The ongoing funding winter could potentially hit female founders in Southeast Asia (and elsewhere) harder, believes Docosan co-founder and CEO Beth Ann Lopez.
“Peer-reviewed research shows that recessions and downturns hit women and minorities harder. Funding is not an exception to this rule,” she said in an interview for DealStreetAsia – DATA VANTAGE’s latest report on the gender funding gap in SE Asia.
Lopez, a Harvard public health graduate, launched the healthcare service marketplace Docosan in Vietnam in 2020. The company, which allows users to search for and book appointments with doctors, raised over $1 million in seed funding last year.
The former SwipeRx executive said she has experienced her fair share of intrusive questions from venture capitalists.
“I have been asked by investors whether I have discussed having kids with my husband yet. I don’t think male founders get asked that kind of question,” she said. “Ironically, despite study after study showing the challenges faced by female founders, a lot of people think women have it easier.”
Edited excerpts of the interview:
Do you think that investors tend to have different expectations or standards for female founders versus male founders?
Yes. There’s peer-reviewed academic research showing male founders get a much higher proportion of positive (‘promotional’) questions from potential investors compared to women, who get mostly negative (‘preventative’) questions. I have experienced that firsthand: being grilled on nitty-gritty details while male founders with no business model get asked about their global expansion plans. It doesn’t matter if the questioner is male or female, which shows you how deeply ingrained this sort of bias often is.
It gets more personal than that. I have been asked by investors whether I have discussed having kids with my husband yet. I don’t think male founders get asked that kind of question.
Ironically, despite study after study showing the challenges faced by female founders, a lot of people think women have it easier.
What are some of the potential reasons for the gender gap in venture funding, and how do you think these can be addressed?
Investing is a historically male-dominated field, and so is entrepreneurship. Women often lack the deep networks that men have. Society also trains women to be accommodating or even modest, unlike men, who are encouraged to take risks and boast about their accomplishments.
Of course, things have improved for women over the past few decades. But that progress is often mistaken as a victory. Some investors and founders think that female equality has been achieved and ignore their own biases.
Investors need to do due diligence on their own portfolios and be more transparent about their gender statistics. And they should think hard about whether they would treat a male founder the same way when asking preventative or personal questions.
In the current environment, when funding will be more difficult to secure for most startups, could female founders find it tougher to raise capital?
Peer-reviewed research shows that recessions and downturns hit women and minorities harder. Funding is not an exception to this rule. My company is doing well, at least.
What advice would you give other female entrepreneurs?
Find good networks of other supportive founders and help each other out, especially other female founders. This is what men do all the time.