This is not the best place for this venture capital company. In 20 14, when Anu Duggal launched the Female Founders Fund, it took two years to negotiate with 700 partners, raised more than 5.8 million US dollars and invested in 30 companies. In the past six years, some of these companies went public, and some were acquired by Wal-Mart and Procter & Gamble. The Women Founder's Fund also completed a second fundraising of up to $27 million, partly from Bill Gates' wife Melinda Gates. In just six years, how did this female VC company win Melinda's favor, quintupled its financing and put the company it invested in on the IPO road?
The initial intention of starting a business is the key to the company's differentiated operation.
"I walked into the conference room and talked for a long time. A group of male investors in their forties and fifties asked me doubtfully,' Can my wife use it in the future?' When investing in Exclusively.in, Anu Duggal (hereinafter referred to as Anu) understood how difficult it is for a female entrepreneur to raise money from a room full of men.
Anu is an Indian American. After graduating from MBA in London Business School in 2009, she followed her parents back to her hometown and founded Exclusively.in, India's first female fashion e-commerce platform with flash purchase mode. When investing, she found that it is not difficult for these investors to understand the business model, but it is difficult to understand women's consumption behavior or aesthetic needs. Who will pay for what they don't understand?
Two years later, Anu sold Exclusively.in to Myntra, India's largest e-commerce retailer, and returned to new york with the money, changing from an entrepreneur to an investor. Many female entrepreneurs cried for her after they got her investment, and also talked to male investors. After chatting for a long time, this group of male investors in their forties and fifties asked them,' Can I let my wife try it?' "
Whether in India or the United States, the experience of female entrepreneurs is the same. Anu began to study the gender differences in the investment market. She found that in 20 14 years, the female investors in the American VC market were less than 9%; The annual investment fund is 1 1000 billion dollars, of which only 2% is obtained by women entrepreneurs; In a survey of 430 female entrepreneurs, "obtaining capital" is listed as the biggest difficulty in the process of starting a business. At the same time, women occupy 56% of the labor market in the United States, and the speed of starting a business is 1.5 times the national average; Companies with women in the entrepreneurial team are 63% more profitable than companies with only male founders.
There is a lack of investors who really know about female entrepreneurs in the market, and the opportunities for female entrepreneurs to get investment are far worse than those of men, but there are more and more female entrepreneurs, which can bring huge benefits. Seeing the unfairness and business opportunities, Anu established the Female Founder Fund of Venture Capital Company (hereinafter referred to as F3) and decided to invest only in female entrepreneurs.
By choosing a portfolio, we can shape the company's values.
In Anu's view, "only investing in female entrepreneurs" is the initial intention of F3' s entrepreneurship and the key to distinguishing it from other VC companies. Only by maximizing their own differences and uniqueness can they stand out in the circle of a venture capital company. How can we maximize the difference of F3?
F3' s answer is to shape the company's values by choosing a portfolio.
In the choice of portfolio, F3 not only invests in female entrepreneurs, but also prefers products or companies that are non-mainstream, unique, unpopular and weird but have strong female values.
For example, F3 once invested in Lex, a lesbian social application.
She felt the desire of women to socialize, and women tended to express themselves in words and communicate emotionally in making friends, but most of the dating software on the market at that time was for men, either only for gay men (like APP Grindr) or the software highlighted users' photos and did not advocate deep socialization (like APP Tinder). Kyle thought, why not create a social APP based on text communication only for women? Lex was born. On Lex, only text introduction is allowed on the user's personal data; Only when users are familiar with each other can the system allow them to send pictures to each other.
Anu was moved by Lex's sympathy for women's feelings and led the investment of one million dollars.
For another example, Anu also invested in Billie, a brand of razors specially made for women.
Billie was founded by Georgina Gooley, a female entrepreneur, on 20 17 1 1 After an experience that shaving tools were badly needed, but only male razors could be found on the supermarket shelves, Georgina found that the razor market was dominated by male users for a long time, and the demand for female shaving was ignored by the whole market like an elephant in the room, thus establishing Billie.
