InvestHer Directory Launch - Investors Briefing

Wonderful. So welcome everybody to this investor briefing. I am absolutely thrilled to welcome you. My name is Anne Ravanona, for those of you who don't know me, and I'm the founder and CEO of Global InvestHer. And today I'm very, very proud and excited to launch with you today, to share with you the launch of our brand new InvestHer Directory. Now, what is this Investor Directory? I want to share my screen with you and explain a little bit about how this is going to work today. So on this investor briefing, we're going to keep it nice and short for you. If you have any questions, please do type them in the chat box so that I can answer them for you live. I'm going to walk you through why we have created the Investor Directory and how it's going to help you to increase your diversity in your pipeline and, you know, attract and focus and target more female-founded companies. And then we will hear also from Julianne Zimmerman from Re-Inventure Capital about her views on the directory and why she feels that it's been useful to her. So without further ado, I want to share with you just so you can see what is— what we're actually talking about if you haven't had a chance to look at it yet. So Let me just share my screen. There we are. Here we are. So first of all, before we start, I wanted to explain to you that this directory is part of our 1 Million InvestHERs initiative. So this is our global movement to help get 1 million women entrepreneurs funded by 2030. Now, I have set up Global InvestHER for the past 8 years as an education and edtech platform to help female founders get investor ready. so that they are better prepared before they go to you looking for funding. And they're not knocking on your door if you're not the right investor for them. And so 1 Million Investors is our commitment as Global Investor to help change the funding game, because as you know, today only 2.8% of venture capital goes to female-founded only companies. 2.8%, and it hasn't changed in 30 years. And I have a 19-year-old daughter and a 16-year-old son, and the hard truth is if both of them went to set up their company today, my son would be 70% more likely to get funded just because of his gender. He doesn't even have to be good, and I want to help change that. And why is this important for you? Because recent research from Boston Consulting Group has shown and shared that investing in female founders can actually add up to $5 trillion to the global economy. And I think we can all agree that's something we all need, and that was before COVID I think it's going to be even more after. This is an important campaign for us, and it's a movement that I've created. I first presented this movement to President Macron of France in early March, just before COVID hit. So I was invited to a private lunch with a very restricted number of people, including Phumzile from UN Women, who's the head of UN Women globally and number 2 at the United Nations. And we were there to get ready for Generation Equality Forum, and so I presented InvestHER 1 Million InvestHERs as our movement towards that forum next year, which is how can we help change economic empowerment of women across the world. So my focus was, of course, on getting more funding towards female founders, and I was asked to present ideas to President Macron as to what he could do for France, what he could do as a leader at the G7 to also impact female founders and funding around the world, because at the Generation Equality Forum in 2021, we will be making global commitments. We'll be looking back on the last 25 years, what has happened since the Beijing Conference, and the countries who've made commitments towards increasing gender equality across lots of different sectors and themes. And we'll be looking forward, so he's going to be leading the charge for all of us to be making global commitments towards increasing gender equality. And of course, my focus and our focus is on equality when it comes to economic empowerment for women entrepreneurs. So we've made a certain number of commitments, and part of the things is in 2015 I did a TED Talk explaining about what are the challenges for female founders when it comes to funding and what needs to be done to change the funding ecosystem. And one of the things I mentioned during my talk was that there is a definition of the word investor. So an investor To invest is the act of devoting time, money, or energy to a particular undertaking with the expectation of a worthwhile result. So you devote your time, your money, your energy to doing something, and you expect a positive outcome. It's not only money. And so One Million InvestHERs is all about us devoting our time, our money, our energy, our mentoring, our other resources towards female founders to help them to serve their respective consumers. But also, the 3 different parts of the triangle are the female founders— they are investHERs because they're investing their time and money to help serve clients with products or services to meet a specific problem. You investors are also investHERs because you are devoting your time and energy to supporting those female founders, as are our partners which includes institutions, education institutions, accelerator programs, etc. So 1 Million InvestHERs is an— is our overarching program, our overarching movement to help move the needle forward for funding for female founders for the benefit of all. And so as part of that, we have created the InvestHER Directory, which is the first global directory of businesses founded by women So that's what makes this directory different. And I want to show you how this could be a very interesting tool for you and your team, for your associates, or if you are a smaller fund or an angel investing network, how you can actually benefit from finding more diverse founders to increase your pipeline and just basically find fantastic new companies to fund. And what makes this directory so special is that it's this directory different is that it is truly global. There are other directories that are out there that focus on different sectors and certain geographies, but this global directory really focuses on over 30 countries. We have currently over 350 companies and over 380 women entrepreneurs in that directory. So let us show you a little bit more and take you over to take you inside the directory so you understand what it is and what I've explained why So the why is we want to be able to help female founders to be easily found by consumers and by you investors. We want to make your job easier as an investor so you don't have to be spending so much time and money and energy to be looking for those diverse founders across the world. We've done a really qualitative selection for you and made it an easy, simple tool that I want to share with you here today. If you have any questions, just please type them into the chat box, and I'd