥檚 respective CEOs, who are women, aren鈥檛 co-founders of the companies.

There are a lot of reasons so few women who have founded companies have taken them public. But it more or less comes down to the fact that women face more obstacles when it comes to a critical part of a startup鈥檚 lifespan: the growth stage.

One of the biggest challenges women entrepreneurs face is at the growth stage when it comes to scaling their businesses, according to Lakshmi Balachandra, an associate professor of entrepreneurship at , whose research focuses on the impact of trust and gender in receiving business funding.聽

Balachandra pointed to a recent study that examined if there were gender-based challenges for entrepreneurs trying to scale their business. The researchers interviewed 30 women who all ran businesses with revenue above $5 million.

鈥淲hat was honestly so surprising and depressing was that women still face funding challenges,鈥� Balachandra said. 鈥淭he financing of the later stage, late-stage venture capital, and private equity is almost no different from the early stages where women are still faced with conversations being very different from the ones men have to deal with.鈥澛�

Balachandra, who previously worked in venture capital, noted there鈥檚 an implicit bias to what investors find 鈥渇undable鈥� or businesses that they believe have a large market and can grow.聽

In addition to the assumptions investors could make about businesses, women also tend to receive questions around their competency and ability to scale a business.

鈥淭he inherent feeling that women expressed over and over again were the challenges they faced in private equity, later-stage funding,鈥� Balachandra said. 鈥淭he other part was still feeling left out.鈥澛�

The challenges women face at the earlier and growth stages of a company continues to affect the company when it reaches later stages, she said.聽

鈥淏ecause you鈥檙e not, as a woman entrepreneur, getting the venture rounds 鈥� you鈥檙e having to grow your business underfunded,鈥� Balachandra said. 鈥淵ou don鈥檛 have the money to scale quickly. And then you鈥檙e going to later-stage investors and you’ve done everything right, you鈥檝e scaled, you鈥檝e grown, and people are saying, 鈥楬ow come it took you five years? Why haven鈥檛 you done this market? Why haven鈥檛 you done that?鈥� When you didn鈥檛 have the money to do that.鈥澛�

There鈥檚 starting to be more parity at the top of the funnel, according to Rhonda Shrader, executive director of the 鈥檚 Haas Entrepreneurship Program. More women are starting companies and thinking about entrepreneurship. But the challenge is still when it comes to scaling a company, investors tend to go with what they know, she said, although there鈥檚 been a push to change that.

鈥淚 think growing them to the point where they can go to a public market or get acquired (is the challenge),鈥� Shrader said. 鈥淭here鈥檚 some reticence of some funders to give to folks they haven鈥檛 before.鈥澛�

Illustration: Dom Guzman