Female Fusion & Mindshift Capital Collaborate to launch Investment Summit for women-led businesses

Female Fusion has collaborated with Mindshift Capital, the UAE’s first gender lens venture fund, to launch its first ever Investment Summit for women-led businesses. The aim is to help women led businesses explore and connect with the start-up and scaling finance options available in the UAE.

The event brought together female entrepreneurs, representatives from angel investors, VCs, institutional funders, and debt financing organizations. The event brought a wide range of funding opportunities for women-owned enterprises and rendered guidance on the legal aspects from an expert in the field. The event also showcased stories of female-run businesses that had successfully received capital to back their venture. Three entrepreneurs also pitched their business to a panel of investment experts at the event.

Jennifer Blandos, CEO, Female Fusion opened the event with remarks on the massive gender gap that exists in terms of business investments in the MENA region. She said that just 2% of global venture capital funding goes to women-led enterprises, and hardly 0.1% in the MENA region.

Walid Faza, COO and Partner of MSA Capital spoke to the audience of 40 invited female business owners about the various stages of investment and the different opportunities that exist in the regional ecosystem. Walid explained the key indicators that investors look at. He also encouraged entrepreneurs to look at all the options to find an investor that would represent a good fit for their business.

Mark Griffiths from UAE lending platform, Beehive spoke about the opportunities for debt financing towards business growth. He described the workings of different funding options and how to pick the right solution.

Heather Henyon, Founding Partner of Mindshift Capital and Founder of the Women’s Angel Investor Network (WAIN), the first and largest women’s angel group in the Middle East also spoke at the event. In a fireside chat, she shared her vast knowledge on investing in over 200 start-ups and experience of gender-lens investment funding and the requirements for the different stages of investment, from pre-seed to series A.

The event ended with an investment pitch from three female entrepreneurs to a panel of Mindshift Capital team members including Joumana Jallad, Barbara Baumgartner and Rona Shedid. The panel also included Grubtech CEO and cofounder Mohamed Al Fayed and MSA Capital’s Walid Faza.

Jennifer Blandos concluded the event by saying, “We held a powerful event to connect female entrepreneurs with investors and provide them with insights on making their businesses more investible. Our partnership with Heather Henyon and Mindshift Capital was pivotal, as they are leading the way in the region for investing in women-owned businesses. This is just the first of many events we plan to hold in the region to help women access the right networks and information to scale their businesses.”