be delighted to listen. I'd be delighted to answer them there. So I'm just going to make sure that I have that there. It's all open. Fantastic. Lovely to see you, Julianne. Julianne Zimmerman, who's joining us and who's going to be sharing more very shortly as to why she feels that the Investor Directory is useful to her as a venture capitalist. And how it could be useful to you too. And hi, Florence, lovely to have you with us live too. So let's take a look at this. First of all, this directory, as I said, is all about helping to reduce the funding gap, the $1.7 trillion funding gap that exists between the amount— between male and female entrepreneurs when it comes to funding. And for you, the investor, we consider you as a key funding partner. You're the gatekeeper, you're the force of nature, you're the powerhouse who's got the money. That's right. Got the competencies, who can change industries and can change the destinies of companies. And we want to help you to fund the change. We want to help you to fund the change and to make things easier. And as part of our whole 1 Million Investors movement, 10% of everything that is spent by any of our customers— so you investors or female founders who join— 10% of anything that is bought with GlobalInvestHER goes back into an investor fund to go back to female founders, where we will give them money through grants and other services. So let's have a look inside this directory. I want to give you a big overview. As I said, we've over 30 countries, 350 companies, and growing. This is our launch day. This is today. This is going to be so much bigger, so much faster. But I'm excited to kind of give you a taste of this investor briefing. I wanted to make sure that, that you could see it first. And what's different is this: we are targeting and showcasing 75 different sectors, um, you don't have to go looking over everywhere for it. So this is our cool team. We're all very motivated women here who have made a big difference to try and make a difference for you and make your life easier as investors. So Madeline Parson is our, our directory lead, and she's working very closely with me to make sure that we are constantly upgrading and updating the directory on a daily basis with new companies across sectors in different parts of the world to make sure that there's always new opportunities for you, the investor. So what's really interesting is that you can search the whole directory. So let's take this from a big picture view. You can search the entire directory, which you can click on here. I'm not going to do it now. I'll show you why. And then you can search by key sectors. So you'll see this is not a pink directory. It's not only retail and fashion. You're going to find a lot of great companies that are SaaS companies, that are in cybersecurity, that are in AI, that are in, you know, hardware, in IoT, in healthcare, in medtech, all those other tech areas that you're interested in. So you'll see we've actually broken down the directory for you so you don't have to go searching for them. We broke it down by different sectors, and here you will see even more sectors. So AI, industry, manufacturing, fintech, consumer products, services, retail, marketing, business services, and of course healthcare, wellness, and family services. So we've broken it down, but also wanted to make sure that it's easy for you to find. So by sector and also by geography, so you and your team can already look if your investment piece has a specific geographical scope, as most of you do, of course. You don't have to be searching through the whole directory to look for it. You can just straight away go into your geography. to find out what is good for you. Not only that, we have also broken down the directory and the entries by diversity. So for those of you who are in a specific type of impact investing and you want to focus on founders who are Latinx, or who are Black female founders, or from the LGBTQ community, there are veterans. You have all those different types of diversity here. So this is a fantastic source to help you to do good and to find those companies that you want to fund and also help a specific group with a specific affinity. We've tried to make this as easy as possible for you. And last but not least, you can search by funding stage. So no longer having to go scrolling, scrolling, scrolling through loads and loads of filtering. We've broken it down for you. So if you're only interested in pre-seed, you can have a look at them here. Only interested in seed, Series A, let's have a look. You can click here and you're going to go straight into all of our entries from the pre-seed or the seed and Series A category. So here we have Series A companies from across the globe, and each entry I'll show you here, it's very simple. What you do is we click here and I'm going to show you the type of information that you can get. So this is no— as you know, most directories give you the very simple information, so you're going to have The company name, maybe the director's name. If you're lucky, you'll have, you know, the URL, some socials, and that's about it. And here, what is different is, A, we've found only those companies that are founded or co-founded by female founders. So you don't have to go searching through the Crunchbase and the PitchBook and the other databases that exist. Where are the ones with the female founder only? We have done that for you here. And as I said, we're only starting with this set of 350 companies. This is going to grow exponentially as we move forward. So let us take you through what you will get, the type of information. So you will see, you will have the information about what they do. So it's short, sharp, and simple. So you can go quickly, you can start having a look through it. You will find that you will have the link, the LinkedIn profile already of the female founder. So you can go straight to it. You don't need to go searching on it. You don't get that on Crunchbase and PitchBook. You have to go searching for it. You will find out the different categories. And then if you want to search more in more depth categories, you can do the searches by keyword through machine learning, AI, and so on. So you can actually trickle down. Of course, we then break it down by type of company, if it's B2B, B2C, D2C, etc., etc. You have all the socials. So if you ever wanted to check out how they're communicating, this is where you can do it very easily. You have the geographical scope and then special offers. So this is the section that is actually particular to consumers. And in this case, this is a B2B SaaS company. That does AI, and they, they have a tech that helps you to find developers to develop out part of your tech product very quickly, and they've all been pre-qualified. So what helps you here is that you can find out, you know, here is a video that tells you all about them, here's their special offer, so