Women in FinTech 2020 (Founders)
Despite the industry improvements of women in leadership roles within financial services, there is still more to be done in this new decade. From startups to enterprises, development programs and mentorship are slowly increasing in the workplace to allow for more of these opportunities for the next generation of FinTech leaders.
“Women represent only 30% of the fintech workforce, 12% of fintech founders are women, and women founders receive just 2% of venture capital. But irrespective of the imbalance, there is a fiercely active, tightly knit community of women working to change fintech for the better – from those actively building tech solutions, to those working inside financial institutions to drive innovation and change, or those designing products that better tap into an underserved market and drive financial inclusion.
Ghela Boskovich, Founder of FemTech Global (NSBanking)
In this first installment of a 2-part series, let’s explore some of the top female founders from the last 15 years as they pave the way for change within their company and the industry for more women in FinTech.
Top Female Founders in fintech
Kathryn Petralia, Kabbage
Based in Atlanta, Kathryn successfully launched Kabbage (a business lending platform with lines of credit up to $250K) valued over $1B. Kathryn comes from a finance background, working previously for payments, e-commerce, and credit companies for over 15 years.
Knowing firsthand how critical short-term capital is for businesses AND the gap in the lending market for this segment, she started Kabbage. With other fintech companies looking to compete in the business lending space, Kabbage is looking towards adding payments and other products as a key differentiator. In 2017, Kathryn made the list as one of Forbes’ 100 most powerful women.
Advice from Women Founders in FinTech (Image - CR)
Lucy Yueting Liu, Airwallex
Lucy is a co-founder of Airwallex, a top cross-border payment startup with remarkable growth in the Asia Pacific region. Her background is in investing and consulting (with China International Capital Corp) and finance (Master’s from the University of Melbourne).
Seeing a huge gap in the payments industry with companies and foreign exchange, she and a group of friends launched Airwallex. Lucy oversees the office in Shanghai and built the Chinese division of the startup.
Sallie Krawcheck, Ellevest
Ellevest is a well-known fintech startup committed to narrow the gender gap in investing. CEO and co-Founder Sallie Krawcheck is the visionary who helps empower women with custom portfolios offered by her company.
Seeking to breakthrough a sector primarily led by men, she created Ellevest. Ellevest highlights key gender issues such as earnings gap, career pause and restarts, and lifespan. Sallie is focused on delivering the financial tools and knowledge to women, so they can meet their goals.
Rebeca Minguela, Clarity
As founder and CEO of Clarity, Rebecca solves the problem of inefficient capital allocation through a universal framework and system to rate companies.
Within the industry, she was recognized early in 2017 as the first winner of the ‘Women in Fintech’ prize at the BBVA Open Talent competition.
Clarity is focused on narrowing the gender gap in tech with nearly half of the company’s staff being female.
Catherine Wines, WorldRemit
Part of the early days of FinTech, Catherine (founder and Director) started WorldRemit in 2010 to compete with MoneyGram and Western Union.
Focused on enabling simple, low-cost global remittance services for immigrants and developing countries, WorldRemit has become a trusted brand in payments. Catherine supports not only women in fintech, but female migrant workers throughout the world.
Eva Wong, Borrowell
Without prior experience in tech or banking, Eva launched Borrowell, a startup that assists Canadians with credit. By offering multiple services (such as free credit reports, scores, and custom financial recommendations for lending products), Borrowell was able to capture early growth.
In addition to empowering her clients, Eva has also focused on women in the workplace — she increased her own workforce from 20% to 50% female.
Amy Nauiokas, Anthemis Group
Amy was active in FinTech investments before co-founding Anthemis Group (a financial services investment company) in 2010. She is also founder / CEO of Archer Gray, a media production, finance, and investment firm.
With leadership roles at Cantor Fitzgerald and Barclays, Amy wanted to focus on what’s next in FinTech. Her top areas of interest have been home ownership and lending, and the SMB segment.
Teresa Y. Hodge, R3 Score Technologies
R3 Score Technologies was founded by Teresa to help individuals with criminal backgrounds gain back opportunities in society, specifically with work, education, and financial services.
Having spent time in prison, she knows the justice system first-hand and what the struggles are after serving a sentence. R3 built a platform that identifies other factors in a person’s background, which impact financial worthiness. Teresa also launched a separate company that offers education, training, and coding to potential entrepreneurs with a criminal past.
Cristina Junqueira, Nubank
Cristina, known for co-founding Nubank (a Brazilian neobank), had come from a formal banking background in which she struggled to make changes towards financial wellness.
She left the corporate world to focus on providing better and affordable banking in Brazil, a country that charges the highest fees for lackluster service. Cristina has been able to guide the country back towards trusting in banks — the neobank has over 12M customers and a $10B valuation, making it the most valued challenger bank globally.
Viola Llewellyn, Ovamba Solutions
With Ovamba Solutions, Viola helps micro, small and medium-sized businesses in Africa have access to short-term capital.
The fintech has expanded into northern Nigeria and South Africa with its offering, and processed over 1K transactions for businesses in Cameroon (summer of 2019). Viola is also an influencer in the industry (speaker at TEDx) and on the board of advisors for Lobbying Africa, a group that helps companies enter into the African market.
Judith Erwin, Grasshopper Bank
Judith has deep experience in launching banking platforms, previously a part of Square 1 Bank — now leading Grasshopper Bank as its CEO.
Known for being a business banking veteran, she started the digital bank with a high focus on security to avoid data compromises and financial penalties. Her company is backed by well-know investor groups, such as T. Rowe Price, who have participated in the $130M in capital raised.
Julia Kurnia, Zidisha
Zidisha is a fintech startup that provides a digital marketplace for small business lending for entrepreneurs. As founder and CEO, Julia has focused her microlending platform in developing countries. Inspired to action during a stay in Niger, she wanted to build a company that reduces the disparity in wages.
Zidisha has minimized the lending cost on the microloans in order to make this change happen. Julia’s background before starting the company was as a portfolio analyst (for US African Development Foundation) and international finance professional.
Jennifer Fitzgerald, Policygenius
Back in 2014, Jennifer Fitzgerald co-founded Policygenius to make it a simple and easy platform for consumers to educate themselves and purchase the insurance they need. Over the last 6 years, the company has been able to deliver on this commitment and become a top InsurTech firm in the industry, with over $50M in funding raised.
Jennifer’s work in finding investors wasn’t easy, but it has all been worth it as Policygenius is recognized as the nation's leading online insurance marketplace.
Anne Boden, Starling Bank
Anne Boden is well-recognized in the FinTech industry as the Founder/CEO of Starling Bank, a challenger bank in the UK. She had worked her way up in banking at Allied Irish Banks, eventually becoming a COO.
With support from the Royal Bank of Scotland, Anne has helped Starling grow to over 1M customers and £1B in deposits.
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