Supporting Women Entrepreneurs

Women in Business today

In 2019, it was reported by the Telegraph that women entrepreneurs get 157 times less funding than men entrepreneurs, and according to Crunchbase, only 3% of venture capital investments go to women-founded business. This makes it extremely challenging and lonely for women entrepreneurs to thrive and succeed in starting a business and making it succeed.

What are the challenges women entrepreneurs are facing?

Balancing business and family life

Women are expected to spend more time taking care of their families and children which leaves them with less time and energy to spend on building and growing their businesses. Around the world, the majority of women in their 20s-30s, the age when most men start businesses, have someone to care for whether children or in their own families. Social expectations are stricter on women than men in this regard in most cultures and societies.

          Lack of Funding

Not taken seriously by investors, not having access to loans and grants, social and gender-based expectations are some of the many reasons that make raising capital an even more challenging aspect of starting a female-owned business.

Finding the money needed to start a business is challenging for both men and women entrepreneurs, but women are proving to be facing even more challenges in this area.

AFSS helps in raising capital for female-owned businesses by introducing them to angel investors and VCs through its Raise Capital program.

          Lack of Education

Women worldwide have poorer chances of getting a high education. Although academic education may have little to do with business, this affects their chances of starting a business because it affects their chances of starting a career altogether.

          Building a network

In some business networking events, you can count women attendees on the one hand. Not having access to a network of businessmen and businesswomen who can support your business might be just another challenge for female founders. The more women in business there are, the easier and more encouraging it is for other women to become entrepreneurs.

          “Familiar” Markets are saturated

It is stated that women founders tend to start businesses in healthcare, education, media, and food. These markets might be saturated and women founders are left to search for new markets and territories. Less women founders start businesses in technical, construction, or transportations industries for many reasons. This leaves women entrepreneurs with less markets to navigate which is another challenge for them.

The Bright side of Female Entrepreneurship

Although a lot of challenges meet women entrepreneurs on their way to build successful businesses, they are still making a big progress.

In the last 20 years it is stated that women-led businesses increased by 100% and by 114% in the US.

The case might not be the same in the Middle East as the female business ownership rate is estimated by less than 10% but FasterCapital’s and other initiatives are there to make it a little easier for women founders and to potentially bridge the gender gap in the Middle East and elsewhere.

How is AFSS supporting female founders?

Woman empowerment is going big and every sector in society is contributing. We at AFSS will be very glad to contribute with what we are good at; supporting businesses!

We support startups and founders in general, but we also provide special support for women founders and teams that include women.

We want to be part of the process of making the world a better place for women and therefore for everyone else!

If you are a woman founder or a woman team member in a startup, or if you know someone who is, we will be glad to have you or them in our network. Join our programs anytime here.

As an online incubator and accelerator we are willing to work with female founders from different regions and countries. We have a round of funding only for founding teams that include women and for female founders. We offer making an evaluation for free to startups joining this special round of funding.

We support women entrepreneurs by helping them in starting their business, transforming their ideas into startups, and building their product(s). After building the product, FasterCapital can help you with marketing and promoting it and in increasing your sales and entering new markets through our growth and scaling program.

Invest in women-owned businesses

If you are an angel investor and interested in investing in women-owned business, we will be glad to have you in our investors’ network .

We will help you find and invest in women-owned startups from different stages and industries. (Fintech, Edutech, Helthtech, B2B, B2C and other industries).

If you are a VC firm that supports women founders, AFSS will also be glad to collaborate with you on supporting female-owned businesses by discussing co-investments, deal-flow, and other types of collaborations.

Our services include technical development, business development, raising funds, sales and marketing, among many others.

Our programs and services for women entrepreneurs

We can help female founders through one of our four programs: Raise Capital, Tech Cofounder, Idea to Product, and Grow your Startup.

AFSShelps women entrepreneurs with many services

          Raising capital for women-owned businesses

If you are a female entrepreneur and you want to raise capital and funds for your own business, FasterCapital is ready to help you.

AFSS has a huge network of angel investors, mentors, regional partners, and representatives. We will help you find angel investors who are focusing on investing in women-owned businesses and help you in getting funded by venture capital firms that support women entrepreneurs.

We also provide access to small business loans and small business grants for women by helping women entrepreneurs get connected with local and global banks.

We help women in raising money regardless of the stage of the business. We help in raising seed funding, pre MVP stage funding, post MVP stage funding, and series A funding for women-owned businesses.

We also help in raising funds for women entrepreneurs in Fintech, Edutech, Helthtech, B2B and most other industries.

We also go beyond helping in raising capital, we also help women entrepreneurs by improving and reviewing the business plan, pitch deck and financial forecasts to help get all their materials ready for pitching.

          Find an angel investor for a woman-owned business

Since AFSS is an online incubator and accelerator, we have a huge network of angel investors, ecosystem partners and VCs, we help female-led startups who are looking for angel investors – especially the ones who are interested in investing in and supporting women-owned businesses.

If you are a female founder or a female entrepreneur and you are looking for an angel investor for your women-owned business, we will help you find the right angel investor for your startup through our network.

First, we will work on your pitching material (pitch deck, business plan, financial forecast), then we will help you match and get connected with the angel investor to make sure you approach angel investors successfully through our Raise Capital program.

          VC funding for female founders

If you are a female founder who is looking for VC funding and investment, we will help find the right venture capital firm for your business in your local area or globally if preferred by you.

AFSS helps women-owned startups to get funded through venture capitals. We provide different funding options for women-owned businesses, and VC funding is one the best funding options that are available.

          Accelerators and incubators for female entrepreneurs

AFSS is an online incubator and accelerator that provides different services for startups and special funding rounds and discounts for women entrepreneurs.

Through our Raise Capital program, we help women-owned businesses raise the money they need. We also help women entrepreneurs in technical development, and growing their businesses by offering sales and marketing services on an equity basis.

Since AFSS has always supported women entrepreneurs in their journey of building their business, we offer a special funding round for female entrepreneurs who are looking for funding options for their business. We can invest up to 50% of the money needed.

          Small business loans for women

If you are a female founder and are looking for funding from small business loans, AFSS can help with that. Through our Raise AFSS program, we will help in accessing small business loans for female founders through connecting them with local and global banks.

AFSS will consult on whether you want to have a loan for women-owned businesses from the beginning and try to approach funds or high net individuals to help women-owned businesses raise funds through small business loans.

          Small business grants for women

AFSS helps women-owned businesses raise funds through small business grants. If you are a female founder who is looking for funding from small business grants.

There are many different types of small business grants for women-owned business like direct grants and soft loans.