By Rebecca Burn-Callander
In celebration of International Women/s Day, which takes place on the 8th March 2025, we analyse whether female founders are in a better position today, compared to yesteryear.
This year’s UN Women’s #IWD2025 theme is: Rights. Equality. Empowerment. For ALL women and girls[1]. Measuring progress against complex metrics like these is challenging but we can analyse data from key areas, such as investment into female-led businesses, women in senior leadership positions in the FTSE 100, and the rate at which start-ups are being launched by women.
Female founders on the rise
The facts are undeniable – more women are becoming entrepreneurs.
According to the Global Entrepreneurship Monitor, which analyses entrepreneurial activity across the world, early-stage entrepreneurial activity by women in the UK has almost tripled since 2002 from just over 3.5% to 10%.
The GEM also analysed how many women are creating businesses, relative to men. In 1999, when the monitor was first created, women demonstrated just 40% of the participation evidenced by men. In 2023, women’s participation reached 85% of the level of men, which is approaching parity.
The GEM credited initiatives such as the 2019 Alison Rose Review of Female Entrepreneurship[2] for encouraging more women to start businesses. But there is still some way to go. Of the UK’s small and medium-sized enterprises with employees, just 15% were led by women in 2023, according to data from the Government’s annual Small Business Survey.
The UK government aims to increase the number of female entrepreneurs by half – the equivalent of around 600,000 entrepreneurs – by 2030.
Sisters in arms
One of the great successes achieved by this generation is the increase in women holding senior positions in UK corporations. Back in 2010, just 12% of women held board-level positions, prompting Baroness Helena Morrissey to create the 30% Club, drawing attention to the lack of equality and pushing CEOs and board members to shake up the status quo.
The change has been remarkable: in January 2025, 42.8% of FTSE100 and 42.6% of FTSE350 directorships were occupied by women. Just over half of all new FTSE100 board appointments were women (53%).
There has also been a proliferation of communities that support female founders in recent years.
Some are small grassroots initiatives, such as Female Founders Rise, a membership organisation and accelerator aimed at helping women find financial freedom, and Buy Women Built, a start-up launched in 2024 by Coffee Republic founder Sahar Hashemi, which highlights the UK-based brands created by women.
But progress is not straightforward. There have been failures as well as successes. London’s Allbright, the city’s sole women-only members club, which was created with female founders in mind, closed its doors this year.
Access to finance
In 2025, female-led businesses remain woefully underfunded. Female entrepreneurs cite multiple barriers, from family/caring commitments to a lack of confidence for the enduring gap – and the situation is getting worse, not better. A report from the British Business Bank shows that in 2023, all-female founder teams secured only 8.2% of equity deals, a slight decrease from 8.9% in the previous year.
Female founders did 162 deals across the course of that year, raising £232m, compared to the 1,413 deals completed by men, raising £6.5bn during the same period.
The Investing In Women Code was created in 2019 tackle this ongoing shortfall. The Code encourages finance organisations to prioritise equality in access to finance. One growth investor, BGF, has committed £25 million to female founders and women-led businesses across the UK through the Invest in Women Taskforce.
According to The Rose Review, up to £250 billion of new value could be added to the UK economy if women had started and scaled new businesses in the UK at the same rate as men.
Female founders in Wandsworth
Wandsworth has been running its Women’s Enterprise Day for 11 years. The event, which was created by Wandsworth Council’s enterprise team, gives female entrepreneurs in the borough access to business advice and the opportunity to connect and build networks with like-minded women.
Wandsworth Council also runs regular Access to Finance events to help all entrepreneurs, women in particular, to find the right investment to help them meet their business goals.
This year’s Women’s Enterprise Day will take place on Wednesday 26 March at OSMO Nine Elms.
Find out more and book your early bird ticket.
Rebecca Burn-Callander is a former Enterprise Editor at The Telegraph. As a journalist and podcaster, she writes about entrepreneurs, start-ups and personal finance. She is author of The Daily Telegraph Guide to Investing.
[1] https://www.unwomen.org/en/news-stories/announcement/2024/12/international-womens-day-2025-for-all-women-and-girls-rights-equality-empowerment#:~:text=On%208%20March%202025%2C%20join,no%20one%20is%20left%20behind.
[2] https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/the-alison-rose-review-of-female-entrepreneurship