they give you a place to sign up for free. You can find out what are the key ways that they're promoting themselves, you can find out places to buy from them, and what's going to really boost So here you can see how that company is presenting themselves to their consumers, to whether it is a B2C or a B2B. You can actually see how they are pitching themselves to those different consumers and the stage of business that they're at. Now you may say to my— to me, well, Anne, that's lovely, but I'm an investor. I saw somewhere else that you have it by Series A. So obviously in this group, these are all companies who are at Series A. So if you're searching for Series A, you can of course filter in here and add in filters. So more information about the company, the sectors, about what they do, the type of business, etc. So all of that information is here, but as an investor you get more, and this is where I want to take you to the, um, the investor page. So on the investor page— sorry, that's this one here— as I've shown you, we want to make sure to make it easy for you. You can search the entire directory, but you also get some extra filters. So as an investor, we've already filtered and done the quality screening for you. We filter down by sources of funding used so far, so you can see who's kind of generally on the cap table. We've actually broken that down for you so you don't have to kind of wade through it. You can see, have an overview of who's on the cap table, how much money that they have raised already, or the amount of revenue that they have. Now, this information has been inputted either by the female founder herself or from the Investor team where we have gone and done the searching for you on Crunchbase, on PitchBook, across the press. So wherever the information is, the latest information, we have gone to get that for you so you don't have to be searching and filtering down. We've got it and done it for you. So when you pay the subscription as, um, for your associates to come in and see the Investor View, these are the extra filters that you get. You'd also be able to see the number of founders, when it was founded, and the number of employees. So that will give you much bigger scope as to and a feel as to what type of company it is. And what's important as well is that, as an investor, you can get to know those women entrepreneurs better. That's why you should partner with us, because we are the bridge at Global Investor, and this Investor Directory, we're the bridge to help expose you to more female founders and expose them to you. We know and understand female founders. We've been working with them on the funding trail for the past 8 years, so we really are fantastic partners to help you to bring and help you find a pipeline of diverse female founders that match your investment thesis. So how can you get involved? When you join, you can actually register— register your organization now. That is free. It's a Typeform. It's super easy to fill in. And all we want to know is, like, how would you like to get involved? This is for those of you who are serious about investing in female founders. Come and join your community. You'll have a special page a special space in our community only for investors where you can connect with other investors. And you can actually— we will be able to give you opportunities to have access to those female founders, whether you want to be part of female founder office hours. So if you have your normal office hours, we will promote them here so you don't have to do it twice. Or you want specifically to do one or several of your months only female founders, we can be the vehicle to help you do that. Then we can have some quarterly conversations. So the quarterly conversations are not going to be normal pitches. It won't be a 5-minute or 10-minute pitch. This is where we can actually sit down, you can actually have a proper chat with the founder and see if they meet your, your thesis. So this is something different. And of course, you can then offer investors— so investor directory, our community, and our other resources to female founders. So we can become an actual resource to train up your female founders, to show that you are supporting and, and helping other female founders. So, so this is where you can do it. And what we want to be able to do is to help you to do that faster. So if you're an investor, of course it's nice to be able to screen and to have a look through all that, but you want to download the database, don't you? Of course you do. So for that, you can do it, you can have access to it for only $199 a month. There is a yearly discount if you're interested. All you need to do is to sign up here, contact us here by email. But this is brilliant because what we can do is we can have a monthly subscription and we can do searchable downloads. You can have it as a CSV, an Excel, or a PDF, and you can unsubscribe at any time. Now, why would it be a monthly subscription, you ask? Well, because we are upgrading it on a month-on-month basis. So that's why it's important. So I'm going to take a couple of questions. So Hannah is asking through, what is the platform built on? Through Airtable? Yes, it is on Airtable, Hannah, for the moment. Um, Airtable because it's fantastic for slicing and dicing, uh, the data and we can really go into depth. And it also allows us to choose who has access to different parts of the information. So that's what it is. Is there a minimum for investments in InvestHer? Um, no, you can be as an angel investor for somebody who invests €1,000, you can be part of an angel syndicate, or you can be much bigger. Because what's interesting here on the directory is that we have— we have founders from all different levels. So if you're a seed, Series A, Series B investor, you will find these companies that are female-led in here already, and even those that have been acquired or have gone through IPO, because there's actually quite a few companies that you may not have heard of that are female-led and that have already IPO'd, or there's some that are in the Series C+ that you may not have— they may not be on your radar. So we want to help diversify and bring you new people onto your radar. So I'm going to pause there as I'm going to get ready for Julianne. Julianne, I want to give you a heads up that I'm going to start making you a panelist if you want to get ready to switch on your video in 1 second. And I want to invite our guests to have any more questions as well, because Julianne is going to share with us, you know, what she thinks of the Investor Directory and also a lot more about Re-Inventure Capital, who is doing an amazing job to fund and support Black and diverse founders, not just female. So I want to make sure, Julianne, if— let me just change the video. There you are. If you want to unmute yourself, and I'm going to stop sharing so that we can hear you in all your glory. How are you?

