Europe’s debate about gender equity in venture has moved beyond awareness and intention. The real question now is much sharper: how does capital actually move, where does it get stuck, and what genuinely changes outcomes for women building companies today?
In this episode, Andreas sits down with Debbie Wosskow, a serial founder, investor, and Chair of the UK’s Invest in Women Task Force, to discuss what she has learned from 25 years inside the system. This is a conversation about incentives, power, institutional capital, and why gender equity in venture is not a “nice to have” but a performance strategy.
We move from founder mindset to investor behavior to ecosystem and government-level levers and end with a clear-eyed reflection on DEI, ESG, and feminism. At a moment when many are retreating, the case for backing women has never been stronger.
Context: the data doesn’t lie, and it isn’t improving fast enough
Debbie opens with a hard truth:
Women do found companies. In the UK, 1 in 5 high-growth, capital-ready businesses is founded by a woman.
Yet only ~2% of venture capital makes it through investment committees to women-only teams. This gap isn’t explained by ambition, readiness, or quality. It’s explained by how capital flows and who controls those flows.
Debbie’s motivation is blunt and unapologetic: the gender pay gap creates the gender savings gap, and without access to capital, women don’t get rich. Fixing that requires changing how money moves, not running more mentorship programs.
Who Debbie Wosskow is and why she’s doing this now
Debbie founded her first business in 1999 and has since built and exited three companies, raising capital across angels, syndicates, venture, and private equity.
Her career insight is disarmingly honest:
“The single point of difference in my success is that I’m very good at asking men for money.”
As she enters her 50s, Debbie has chosen to focus almost exclusively on changing capital allocation for founders and for investors. The reason is simple and data-backed:
A female investor is twice as likely to back a female entrepreneur.
That insight underpins her work as Chair of the UK’s Invest in Women Task Force, an industry-led, government-backed initiative with one goal: redirecting institutional capital toward women, not as DEI, but as a way to drive outsized returns for the UK economy.
What the Invest in Women Task Force actually does
The Invest in Women Task Force is not a grant program and not a PR exercise. It is a politically convened, industry-led effort to change how institutional capital—pension funds, banks, insurers, and asset managers—flows into venture.
Key points:
Industry-led, government-backed (with convening power, not “free money”)
Focused on institutional capital, not charity
Explicitly framed around returns, performance, and untapped alpha
Debbie co-chairs the Task Force with Hannah Bernard (formerly Barclays, now Nationwide), pairing entrepreneurial and banking perspectives.
Their initial target was £250m.
As of today, they’ve raised £635m without taxpayer money, without shortcuts, and with significant resistance along the way.
That capital is split across:
A fund of funds backing female and mixed-GP venture funds
Strategic partnerships with institutions like the British Business Bank and BGF, pushing for gender-balanced investment committees and transparent reporting
Advice for women founders: money, confidence, and pattern-matching
When Andreas asks what women founders most need to hear, Debbie is clear:
Talk about money. Want money. Don’t apologize for wanting money.
Be capital-ready and know your ask
Understand that the funnel is real: 1 in 5 → 2%
Investors pattern-match and women don’t always look like past winners
She shares a familiar story: businesses serving women are often dismissed as “niche,” despite representing half the population.
Debbie also notes a structural shift worsening the stats: most large rounds in recent years have gone into AI, where women are underrepresented as founders.
Her practical advice:
Build networks intentionally
Learn where capital actually sits (e.g., SEIS/EIS in the UK)
Sell yourself and your story with the same confidence expected of men
Seek out initiatives like the Invest in Women Task Force that actively map female investor networks
The real bottleneck: investors, not founders. A recurring excuse from venture firms is that the problem is “top-of-funnel,” that they simply don’t see enough women.
Debbie rejects this outright:
The data shows women exist in the pipeline.
They just don’t make it through investment committees.
Her response shifts responsibility squarely onto funds:
All-male firms see fewer women-led deals
Pattern-matching is reinforced by homogenous teams
Marketing, messaging, and website photos don’t fix this
Her answer is unequivocal:
The single most powerful thing a fund can do is hire women.
Hiring women, especially into senior GP and IC roles, changes:
Deal flow
Decision-making
What “venture-scale” looks like in the room
Why mixed teams matter (for founders and funds)
Debbie emphasizes a critical, often overlooked lever: Mixed teams deliver better returns.
Her message is intentionally directed at men:
Male founders: build with women
Male investors: back mixed teams
GP teams: share economics equitably with women
Why? Because incentives matter.
If capital pools explicitly favor mixed teams and female GPs, behavior changes. That’s not ideology, it’s venture mechanics.
Ecosystem lessons for Europe: what actually worked in the UK
Andreas asks what other European ecosystems can learn.
Debbie highlights several factors behind the UK’s relative progress:
Getting the issue on the political agenda (for convening power, not subsidies)
Creating a moment in time with a ticking clock
Convening institutional capital and asking a direct question: will you back this or not?
Forcing transparency: reporting gender data, reforming IC composition
She’s candid about trade-offs:
A centralized fund of funds was the goal, but reality required flexibility
Progress is slower than headlines suggest
£635m is meaningful, but £15bn was deployed in UK venture last year
The episode closes with a wide-angle reflection on 2026.
Debbie doesn’t sugarcoat it:
She’s more worried about feminism than ever before
Flexible work risks invisibility for women
Public backlash and “D&I fatigue” have given institutions cover to retreat
But she reframes the opportunity:
This is the moment to prove that gender equity is about performance.
Not charity.
Not compliance.
Not virtue signaling.
Her optimism is grounded in facts:
A major wealth transfer toward women is underway
More women are earning six figures than ever before
More female billionaires are emerging
Capital in women’s hands changes outcomes
Her motivation is clear:
“This is about women being economically independent—and about institutions making more money by backing them.”
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