A recent report showed that the share of equity investment going to all female-founded businesses remained at 2% in 2025, the same as the average across the last decade.
We asked female entrepreneurs and business experts for their thoughts. Some shared ideas for what needs to be done to increase the share of funding going to female founders and others argued that we’re focusing on the wrong issue.
“We need more visible role models, stronger mentoring and investor networks, and a broader view of what an investable business looks like. There are so many women building profitable, scalable businesses, but they often don’t fit the traditional pattern investors expect. We need to change that, not the women.”
Susan Bonnar, The British Craft House
“The statistics are disappointing, but unfortunately not surprising.
“As a female founder, I’ve learned that access to funding isn’t just about having a great product or a strong business plan—it’s about access to the right networks, visibility, and decision-makers. Women are still too often required to prove more with less.
“What needs to change is greater representation of women on investment panels, more early-stage funding opportunities specifically designed to back female-led businesses, and a stronger focus on evidence of commercial potential rather than pattern-matching founders against what has historically been funded.
“I’ve built my business from the ground up through resilience, customer trust, and measurable results. There are thousands of women doing the same. The investment community isn’t short of exceptional female founders; it’s simply overlooking too many of them.
“Backing more women isn’t about lowering the bar; it’s about widening the lens. When we invest in female entrepreneurs, we create stronger businesses, more innovation, and lasting economic growth.”
Samantha Parkash Singh, LUSHKA Cosmetics
“Running a business is hard regardless of gender, but female founders often face additional barriers when it comes to raising investment. We don’t need special treatment – we need equal access to funding, networks and opportunities. Until the people making investment decisions better reflect the diversity of entrepreneurs building businesses today, the statistics are unlikely to change.”
Kelly Peak, Peak & The Pantry
“Part of the problem is that we are still being assessed against a model that was not built with us in mind. When I looked at raising investment, the businesses getting funded fastest all had the same shape, fast growth, easy scale, easy exit. Mine did not fit that shape, and I doubt I am alone in that.
“Rather than force it, I built a CIC alongside my business, which brought Sport England and National Lottery funding and real recognition. Investors need to change their mindset, but so does the definition of what counts as fundable. Two years in, mine is up 200% year on year, built on a route the equity world was not offering.”
Julia Hartley, Guided Outdoor Adventures
“Gender parity in business investment is the next big hurdle in female financial empowerment. The awareness campaigns are important, as are funded initiatives and grants, but ultimately it’s more women sitting on the investor side of the table, deciding where capital actually flows, that will bring the change.
“Women build businesses that solve problems other women live with every day, and right now those problems are being evaluated through a mostly-male lens.
“2% for 10 years is outrageous, exasperating and sad. But zooming out, the bigger picture is not so bleak. The number of female angel investors in the UK has grown 60% since 2022. Billions worth of equity deals now involve women angel investment in some form, according to a UK Business Angels Assocation report. Crucially, and down-right obvious, women angels put more money into women-led businesses, compared with male angels.
“Women are natural multipliers. Every woman who becomes an investor doesn’t just add capital to the market, she redirects more of it toward other women. Growing the female investor base is the fastest way to close the founder funding gap. Let’s not sit around waiting for male-dominated funds to wake up to the returns they’re missing out on.”
Amy Knight, SCALE
“As a disabled, female, solo founder, I actually had a male who supports SMEs get investment advise me to get a male, able-bodied co-founder in order to have an investable business. I understand the advice, but was also appalled.”
Elizabeth Padilla, Hues Clothing
“That 2% figure is jaw-dropping and depressingly consistent. At a recent talk I attended by Sam Cooper-Gray, the driving force behind Women Are Good Business, the same paradox came up: her stats say female-led businesses saw 22.1% turnover growth in 2025, ahead of male-led (18%) and mixed-led (17.8%) – yet secured only 12.1% of external capital, versus 18.5% and 17.2% respectively. Better performance, less capital.
“AI is only widening that gap – the stat on just one all-female-led team landing an AI deal above £10m since 2021 says it all. This isn’t a pipeline problem when women make up 58% of UK graduates and 51% of the population. It’s a bias problem in who gets to write the cheques. More women actually sitting on investment committees, not just pitching to them, feels like the lever that would really move this.”
Ruth Dietrich, Ruth Dietrich OBM
“As a female founder, it’s disheartening to see these numbers remain unchanged after a decade.
“I also think we need to rethink the investment criteria. Too often, funding is tied to businesses already meeting minimum revenue thresholds or employing a certain number of people. But every successful business started with zero employees and an idea.
“Early-stage founders need investors who are willing to back potential, not just proven traction. By the time many businesses reach the metrics investors are looking for, they’ve already survived the hardest part. Unfortunately, many promising start-ups don’t make it through those first two years because they lack access to early support.
“More women writing the cheques, more diverse investment committees, and greater trust in bold ideas could help change that.”
Paulomi Debnath, Handmade by Tinni
“The stats aren’t changing because the industry isn’t changing and, unpopular opinion, perhaps we’re focusing on the wrong thing.
“The 2% figure is disgusting but it’s also a red herring. We keep pointing at the number without asking whether equity investment (especially in its current form) is even the right vehicle for most female-led businesses in the first place?
