Visibility and role models to promote women’s presence in Colombia’s entrepreneurial ecosystem

In Latin America, the gender equality rate is 74.3%, behind Europe and North America, according to the World Economic Forum (WEF). The organization also states that, at the current pace, it will take the region 53 years to achieve full gender parity. According to the WEF’s annual Global Gender Gap Index, Colombia ranks 42nd out of 146 countries in the 2023 edition, climbing 33 places from the previous year. This is a notable improvement, although the country falls to 92nd place specifically in the area of economic opportunities and participation.

Entrepreneurship can play a significant role in efforts to achieve equity at all levels, both as a driver of employment and by creating ‘femtech’ solutions that address specific needs of women in health, finance, or work-life balance. This was recently discussed by BBVA Spark in celebration of Women’s Day with a focus on Latin America. This region is the most entrepreneurial in the world, and several Latin American countries have the highest rates of women entrepreneurs globally.

The case of Colombia

Colombia stands out as a country where women play a significant role in the business sector. According to data from the Single Business and Social Registry (RUES), 47.6% of the total sole proprietorships registered in 2023 are led by women. However, only 13% of companies (more solid productive units) are female-owned, and women own only 16% of the capital of legally registered companies.

Women’s participation in the labor market is 25.9 points lower than that of men (51.78% vs. 77.68%, respectively), according to WEF figures. This gap narrows among technical and skilled professionals to 5.48 points. Moreover, only 12.9% of board members of publicly traded companies in Colombia are women, just 17.3% of companies have majority female participation, and 18.9% have women in senior management.

According to the ‘Colombia Tech Report 2023-2024’, about 23% of Colombian startup founders are women. This percentage varies by sector: in fintech, for example, the percentage of female founders was 42% in 2020 (the highest in Latin America, with an average of 40%), according to a report by the Inter-American Development Bank, BID Invest, and Finnovista. The analysis also shows that startups with female participation perform better economically, despite receiving less investment: for every dollar of funding received, women-founded fintechs generate 78 cents in revenue compared to 31 cents for those founded by men.

An opportunity issue

Women Colombia Fintech, held on May 15, brought together some of the most prominent Colombian female entrepreneurs in the fintech ecosystem. 250 founders and executives of startups gathered in Bogotá to discuss women’s participation in decision-making spaces in the sector. This key event aims to promote equity in access to opportunities in the sector, explains Piedad Marcela Valencia, Business Innovation & Strategy Discipline Manager of BBVA Spark Colombia: (an entity that recently celebrated its first anniversary): “These events help to make us more visible or at least slightly more aware of the opportunity and the challenge we face.”

“It is a very important model of inspiration. All these leadership and community spaces start to gain relevance by giving women the example and empowerment to dare [to undertake],” agrees Alexandra Mendoza, board president of Colombia Fintech and founder and CEO of fintech Liquitech—a platform providing centralized electronic factoring services—who also spoke at Women Colombia Fintech.

Financial innovation is the most thriving sector in Colombian entrepreneurship, both in terms of the number of startups and the funding raised. It is also one of the areas where women’s contributions are particularly crucial to fully exploit the potential of fintech in serving financial inclusion. Solutions like Liquitech, for example, help SMEs access the financing they need to grow. “Factoring can be a growth driver because it leverages immediate liquidity, which is the foundation for a company’s constant and sustainable growth in the long term,” explains Mendoza. Additionally, Liquitech has launched the Young Woman Challenge program, in which “for every invoice we accumulate, we train women in entrepreneurship, providing them with the necessary tools and seed capital to start their own business units,” she details.

Key factors for the future

The participation of Colombian women in the entrepreneurial ecosystem at all levels is a clear and accelerating trend, but it still needs a firm boost to materialize into real equality. Experts highlight four key areas:

• Education: “There is a path to follow from education, from the way we are training girls and young women to aspire to spaces and roles related to science and technology,” notes Piedad Valencia of BBVA Spark Colombia. “There we are failing as nations.” Alexandra Mendoza of Liquitech agrees: “The most important thing is education, changing the paradigm from early childhood towards girls by showing them the capabilities and possibilities that exist.”
• Work-Life Balance: The extra domestic care burden that women assume remains a major impediment to joining the labor market (according to the Integrated Household Survey, household chores are the reason cited by 68.8% of women not actively participating in the labor market in Colombia). “Motherhood and the work phase coincide, making it more complicated because a startup requires full attention and many hours of work, and obviously a family too,” stresses Valencia. Addressing this issue is especially important considering the difference in opportunities, Mendoza reminds: “The challenge is how we can start penetrating those populations where there is less access to resources and education, where the patriarchal structure is still maintained the most.”
• Role Models: The success stories of other female entrepreneurs and the spaces that highlight them are a driving force for women’s participation in the ecosystem, says Mendoza. “From that visibility we begin to give through our example, we start generating more confidence and a dynamic that replicates itself,” she explains. “The point is to arrive to be the living example that it is possible for those who come after, not to settle for being only ‘where they have to be,’ but to aspire to a presidency, to lead an organization, to lead spaces, associations, or any entity that allows their capabilities to shine also in decision-making and execution roles,” Valencia reflects.

• Support Programs: “While there is a significant gap, there is also a greater degree of awareness to break it, and more and more incubation, acceleration, and other grant programs that give greater visibility and promotion to women’s participation in startups,” notes Valencia. Mendoza’s personal experience reinforces the importance of such initiatives: “I was in an acceleration program, Start Path Empowered by Mastercard and USAID, specifically aimed at women,” explains Liquitech’s founder. “From there, I gained much learning and legacy.”

As founders, occupying management positions, or performing all kinds of roles, Colombian women are making their way decisively in the entrepreneurial ecosystem. A promising path, stresses Piedad Marcela Valencia of BBVA Spark Colombia: “The important revolutions in humanity have happened when there have been structural changes, shifts in thinking, in the ‘status quo.’ I feel that in ‘fintech’ and generally all technological verticals are where that revolution can happen, leading to girls and young women who come after having different possibilities.”