Women founders, female founders...or just founders?
Edition: 01. I'm Ana, and this is your somewhat regular round-up of curated startup updates on women founders and the female economy in the Nordics.
Okay guys, let’s get started!
Let’s start with this ^ when I refer to you as guys, do women feel unrepresented? After all, everyone knows that “guys” includes women too 🙃.
That’s the start of our journey together, but really, there will be a little bit less of this and a little bit more of actual news. I do get this question a lot tho, so let me give you my take.
You might have also noticed titles like this in news articles featuring a list of founders:
if it’s a list of ONLY male founders the title is “A list of founders”
If it’s a MIX of male and female founders, the title is “A list of founders”
If it’s a list of only WOMEN founders, the title is “A list of FEMALE founders”
Do you every think about why that is?
My favourite explanation is the one provided by Caroline Criado Perez who talks about the “default male” in her amazing book Invisible women. A default male is when male experience and perspective has come to be seen as universal, while the female experience, that of the global half population is seen, well, as niche.
So if we say “A list of founders” we don’t expect to see women only on the list, that title is reserved for the default male, or a mix of genders, you know, universal. If we want a list of women featured, we have to specify that it’s women.
This is why for example the Danish national football team page on Wikipedia doesn’t have to say that it’s about the men’s team, that’s given (default male), while the women’s page is called “Danish women’s national football team”.
WARNING: Once you see this phenomenon, you cannot unsee it. You will start seeing it everywhere.
So if we want an initiative that specifically focuses on women, well, we need to specify that.
I assume most of you reading this already know that women are largely underrepresented in entrepreneurship. Both as number of founders, and the funding they get. Women on average receive around 2% of the TOTAL available founding in most countries in the world. Men receive around 90%+ OF ALL AVAILABLE FUNDING (and there’s some percentage for mixed teams). Think about how insane that is.
(You might be wondering why that is, but that will take forever to explain. Instead, let’s go on.)
So if we ever want to move the needle on the gender gap in entrepreneurship, we need a concrete, direct, and targeted approach. We can’t rely on the industry to fix itself. We need specific initiatives designed to create an even playing field for women founders. And in order to do that, we need to clearly state that they are women.
In the next newsletter I’ll explain a bit more about the female economy. Now, let’s move onto the news!
What’s been happening in the Nordics?
🇩🇰 The Danish #FoodTech startup Tempty foods has successfully raised their (undisclosed) pre-seed round. They are creating the next generation alternatives to tofu and meat based on mycoprotein. You can already buy their first product TEMPTY at the Burger Lab at DTU. How cool is that! Founded by: Ana Pejic, Martina Lokajova and Cecilie Engvang Lund
🇩🇰 The Danish podcast startup that’s built around a Netflix-style subscription fee Podimo raised $48M. They have previously raised over $200M. I don’t think it’s that well known, but yes, Podimo has a female co-founder. Eva Kirstine Lægdsgaard who holds the Chief People and Culture Officer role there. She has a great profile and has been in the industry for a while. She was a Project Manager at Last.fm, and later at Spotify for close to 9 years where she was a Director, Artist & Label Services for the Nordics.
🇩🇰 The one that really made my day, is the MASSIVE WIN from Qvin. I think Qvin will be the next unicorn in #FemTech. Qvin made history by getting the first FDA approval for menstrual blood testing. They have developed a removable collection strip that collects blood. Why is this important? Because menstrual blood can be used to continuously monitor different conditions, for example diabetes.
Qvin is based in the US, but founded by two Danish founders, one of which is Sara Naseri. Sara’s experience and background are incredible. She is a visiting Scholar Scientist at Stanford University of Medicine, where she has been a student. She previously founded a platform technology which absorbs 99,99% of UV-radiation which can be added into products useful for skin cancer prevention and to extend the lifespan of various materials.
🇳🇴Norwegian Fauna has received a grant of 16 MNOK from the Norwegian council of research to further build their platform that allows you to be awarded for making climate-friendly decisions. It’s founded by Synne Asheim Haga who previously was the Norway’s youngest newspaper CEO.
🇩🇰On the VC side, Danish VC Kost Capital announces first close of €25M fund to invest in pre-seed and seed startups across Europe, focusing on B2B inputs in the future of food. They have already made the first three investments in Estonian palm oil replacement company Äio, the French infant formula company Numi, and the Danish ingredient company Nutrumami. Bodil Sidén has joined as one of the GPs of the fund.
That’s all for today. If you have any tips and news you think are relevant drop me a message at andonovska.a@gmail.com
Until next time,
Ana, founder of evenfounders.com