The ebook "Why are Women Funded Less than Men? A Crowdsourced Conversation", as with the year long video interview project from which it arises, is an attempt to bring human faces & voices to the issue of the lack of female entrepreneurs who are successful raising venture or angel capital. The book also highlights the scarcity of women venture capitalists & angel investors. There are a few organizations who have conducted research & provided supporting data, some of which forms the backdrop of the book.

I spent 5 years in London trying to raise funding for my online matchmaking business and in the end had to admit failure. My story is only one of many.

Very early on in that journey I had committed to help women source venture once I became successful. As it turned out I have been doing just that, not because I was successful, but because I failed.

Possibly if I had been successful I would never have had the time to accomplish a project like this. Over the past year, I have been video interviewing venture capitalists, angel investors & women founders on the shortfall in funding for women. My goal has been to listen to as many people as I could from both sides of the table, so I could hopefully determine where all these conversations intersected.  

Whilst I have been doing these interviews, many people have said to me that no problem exists and that women can be as easily funded as men if they have a great idea, team, plan and advisors. However the statistics, some of which are mentioned at the beginning of the book, show another story.

The percentages of women in technology, female entrepreneurs and female venture capitalists are extremely low. The reasons are multifold and complex and cannot be answered or resolved quickly or easily.

Many wonderful people and organizations are working to change the ratio and I am sure that the situation will slowly shift due to their efforts. When I started this project a year ago, the conversation and debate was hot & heavy and continues to carry a lot of emotional response from both genders. So I surmise that it is timely to showcase these conversations about the lack of women being funded compared to men, to shed further light and awareness on the subject.

Some of the questions that were addressed include: Is there a problem? Is there overt discrimination? Does bias keep women disadvantaged for investment? Are there advantages of diversity? Should we generalize about gender? Are there differences between men & women? How does the female market impact investment? What do female entrepreneurs have going for them? Other issues: risk & failure, thinking big, children, sex & power & helping other women.

Just when you thought you couldn't go back in the water or get funded,  the ebook "Why are Women Funded Less than Men?" is available.

With a cast of thousands (well a lot anyway: 120 embedded video conversations with 26 venture capitalists, 19 female founders & 7 others) this is a truly crowd sourced conversation.

Download it here now for only $2.99

Watch a video about the e-book below.