Hello, Anne, and hello everyone on this webinar today. This is such a great moment, Anne. I want to congratulate you, and on behalf of women founders and investors, investors in women founders all over the world to thank you for creating this excellent resource.

Thank you.

This is brilliant. It's been really extraordinary to get to watch this come together. And as you've been preparing it for launch and today's announcement, I'm just thrilled that it's live and it's only going to become more widely and thoroughly populated from this point on. So I can't wait to see how that comes together. Um, as you mentioned, ReInventure Capital is a US-based investment practice. We are in Boston, Massachusetts. We invest exclusively in US-based companies that are led and controlled by BIPOC— Black, Indigenous, and other people of color— and/or women, and by that we mean female identifying of any identity, um, and, uh, at break-even and poised to grow profitably. So, um, we're diff— we're different in a few ways from our mainstream venture peers and colleagues, both in terms of the founders we're interested in and also the kinds of business trajectories we're interested in. And so we have a cross-sectoral investment thesis. We like to get to know founders who might be future prospects a bit upstream of an investment decision. So sometimes we get to know them as early as, say, first revenues. But we are looking for that moment when they have figured out the business model, they understand the value proposition that their customers are purchasing, whether that's an outright purchase or a lease or a subscription or whatever it might be. And that's not the same as what you're selling, by the way, but they understand what their customers are purchasing. And they, they have figured out how to deliver that repeatedly. And so they, they have a replicable business operating model that they are ready to scale. And that's the point at which we're keen to invest to help them to scale more profitably. So, you know, that investment strategy is important to us because we know from experience that it is a high-impact, high-return investment strategy. High impact because, as you've already mentioned, Anne, you know, we have a steep and persistent asymmetry in access to capital for those founders we are targeting. And that presents immediate social and economic ills by concentrating wealth and opportunity in ways that are highly damaging. But it also stifles innovation. And so we know that to invest as we do in those BIPOC and female founders has real social, economic, and broader sustainability and other impacts. We also know from experience that it has competitive returns. So my senior partner, Ed Dugger, pioneered the investment strategy we are pursuing with ReInventure. And in his former fund, applying this exact practice, they returned 32% IRR, which for any investor on the line is an outstanding result.

Good to know.

So, so we know again that this is a high-impact high-return strategy. And, and it's especially timely now, given that, you know, the entrepreneurial population is more robust, more diverse, more, more interesting in terms of the wide range of technologies and sectors and, and products and services and platforms and other solutions they are bringing to bear. And so the opportunity set is richer than it has ever been at any other point in history. And not only that, but we also know because several extremely reputable organizations, Forbes and Morgan Stanley and the U.S. Department of Commerce among them, and the Brookings Institution, and let's see who else, Morgan Stanley and Boston Consulting Group and numerous others have identified in their own analysis that female founders and founders of color are more likely to be able to deliver returns than their white male peers, particularly when we're talking about homogeneous teams.

Mm-hmm.

So diverse teams are, are better at innovating. We know that from the organizational literature. Diverse teams, as it turns out, are more likely to be able to generate a meaningful return. And we also know from analysis that's been done, again by the Brookings Institution and others, of the Great Recession, which was just over a decade ago, and in some cases, you know, we're still seeing the effects of it, that the companies led by those founders did suffer disproportionately from lack of access to capital. And so they were more vulnerable in the Great Recession. Nevertheless, the gains out of the Great Recession were led by those founders. And so Because of the demographic shifts that we see occurring in the US. The US will be a majority brown country by 2040, and in many places is already now. And you don't need to be reminded, women are already half the population.

We hold up half the sky, as the Taida says.

