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Women entrepreneurs worldwide
GEM Global Report
The data on female founders worldwide
Global patterns in women's entrepreneurship, capital, and practice — drawn from Oxford Saïd research and the growing SOFIA knowledge base.
By the numbers
The scale of women's entrepreneurship, and the gap in capital and support.
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Of venture capital reaches women-led startups
Dealroom · 2024
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Higher ROI from women-founded companies
BCG · 2024
1 in 3
Businesses globally are women-owned
World Bank
What the research found
Share of founders whose interviews surfaced each theme
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The problem that won’t let go
Every founder built from something she personally encountered. None described a market opportunity. All described a gap they couldn’t stop seeing.
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Refusal as a practiced skill
Rejection was treated as incomplete information. Founders gathered more evidence, reframed, and returned. Pitches before a first round ran into the hundreds.
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Trust before product
The entry point was always relationship, not technology. Founders called leads individually for months before products had regulatory approval.
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Community as the growth engine
Community wasn’t bolted on; it was load-bearing. Crowdfunding drew on existing customers as investors and broke platform records.
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The system, not the woman
The barriers were structural. Profitable impact models were categorised as charity. The problem was consistently misattributed to the founder.
From the founders themselves
In their own words
“You don’t achieve anything by doing safe things. I made more than 300 pitches before securing the first round. People said you can’t start a bank. And yet.”
Anne BodenStarling BankOxford Saïd IFF
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Share Your Wisdom
Wisdom library
A living library of SOFIA-generated narratives from founders, board members, and investors. Each PDF is produced with AI assistance from curated interviews; new reports appear here after both the participant and an administrator have approved publication. Newly published reports appear at the top of the grid below.
Portraits use Oxford-hosted photos where we have them; otherwise a professional stock image from Unsplash until an approved headshot is provided.
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