Dell announced findings of the 2016 Women Entrepreneur Cities Index (WE Cities), revealing the top 25 global cities fostering high potential women entrepreneurs.
The new Dell Women Entrepreneur Cities Index (WE Cities) is the only global gender-specific index that looks at a city’s ability to attract and foster growth of women-owned firms. Extensive data and analysis says that when impediments to female entrepreneurship are removed, there is a dramatic uplift in a city’s economic prospects.
Ranking of top cities for women entrepreneurs
| 1. NEW YORK2. BAY AREA 3. LONDON 4. STOCKHOLM 5. SINGAPORE 6. TORONTO 7. WASHINGTON, DC 8. SYDNEY 9. PARIS 10. SEATTLE 11. MUNICH 12. AUSTIN 13. BEIJING 14. HONG KONG 15. TAIPEI 16. SHANGHAI 17. TOKYO 18. MEXICO CITY 19. SAO PAULO 20. SEOUL 21. MILAN 22. DELHI 23. JOHANNESBURG 24. JAKARTA 25. ISTANBUL |
What can we do in Atlanta?
How do we take our terrific local talent and catapult it to the global tech stage? I’d love to know what you think. Locally, we all know Atlanta is a top city nationally in the production of female entrepreneurs. Also, the women-led companies we have here are among the most profitable in their space.
We celebrate these figures, and yet, this study reveals our local economy doesn’t have the hallmarks of a global leader in this space–yet.
Want to do something about it?
Here are four ideas:
1) Create benchmarks around startups and manage to numbers. Are you seeing enough women entrepreneurs? With 41% of the companies pitching for early stage investment led by women or minorities, your network should reflect our market reality.
2) Choose to mentor women entrepreneurs.
3) Don’t sit on tech or startup panels that aren’t gender and racially diverse.
4) If you’re an investor, manage your portfolio to make sure you’re getting exposure to high growth, women-led or gender diverse teams.
I love Atlanta. We’re such a big, busy city that we can lose perspective about our relative performance on a national and local level. This study from Dell is a potential wake up call that even a tech corporation, like Dell, doesn’t see our community as a leader in a metric-driven area of entrepreneurship that’s important to them on a global scale.
If you’d like more exposure to local women tech entrepreneurs, let me know. Valor can help.