About the Ecosystem

The Ecosystem: Building conditions for women to succeed

We know that funding alone isn’t enough.  In addition to addressing where the money flows, the Invest in Women Taskforce is also tackling how the system operates. 
 
If we want more women to scale their businesses into high-growth ventures, we need to change the system that surrounds them – from the networks they access to who’s investing and what barriers exist at every stage. 

That’s where our Ecosystem work comes in. 

Through our Ecosystem Working Group – made up of leaders from across the UK – we’re focused on shifting the conditions that shape how women build businesses. That means:

1. Enable and inspire more women to consider starting a business and providing them with the necessary tools and micro-finance to start out.
2. Ensure female-led businesses can successfully scale their businesses into high growth companies and increase the proportion of female angel investors. Creating a virtuous cycle of women backing women in the investment ecosystem.
3. Driving systemic change by creating a long-term shift in the entrepreneurial and investment ecosystem through influencing policy.

This work is grounded in listening. We’ve hosted nationwide roundtables to hear directly from founders, investors and policymakers, to help target the real-world friction that women face in starting and scaling their business.

This is a systemic problem that we are determined to transform. Through our work, we are reshaping the ecosystem to recognise and amplify the value that women create, and to clear  the path for them to build, raise and scale. 

£250bn

potential boost to the UK economy

if women were to start and scale their business at the same rate as men

- Rose Review