Demographically, you know, there is There is already, let's say, a more than sufficient population of innovators and customers alike. But we also know, again, that those diverse founder teams are the ones most likely to lead us out of our current calamity. And so not only is this an investment strategy which is very well grounded in experience and evidence and data, but it's also an investment strategy which is very much timely in this moment and, and only to get better over the next several years, probably the next generation. And so we are just thrilled to see you contributing the Founder Directory for founders and investors alike to be able to connect together more efficiently, in more, more direct and, and more substantive ways to help all of us, founders and investors alike, to accelerate that process of growing up businesses that are value creators, innovators, problem solvers, and the ones that are going to lead us out of our current calamities. So thank you, thank you.

I love it, and I just, I love how eloquently you state, you know, the major, the seismic shift that's happening now in society and what's coming ahead of us, and how I think the role of investors, like, we have such a responsibility and an opportunity, and it is, it's an arbitrage opportunity here to seize, to invest in diverse founders because they have been untapped, they have been Overlooked, and we're saying no more. And we salute you at Global Investor, we salute you at Reinventure Capital for everything that you're doing and the huge, huge changes that you're helping to make capital flow in a more equal way. As you said very eloquently, I wanted to mention that on our late— our most recent podcast episode at Investor Podcasts—

Thank you.

I've put the link in here so you can listen to Juliana and to Ed share in more detail about their investment thesis and the Third Reconstruction and what all of that means. But I really love the way that you're positioning all of this because, you know, it's time for us to come together. I think that the funding model is changing and it's time that it needs to properly change, and we need to have more equal opportunity for founders across the globe. As you say, the innovation is everywhere and we need to start funding those BIPOC and diverse founders that you've mentioned in a much more consequential way. I mean, the fact that it's all made— all-male white teams have been predominantly getting over 80-something percent of venture capital and capital full stop for the past 30 years, it's no longer acceptable. It just isn't.

Well, as you said, there are real costs and real negative impacts of that hyper-concentration of capital. And, you know, again, speaking to other investors, you know, we hear our peers for the past years complain about, you know, we're killing each other for deals and there's just so much money and not enough high-quality deals. And our response to that is there are actually many, many, many more high-quality deals than you have been Perceiving.

Yes.

Because, you know, they were outside the pattern you were seeking to match. Right. But if you look at the opportunity set, it's quite clear that we have hyper-concentrated capital and we've done so in defiance of the readily available data. And, and that is the market definition of a dislocation. I mean the textbook definition rather, excuse me, of a market dislocation. And when you have a market dislocation where the market fails to appropriately price risk and opportunity and therefore concentrates capital and does not capture a significant opportunity, then yes, you are absolutely right. That creates a tremendous disproportionate disproportionate opportunity for those who are able to recognize that and invest accordingly in that uncaptured opportunity. And that opportunity is profound.

I love the way you say that. I totally agree. And that's exactly what, what the Investor Directory is, is there to help be part of, to be able to open up the mindset and to open up take off some of the blinkers and to be able to show what's out there. There are so many. I mean, we're excited to have the first 350, but there are thousands and millions of incredible female founders out there that need and deserve your funding and your support. Now, I wanted to make sure that we could hand over as well to our other investors who are online with us. Julianne, are you okay now, or do you need to leave us? Because I know that you had a time commitment.

Oh, thank you for asking. No, I can stay. Thank you. But I'm happy to step back and hear from somebody else.

That's wonderful. And thank you so much for sharing. I really would encourage you— I've put the link to ReInvent Your Capital in the chat box. So do check them out because they are phenomenal. And, you know, they're always looking. You've already raised your— you know, raising a fantastic fund. They're always looking for great LPs out there because I'm hoping there's some LPs watching this as well as GPs. You know, this is a great opportunity. Go talk to Julian or Ed. They are phenomenal. know people and your money will be in very safe hands with them.

Thank you.

So I just wanted to see, Flohols and Hannah, would you like to, to be able to be visible and to talk and to add to this? Okay, you're not seeing the link. Well, let me just check. I'm going to allow— let me see, here we go. I'm going to allow you to become panelists. Your video can go on now if you want. I'm just going to Here we go, and then that should work, Hannah, as well. Anthony, I think, is just going to listen in. So there you are, Florence and Hannah. If you want to put on your videos, it's always nicer to see you. If you prefer just audio, that's perfectly fine too. Welcome to the chat, because it's always nice to have investors talking.

Hi, I'm traveling, so it's a little bit complicated to be online. But thank you for your invitation. It was very interesting to see the enormous amount of segmentation work and gathering and collection of all these things that you've been doing. It's very impressive. Yeah. So my, my work is around funding, you know, entrepreneurial ventures that matter. And a lot of it is around impact. And so I work a lot with women founders, and we— how can I say that? We always run into the types of situations that you have been describing.

Mm-hmm.

