“She’s the business”: this is the report commissioned by HSBC to highlight the difficulties that female entrepreneurs face in raising funds. Conducted for the first time in the world, this research involved more than 1,200 female entrepreneurs in Europe, Asia, Mexico, the Middle East, and the United States aiming at identifying the challenges that female entrepreneurs have to face in order to start and sustain their business. The research is part of HSBC’s constant commitment to overcome the difficulties encountered especially by women in entrepreneurship.
The report showed that 35% of businesswomen are victims of gender discrimination during the capital raising stage. Moreover, the funds granted to women in the world are 5% less than those raised by men.
“What this global research clearly shows is the presence of gender disparity even when women are entrepreneurs, to such an extent that they find it more difficult than men to raise capital” said Anna Tavano, Head of Global Banking for HSBC in Italy.
The results indicate that 58% of women entrepreneurs fear that gender differences may compromise the capital raising stage. This suspect is also due to the fact that, during the process of new investments pitching, almost two-thirds (61%) of women entrepreneurs meet evaluating teams almost exclusively composed of male investors.
Another concern is the one regarding the preparation of business plans (58%), and the lack of support (41%). Furthermore, the report shows that, on a global level, half of the investment pitches proposed by women entrepreneurs do not get funding. Finally, the entrepreneurs who participated in the research focused on the factors that need to be developed in order to improve the overall investment process. On one hand, the access to networks: a greater possibility of support coming from larger networks can help women to grow their business. In addition, gender disparity can be overcome by regularly reviewing investment choices and by creating mixed groups of investors. Finally, women entrepreneurs stressed the importance of including clear and specific investment criteria in the pitches, in order to improve the transparency of the entire investment process.
“We can and have to do more to support women in the business sector“, Anna Tavano said. “HSBC works with entrepreneurs all around the world, and our intention is to help women grow their businesses through fundraising, networking and mentorship opportunities. We are very proud of our partnership with AllBright, as it allows us to support networks of women“.
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