Good morning! FEC commissioner calls out Trump for trying to fire her, UPS CEO is facing unhappy investors, and the VC gender gap has consequences beyond funding.
- Gender gap. The venture capital market has started to slowly rebound over the past year. But that rebound hasn't been felt equally. Female founders feel less supported by VCs and less optimistic about raising funding, according to a new survey by January Ventures.
The pre-seed fund surveyed 311 early-stage founders between September and December of 2024; January Ventures shared those results exclusively with Fortune. Of the founders surveyed, 20% hadn't yet started to raise capital, 50% had raised pre-seed or angel funding, 25% were seed stage, and 3% were Series A. Half of all respondents were in the U.S., with 35% in Europe. Just under half of survey respondents were women and almost half were people of color.
Twenty-two percent of male startup founders said they felt strong support from VCs—while only 11% of female founders felt the same. That's the largest gap since before the pandemic. Almost 60% of male founders said they feel optimistic about raising capital, while only 41% of female founders feel the same.
Female founders aren't wrong to be less optimistic. In 2024, total deal value in the U.S. venture capital market crossed $209 billion, according to PitchBook—although outsize AI raises accounted for about a quarter of that activity. Other signs point to a challenging environment for female founders. In 2024, emerging managers raised $15 billion—the lowest sum in a decade, per PitchBook. The seed-stage startup founders surveyed by January Ventures are often among those to receive checks from emerging managers. Indeed, 21% of female founders surveyed said they forewent raising at all in 2024, while only 5% of men said the same.
Compared to their male counterparts, female founders were 30% more likely to report experiencing mental health challenges. Almost 30% of male founders believe that becoming a founder improved their mental health—only 18% of female founders say the same.
"There’s a massive opportunity for investors who can reduce friction for female founders and address this capital inefficiency," says January Ventures managing partner Jennifer Neundorfer.
Emma Hinchliffe
emma.hinchliffe@fortune.com
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