Gender gap: 3 out of 10 science-based ventures in Chile are led by women
Know Hub News
· Santiago
GENDER GAP: 3 OUT OF 10 SCIENCE-BASED VENTURES IN CHILE ARE LED BY WOMEN
They also obtain smaller amounts and less investment than those led by men. A barrier if Chile is to move toward a knowledge-based society.
February 11 is the International Day of Women and Girls in Science, a date established in 2015 by the United Nations to inspire and engage more women and girls in science. If the gender gap is wide in society at large, in science it is even wider. Only 30% of researchers worldwide are women, according to the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization, Unesco.
What is happening in Chile with science- and technology-based ventures? Unfortunately, the gap repeats itself: 7 out of 10 entrepreneurial teams are led by men and 11% are teams led by women (3 out of 10), according to the 2021 Second Characterization Study of Science- and Technology-Based Ventures in Chile by the Ministry of Science, Technology, Knowledge and Innovation.
So-called science- and technology-based companies (EBCTs) are a key player in transforming scientific knowledge generated at universities, research centers and companies into applications with transformative potential and social and economic impact. They are key not only to growth, but also to diversifying the country’s economy and delivering solutions to the socio-environmental problems it currently faces and will face in the future.
At an earlier stage
Varinka Farren, executive director of Hub Apta and president of Women Board Up, notes that progress has been made in EBCTs led by women, but there is undoubtedly a long way to go. “We still need to open up spaces and increase women’s participation in STEM careers, in research and in science- and technology-based ventures”, she says.
According to the Ministry of Science report, ventures of this kind led by women are at an earlier stage: more than 50% are less than three years old. The data show that they were mostly created in academia (73%) and involve technologies related to biology (54%) and the health-pharmaceutical sector.
Why are there fewer women-led EBCTs in Chile? Among the reasons, explains Jovanka Trebotich, technology transfer coordinator at Know Hub Chile and member of the ScienceUP Advisory Board, is that they are concentrated only in biotechnology and human health, whereas those led by men are spread across various fields of knowledge. “It has also been shown that they are younger (less than 5 years since their founding) and have no sales. Finally, multiple studies show that there is a gap in access to private capital not only in Chile, but across Latin America,” she says.
Women-led companies are beginning to emerge in knowledge- and R&D-intensive areas, such as the biological sciences, which, Trebotich says, will take several years to bear fruit. “It can be inferred that women who lead EBCTs are not only devoted to entrepreneurship, but also to an academic career, which limits the time they can dedicate to the EBCT,” she points out.
Less investment
The Ministry of Science study adds that these ventures are more heavily represented among those that had no sales in 2020 (51%), and they are companies that invested smaller amounts and obtained less investment: 32% invested more than USD 500,000 (vs. 56% for men). Meanwhile, only 9% secured investments of more than USD 500,000 (vs. 42% for men). They also made greater use of public support (84%) and rate it more favorably (60%).
Most do not access venture capital, accounting for only 11% in 2019, according to the Corfo study “Characterization of women’s companies that received investment from Corfo venture capital funds in year t-1″. This 2020 study analyzed EBCTs with significant participation by women (in which 50% of the company’s equity belongs to women, 35% of the equity belongs to women and at least one woman is a legal representative) that received capital in the form of investment from Corfo investment funds in 2019.
These gaps are also present globally. According to the US organization Women Tech, only 7% of the money invested by venture capital funds goes to startups with a female founder, and that percentage drops to 3% when the CEO is a woman.
One thing to improve through public policy, Trebotich says, is this gap in access to private capital, which limits not only the creation of EBCTs but also their potential for expansion, “considering that the reach of biotechnology companies is international, which would further limit women-led EBCTs.”
The gender gap in STEM must be tackled bearing in mind that it is a cyclical, self-reinforcing problem, says Maldonado. “We need to look for ways to bring more women into STEM from childhood and also keep them there throughout their careers. Programs like Niñas Pro, which encourage schoolgirls to discover new fields, or gatherings like ChileWiC, have had very positive results: we know how important it is to build community among ourselves. We are also very aware of representation, of other women and girls seeing that we are here and that these are careers that can be interesting for them and in which they can grow.”
“We must also keep improving the number of scientific articles published by women, the equitable career progression of women researchers at universities and research centers, support for increasing the number of women-led ventures, and women’s participation in the labor market and in knowledge-intensive sectors such as technology, innovation and tech entrepreneurship,” concludes Trebotich.
Paradigm shift
A paradigm shift is needed. The naturalized conception of roles means that women mostly choose careers related to health and education, in keeping with their role as caregivers and those responsible for child-rearing, the Corfo report states.
Some actions that can be implemented, Farren explains, include establishing a gender balance and diversity policy within a startup or technology company, since it can serve as an example for other companies.
It is also necessary to gather information about the challenges and barriers women experience in organizations in order to know how to encourage and support them. In addition, Farren says, it is important to support women leaders by making their achievements visible, sharing information about what they are doing, their articles or books, or attending their webinars and conferences. “Having positive role models is essential. And finally, offering mentoring and training opportunities to improve their skills and education, perform their roles in their jobs and help them become more valuable within the tech industry in general.”
The low presence of women in companies, and particularly in science- and technology-based startups, and the impact this has on what gets researched, on the solutions that reach the market and on how this affects society, especially the female population, must be discussed and made known, the specialists agree. “The fact that there are fewer women in science and that clinical studies are mainly designed by men and about men has had certain impacts. For example, in the case of heart attacks, men’s symptoms, pain in the left arm and chest, have been studied extensively, but women have other symptoms that have not been studied as thoroughly, and that is why the leading cause of death among women worldwide is heart disease,” Farren explains.
