The Bridge Conference, a women-led venture capital conference that will take place virtually on May 20th of this year, aims to close the gap between female-led startups and the venture capitalists that fund them by uplifting a new generation of women in venture capital. The event will match limited partners to female emerging fund managers, to help create a more inclusive environment within both the startup and venture capital industries.
Both the venture capital and startup industries are famously homogenized, and statistics show that women are often left out of the conversation when it comes to startups and financial leadership and funding. This often leads to a disparity in the startup industry where female entrepreneurs are frequently left out in comparison to their male counterparts, so the goal of uplifting both female entrepreneurs and female venture capitalists is to create a more even playing field in both industries, where racial and gender equity are able to become a focus.
“According to Carta in 2019, women employees own just 49 cents in equity for every dollar men own, which is astounding,” said The Bridge Conference founders Emna Ghariani and Sophia Platt in a statement that was released this week. “It is important to take operators and turn them into investors rather than asking them for investment experience,” the statement read.
While The Bridge Conference won’t work directly with startups and entrepreneurs, it will provide a resource for emerging limited partners and emerging fund managers to be able to connect in a way that will bring new talent into the industry. The event hopes to keep the event small to assure that all of the general partners meet three limited partners or more, making it easy for new faces to connect and network with one another.
According to Women in VC, only 5.6 percent of all of the venture capital firms in the United States are led by women, and only 2.1percent are founded by a woman of color. The data also shows that only 2.4 percent of all venture capital partners are founding partners in their firm, suggesting that women are often left out of the conversation when it comes to founding new firms, despite the fact that the data suggests that female-founded VC firms often outperform those founded by their male counterparts. And in many cases, venture capital firms don’t have a single female partner at all.
The Bridge Conference hopes to change that, and is excited to welcome in a new generation of women to the world of venture capital through its events. You can snag an invite through the link right here.
