WEGate, the one stop shop for women entrepreneurs, was a key feature of the “Startup to Scaleup – The Role of Business Angels” event, organized by France Angels and Business Angels Europe on 8 and 9 March in Paris. It provided a great opportunity to showcase the value of the WEGate platform and programme to an audience of more than 190 leaders in the European access to finance ecosystem.
BAE is part of the consortium that manages the WEGate programme, specifically taking responsibility for the “Access to Finance” stream, for which BAE has already organized multiple online events (see upcoming webinar).
The dedicated WEGate panel on “Women and Diversity in Angel Investing” kicked off a year wherein WEGate will be focusing on access to finance in particular. Indeed, the WEGate Barometer has shown this to be a crucial barrier to more women entrepreneurship.
As was found in the WA4E research done by BAE, a key part of the struggle of women entrepreneurs to raise finance for their business, is the severe lack of women investors that evaluate their propositions.
Moderated by Claire Munck (CEO of BeAngels and Scalefund, Belgium), the panel discussed best practices in Europe on having more women investors, and thus, bettering the access to finance climate in Europe.