What Billie really touched Anu was that the brand did not blindly ask women to cater to men's aesthetics. On the contrary, Billie often tells female consumers through advertisements that shaving is only an option. "If you need a shave, Billy will be there; If you don't shave, women are just as beautiful. " 2065438+April 2008, F3 participated in Billie's nearly $6 million seed round financing. Two years later, Billy was acquired by Procter & Gamble.
In addition to these two brands, F3 also invested in social APP peanuts; It's specially made for mothers. Stitch fix-a fashion e-commerce company that can match clothes for women; Let the Runway-an online costume rental platform that understands that women "don't need to own every dress". These companies all embody F3' s investment values: companies create for women, products sympathize with women's needs, and speak out for gender injustice.
Create a corporate brand image by creating a community.
In recent years, the female market has been continuously explored, and more and more VC companies only invest in women. F3 began to think about how to ensure that female entrepreneurs can think of F3 first when financing. How can we really have a "only for female entrepreneurs" sign?
Anu's answer is that F3 should not only be a fund, but also a female brand. F3 needs to create a community to own and bind the brand "only for female entrepreneurs".
So in 20 14, when F3 raised the first 6 million yuan, the first person hired by Anu was not an analyst that traditional VC companies would hire, but a community director who could carry out activities. F3 community directors convene female entrepreneurs and investors for 40-50 discussions and activities every year.
These activities have several advantages.
First of all, these activities can provide technical support for female entrepreneurs or share their experience in managing companies. For example, F3 once launched the activity of "Building a Beauty Brand on Instagram", inviting the global sales director of Instagram to advise female leaders on how to use IG to promote brand growth. It also held a "Breakfast for Female Entrepreneurs" event, which brought all female entrepreneurs together at a table to exchange entrepreneurial experience and provide entrepreneurial support.
Second, F3 can raise its popularity by holding activities. For example, F3 once organized an activity called "Meeting Women Entrepreneurs in new york" in conjunction with top American venture capital companies such as Bain Capital Venture Capital, First Round Capital, Union Square Ventures and Lightspeed, and invited a group of new york women entrepreneurs to come. That night, because the organizer F3 was as famous as these large funds, it left a deep impression on entrepreneurs.
Third, these activities allow investors and entrepreneurs to introduce each other. For example, in the event of "Meeting Women Entrepreneurs in new york", the founder of wedding e-commerce Zola, Shan-Lyn Ma, met with investors of Lightspeed, and then the investors of Lightspeed led Zola's C round of financing.
Most importantly, by establishing a community, F3 has formed a network dominated by F3, with a large number of female entrepreneurs, female investors and female partners, so that all female entrepreneurs can think of F3 at the first time when they need funds; Female partners can think of F3 as soon as they need to invest. It is not difficult to understand that Bill Gates' wife Melinda will invest F3 on 20 18 when she founded Pivotal Ventures, an investment fund aimed at bridging gender inequality. In the interview, she mentioned that F3, as a limited partner, is the type she wants to invest most: "Fund founders who can think about social issues in their lives will be more able to see and identify breakthrough market opportunities", and "Obviously, F3 can hear the voices of a few female entrepreneurs".
Outline of main points
The Women Entrepreneur Fund is a venture capital company. In 20 14, the company only raised nearly 6 million yuan, but six years later, the venture capital company raised five times and won the favor of Bill Gates' wife Melinda.
The female founder fund mainly did three things right: first, stick to the initial intention of starting a business and turn it into the characteristics of the company's differentiated operation. There is a huge gender injustice in the investment market, so F3 took this as its initial venture and only invested in women.
Second, by choosing a portfolio, we can shape the company's values. F3 not only invests in female entrepreneurs, but also prefers products or companies that are non-mainstream, unusual and unpopular, but have strong female values.
Thirdly, by building a community, F3 has made its brand image of "only for female entrepreneurs" deeply rooted in the whole investment market.
What is your initial intention of starting a business? Do you know how to turn your initial heart into your own characteristics? In the vast business sea, do you know how to run your own company differently? What are the secrets and tricks to build community culture? Welcome to join the Chinese EMBA of City University, with knowledge of investment, finance, marketing, brand and trend business.