However, what the learning is, is that you have to inhabit a segment that for some reason has been left, you know, uncatered to and with a great myopia. So, you know, it's in this blind spot that's been there. So in a way, you come up with solutions that have been just ignored because they're not— because they were representing needs that weren't catered for. But now things are changing, like the underlying situation and environment is moving. So I think it's easier now than ever to get funded when you are an underrepresented founder, because there's more traction and visibility on the topic in general than, let's say, 5 years ago. And that's very valuable. That doesn't change the fact that you have to have traction and you have to display, you know, clients and results and revenues and whatnot, just like anybody else. But there's an opportunity to also present things, you know, in a number of layers of value, which is not only the financial value, but also the impact. And through the impact lens, you are able to magnify the impact, in my opinion, especially when you meet technology and that technology comes in as an accelerator and brings emphasis on everything that you are able to do. So I think that all in all, it's a wonderful time to be in this space. And I'm really glad to be— to have been inhabiting the space for over 10 years. So I can, you know, think about the old days when, when you talked about impact, you were just looked at like you were saying something weird, or you've been drinking something weird, or smoking I don't know what. You're such a tree hugger, Florence. So anyways, but you know, I am a tree hugger and, you know, I stand for the Clorox, I stand for the trees. So that's fine. But I think it's a very good time and we're coming at the intersection of very interesting waves of— and currents of knowledge and of representation and of social movements and It's a great time to be there, so happy to contribute.

And I'm so glad that you've said the magic words of impact investing, because, you know, on the directory you'll see we even have the categories called social entrepreneur, social enterprise, impact investing, sustainability, cleantech. They're all in there. And, you know, I think it's very important to, again, as you say, to kind of close the myopia, the short-sightedness, and to say, look, they're all—

Yeah, and you also see a lot of tech for good that's moving to that space.

Yeah.

And, you know, investors having to be more transparent about how they allocate to their constituents and their, you know, people benefit from the monies that are allocated through them. So all in all, I think all of this makes sense. And it's taken a while because the incumbents are not usually very What is it?

Open to change. Rejoiced by the fact that you step in and you say, oh, how about looking at this area now?

And they just really, you know, take a little time to adapt. But I think a lot of people have moved into different sectors that came from other, you know, businesses and realms of the industry and for-profit, non-for-profit, people in the measurement sector. So I think that the fact that it's been, you know, there's been a lot of people moving around jobs and, you know, segments of the market, this is also helping because, you know, when you don't have the right staff, how are you going to do it, you know? So, and also the education, you know, sector has been providing, you know, teaching, you know, learning opportunities that were not there before. So all in all, we're all growing. And yeah, I think, you know, it's in development, it's evolving, but it's certainly going the right way. Yeah.

It's still going to take time. I totally agree with you, Florence. I think it's going to take time. It is going the right way, thank goodness, because these are— I mean, the fact that we're actually having this conversation, we wouldn't have been able to have it even 5 years ago. even 5 or 3 years ago. So for sure, things are moving forward in a very good way. And that's why we hope and plan on Investor Directory being part of a catalyst for that change. Because when you suddenly have a directory that shows, look at all these IPOs that are led by women. Ah, okay. And look at all the sectors. Ah, okay. And these are all the Series B. There's this dearth of companies in Series B land, and there's certainly no female founders. Actually, here they are. So there's no more of that going on. I'd like to invite Hannah into the conversation. Hannah is in North Carolina— not Carolina, California, sorry. And she was telling us that you were being— you were not close to the fire, so I'm very glad to hear that. But how are you, Hannah? So yeah, so what are your first impressions, Florence, of the Directory now that you're That you've seen?

You know, it looks great. It looks great. More or less in my practice, I've been creating something similar, but just, you know, for myself, for my work. And I, you know, I nourish it. I've nourished it over the years, over 10 years now, of, you know, of knowledge and information I gather. you know, as I am very— I'm paying attention to everything that's moving, but that requires a market, you know, review and attention. That's enormous work. It's creating databases. So yeah, I think it's wonderful. I think you've done a beautiful job. And, you know, it's also powered by you know, technology that I have not developed because I don't really need it because I know my database like I breathe air. So, but that's because I know it. I think it wouldn't be really scalable. I mean, yeah, I've given access to other people at some times, so it's scalable in that sense. But I think, you know, the way you've put it up is, you know, is a lot more you know, is more beneficial, you know, is really beneficial to outside users that might not be insiders. And, you know, so I think it's wonderful. It's a huge effort because it's a, as we said, it's an environment that's always moving.

Yeah.

So you really have to keep up all the time with the latest news and you know, what's shifting and who is going where. Because when people move, you know, all of a sudden activities that weren't carried out or, you know, segments that weren't catered to all of a sudden become, you know, part of the mandate. And all of a sudden it's like, oh, this person's moved, so that's what it is. So you have to be on your toes.