“The venture capital model was built by a very specific type of person, for a very specific type of business. The 5-8 year timeline to exit, hyper-growth expectations, pressure to scale fast and sell faster doesn’t reflect the way many women build. They’re often more profitable, sustainable, and impact-driven. Real value over time. But we keep measuring against a framework never designed for women.
“Good intentions don’t fix structural misalignment (and there are some well-intentioned investors who want to back women). What actually needs to change is the pipeline, education around alternative funding, peer networks and access, and a broader definition of what a successful, fundable business looks like.
“The 2% will keep being 2% until we stop trying to fit women into a model never built for them… and start building something that was.”
Tara Attfield-Tomes, The 51% Club
“These statistics are deeply frustrating but unfortunately not surprising. I buil my business after leaving teaching due to serious ill health and PTSD linked to women’s health trauma. Yet like so many women, I had to build my business without access to the networks, confidence or funding pathways often more readily available to male founders.
“If only 2% of equity investment is still going to all-female founded businesses after a decade, the problem is clearly structural, not a lack of talent or ambition. We need more women making investment decisions, broader definitions of what a high-growth business looks like, and far more visibility and backing for female-led brands outside traditional venture capital circles.
“That’s why communities like Buy Women Built matter so much. When women support women, whether through investment, retail partnerships or consumer spending, it creates real change.
“Backing female founders is not charity. It is smart economics.”
Alicia Drabble-Castellano, Single Swan
“The 2% figure is sobering, but I also think we need to ask whether we’re measuring success too narrowly. In 10 years of building my business, I’ve never sought equity investment, not because I lacked ambition, but because protecting our mission, independence and long-term sustainability has mattered more than pursuing growth at any cost.
“We should absolutely remove barriers for women who want investment, but we should also celebrate the many female founders building resilient, profitable businesses through different routes.”
Sarah Turner, Little Beau Sheep
“This tracks with what was found in the Maple Review too, though our lens was economic hardship rather than gender specifically.
“One of the core recommendations was to target enterprise interventions at those most excluded, and women came up again and again as a group where the barriers stack: financial exclusion, confidence deficits, lack of role models, fragmented support.
“Nearly two thirds of the founders surveyed lacked the savings to invest in their own business, and half didn’t know how to access finance at all. That’s before they ever get near an investor.
“You can’t close a 2% gap by only looking at the cheque, you have to fix the visibility and access that gets someone to the table in the first place.
“You won’t close a 2% gap by only fixing the funding. You have to fix the visibility and trust and access that gets someone considered at all.”
Tara Askham, She Starts Smart
“I sold a business in 2000 and used the same corporate lawyer when we sold our precision engineering business in 2022. I confidently said that he must deal with so many more female entrepreneurs and exits these days – and sadly I was still very much in the minority.
“Yet when you look at the stats, a more gender balanced board tends to return better results – McKinsey’s Diversity Matters 2024 Report showed that companies with more than 30% female representation at Board level are significantly more likely to outperform those with 30% or less.
“A high proportion of equity investment goes to tech companies as you point out, which again has less female Board members – female representation in tech is low and that’s led to AI being trained with a male bias because that’s who it was programmed by.
“So we need more women in at the grass roots, we need women to have access to more financial education and to actually have their ambition sights raised and we need more support along the way.”
Emma Warren, entrepreneur and business mentor
“This 2% figure is so disappointing especially as it’s been so consistent. I wonder what criteria they use?
“Why do they not do some research on female led businesses and reach out to them to offer support and guidance on how to apply and actually pass their criteria so next year the figure increases (by a lot). And if they really wanted to be inclusive they could reach out to female founders with disabilities who run businesses as well and support the economy.
“If they really wanted that number to increase then they need to be proactive but if they don’t, then there is definitely a flaw somewhere.”
Sonal Dave, celebrant, Toastmaster and public speaking expert
“Only 2%? Suddenly my fundraising journey makes a lot more sense. As a female founder building a geek social app, I know the struggle isn’t a lack of ambition passion or innovation it’s getting in the room. Investors are missing out on brilliant businesses!”
Dennie Smith, Geek Meet Club
“This is exactly why women need to be part of the AI conversation now, not later.
“As female-founded AI businesses are barely represented, we are not just talking about a funding gap. We are talking about who gets to shape the future.
“More visibility, more confidence, more access, and far less unconscious bias in the rooms where funding decisions are made.”
Julie Begbie, happiness psychologist and small business mentor
“On the positive side, there are now around 1.8 million women run businesses across the UK, the highest share on record. The funding issue is a huge problem though. Starting a business is one thing, scaling it is much harder and access to capital is a huge part of it.
“There’s another pattern I hear a lot from female business owners though. Many are building service-based businesses such as consultancy, coaching, VA work and bookkeeping, because they offer low overheads, flexibility and control. When a business relies heavily on trading time for money, scaling becomes much harder and unless it’s a subscription model, investors are often not interested.
“I’m also a small business owner and director of a female founded CIC and I am seeing a shift, mainly coming from more practical infrastructure that helps women scale: access to networks, support from the banking sector (mainly education) and digital skill programmes (Enterprise Nation, Google etc). I am also trying to get more female founders and business owners to use marketing software and AI to scale.”
Berit Block, Constant Contact