J.P. Morgan Private Bank and Beauhurst just launched their fourth annual report on The Top 200 Women-Powered Businesses in the UK.
It was great to see Mercia Ventures featured as one of the top investors in women-powered businesses and Investment Manager, Hannah Tapsell Chapman was delighted to have the opportunity to share her thoughts on how VCs can better support female entrepreneurs.
While women-powered businesses are still less likely than the broader high-growth company population to secure equity investment (8.85% vs 9.33%), the report highlights many reasons to be positive…
Since 2021, there has been a significant rise in the proportion of women-led businesses in the UK, increasing from 18.3% of all high-growth companies in 2021 to 29.7% in 2024.
The last decade has seen an increase in the proportion of equity investment received by women-powered businesses. In 2014, these companies received 14.9% (£781m) of total private investment. By 2023, women-powered businesses received 23.3% (£4.01b).
Of course Hannah also couldn’t help but mention two of her investments, ImmuONE and Isomab Ltd. Seeing women entrepreneurs in such classically male dominated sectors succeed in accessing capital and leading growing businesses brings a huge amount of hope.
Thanks to Henry Whorwood, Advone Katsande and Charlotte Bobroff for putting together such deep insights into UK ecosystem and for inviting me to contribute.