Absolutely, that's for sure. I mean, the fun has just begun, and I'm very lucky to have Madeline on board with me, and she loves it as well. Like, we are just so excited. I was explaining, we did a previous webinar with just female founders, a briefing for them, and I was sharing how I had found a female company called Briogeo, and they make hair products for naturally curly hair. And it's a Black female founder in the US who's created this company, and I had discovered them. I was super excited. I put them on the directory, and like a few days later, I went into Sephora, And there they were, and I couldn't believe it, in Paris, and I was so excited. And my daughter has naturally curly hair, so I was thrilled. I bought her a bottle of conditioner. When I went up to pay for it, the lady at the cash register was a Black woman, and I said to her, do you know that this product is made by a Black woman in America? And she says, no way! I said, yes, and it's for naturally curly hair such as yours and my daughter. And she says, that's brilliant, I'm going to check it out after. I said, it's just arrived. Go and check it out. So I was like promoting it even to the cash register. That's what we've got to do. We've got to, at every instance, to say, look, these are the products and services, because the, you know, other founders don't think about us or look after us the same way. That in that particular case, Briogeo, their products are made with beautiful natural ingredients that care for the hair, etc., and don't weigh it down. But anyway, that's just an example. Hannah, I want to check in Can we hear you now? Can you hear me now?

Okay, great.

Hello, thank you.

How are you?

So tell us a bit about you.

Well, I, I really appreciate all of this. I, I've been a serial entrepreneur my whole life but never really had the, the right team, the right investors, never really quite made it with any of my projects very successfully. And so now I run a small foundation called the Abundant Earth Foundation, and we focus on supporting grassroots projects that are using permaculture and regenerative ag and nature-based solutions to— we really focus on efforts that are trying to lift up women and youth and different remote communities using these practices for food generation, for social entrepreneurial efforts. And we're really working to start a new branch of our foundation that is focusing on getting these companies ready for investors. So what are the pieces? And then also the impact investment companies, all of these companies that are looking for regenerative projects that aren't just sustainable but actually repair the planet and societies. And so trying to be that bridge between the companies and the investors. Again, you know, always trying to see, okay, where are the women? How can we help lift them up even more? And the people of color and everybody that, um, that we want to be focusing on Helping as much as possible. So I really appreciate this. We're also working on a networking platform called Weaver Network to just really help connect people. And that's another reason I really appreciate this directory is we really are running out of time to save the ecosystems that we depend on. to save our economies, to save our social structures. I mean, really everything I feel is on the line right now. And it's going to take coming together, supporting each other, raising women up to have these changes. And so, yeah, I definitely look forward to seeing how my foundation can work with investor and— See what we can do to to help move this forward. I was just on a call this morning with the UN looking at nature-based solutions and how we can really be creating these businesses that are going to you know help help communities everywhere. I mean, that's what we've seen this last month or two with now we're into the Greek. with hurricanes. The smoke from California is reaching over into Europe. Australia is on fire again. You know, I mean, it's just like, okay, this is the time to really come together. So yeah, thanks.

And you know, I'm so glad that you say that because, you know, there's— there's— I don't know if you know Tess Mateo. You should know her from CX Catalyst. I don't know if the name— she's also very involved with the UN on the whole green side of things. I'm typing her name in, but you should check her out. She's absolutely phenomenal. I've just— if you can see the chat, I hope you can see it now.

Yes.

Yes, that's cool. And the other thing is that actually we have within the directory, we do have quite a lot of agritech companies. We do have a lot of sustainable companies. We have some insect companies, so companies who are creating insect protein for food, all of that good stuff. So you can check it out. There's going to be a first start for you to check it out. We do have some B Corps as well, so of our first B Corps, which is very exciting. And I'd love to explore with you, Hannah. I'm going to type in my email, so please feel free to reach out to me.

Thank you.

Beyond here.

So yeah, I look forward to sharing this with other investors I know of.

Thank you, that'd be awesome. And I wanted to kind of put the spotlight on one thing before we kind of wrap things up here, is that this is the start. As I mentioned, it's part of our 1 Million Investors movement, and so I'm really calling on all of you, all of you who are actively in the impact investing space, in the investing in female founders and diversity, and as you're saying, in regenerative agriculture and building bridges, we all have to come together. And I think that, you know, I'd love you to be involved Hannah, as well as part of the 1 Million InvestHERs. You'll see, like, on the— on that page, we have a list of partners. Let me just share very quickly. You know, same with you, Florence, and your business, what you're doing, because you do a lot of work as well on helping to create funds and help to coach and mentor founders to do, you know, to expand their businesses. But here, I wanted to show you our first partners. So we have our first here is Re-InventHER, Julianne. With their website. And so we have the first investors who are part of it, different ecosystem partners and research partners and service partners. So this is the very beginning. This is going to grow to be massive in the future, but there's already some great believers and friends who are already there with us. And what I wanted to say is that in one month's time, we're going to be organizing our very first summit. So our virtual summit called Boost Her Biz, and that is all about Again, helping female founders get visibility and helping investors who invest in them get visibility. And so what's very important about that is we're making the first edition the Black Female Founder Edition, because I decided I didn't want to simply have a statement on what Global Investor believes in for Black Lives Matter. That's important, of course it is. I just wanted us to take action and to take it a step further. And so I decided to create this summit. So it's a half-day summit. Where we will have— we'll be showcasing Black female founders who've actually raised money so that they can be role models and explain their journeys to other female founders to show them that it's possible. Because as you know, we can nearly count the number of Black female founders who've raised over $1 million in one hand, and Julianne knows that it's particularly in the States, which is ridiculous. And as you said very rightly, because Black and brown founders are the majority on this planet, and women who are Black and brown are the majority of this planet. So hello, wake up world, we've got to fund them. So as I said, the first part of the summit will be around— focused on female founders, showcasing those who've raised money. And then there'll be a female founder showcase, so you'll get to see founders from our directory so they can showcase their products and services in a very short way. We'll be launching a global pitch competition, which is different. It's actually a funding competition. So where those female founders can actually get funded. So we have had commitments from several funds, including ReInventor, in discussions about, you know, commitments towards being able to actually fund female founders. Now, this competition, of course, has to go through a full process. There will be a jury, and there will be the proper due diligence afterwards. That's why it's not a competition— it's the wrong word. I have to find the right word for this. Julianne, you're gonna have to help me and everybody to find the right word, but it's not just a competition. So what's exciting though is that we want to give the great investors who are doing this great work, we want to give you visibility. So Juliane and Ed are going to be some of our featured speakers at BoosterBase Black Female Founder Edition because of all the fantastic work they're doing on the BIPOC funding on that space. And I know Juliane is, she's so brilliant, she's like, I'll do whatever you want, me to do, because I'll be on your jury, I'll do this, I'll do that. She's just awesome. So thank you so much, Julianne. So I want to kind of reach out for those of you who are interested that there's going to be opportunities to partner either through committing money if you want, and if it's part of your plan as part of your portfolio. If it's not that, you can sponsor, you can be a mentor, you can do many different ways to support the Black Female Founders who will be supporting on that day. And it'll be the first of several summits, so it'll become a template, I hope, for many more that will be virtual and global, focusing on different types of founders. So LGBTQ+, probably in June when it's Pride Month. Next year, Latinas. I know it's this month, but we're not going to make it this month. We're launching the directory, we can't do it all. So suffice to say, there's going to be plenty of opportunities for you to get involved. And if you are angel investors as well. We will be doing— we're doing some global research on angel investing in the States and in Europe. So I have a survey that's going out. There's plenty of ways to get involved, just helping, like you said, Hannah, Florence, and Julianne, just sharing the directory, sharing our resources, pointing other investors to this to say, hey, look, this is the women. This is like starting to kind of say that we want to be a resource that makes this whole easier for you. That's exactly what I said in my email to you. That's what I wanted to be. How can we make your lives easier as investors? And, you know, take the blinkers off. So those are the kind of key messages that I want to share with you. And just want to kind of check in with you and see if there's any further questions that you have, because I know your time is precious and we're nearly on the hour, and I want to keep to our timing. Super important for investors in particular— for everybody, but in particular for investors. If there's any other questions or comments that you'd like to make.

No, but I just look forward to having further conversations with you and seeing how we can partner.

Fantastic.

Thank you so much.

Yes, same thing.

I am gonna have to leave though, but thank you.

Thank you. Thank you, Hannah.

Yes, same thing here. I just, you know, maybe need to have a chat with you later on to catch up. And see how we may, you know, collaborate on it.

Okay? Fantastic.

I have to peel off.

I have to run as well. We're all going to go off now anyway, so thank you so much for being with us live. Thank you, Julianne, for sharing and for sharing about Re:Inventure. The light is gone, so it's going on in the dark. So I say good evening to you all. That's where the computer screen will help. I have to go inside for the 3rd webinar. Thank you so much for being with us. When you, when you go, you'll be linked back to the directory to take a look, and thanks to Billy and Julianne for for being here and being faithful as ever and being a fantastic support.

My pleasure, Anne. Thank you again for all you are doing to help build the ecosystem. And for everyone on the line, I really can't possibly encourage you strongly enough to check out the directory and play whatever part makes sense for you to gain access to a much richer, much more vibrant set of founders.

Thank you. And on that, I'm just going to wish you a wonderful rest of your day, a wonderful evening. As you can see, in France it's evening time, the night is falling. And see you very soon in whichever capacity on the Investor Directory on Global Investor. Thank you for being with us. Take care.