The Rise of Female Leaders in FinTech: Women’s History Month
In terms of startups, male workers continue to dominate the global fintech founder/entrepreneur community, with only 7% of founders being women. If more progress is to be made, investors as well as the financial sector need to rethink their current practices.
Increased female presence and encouragement from the fintech startup environment will, on the other hand, act as an incubator for new ideas, solutions and services. Similar to how the fintech sector flourished during the 2008 financial crisis, the effects of COVID-19 and its disruption to the business environment may actually help level the playing field and open up a number of exciting opportunities for female entrepreneurs.
As we conclude Women’s History Month 2023, celebrated internationally in March, this article highlights the journeys of female innovators who changed the fintech landscape.
Sarah Ratner, COO of Lendable, opens doors for new fintech companies
Sarah Ratner is the Chief Operating Officer of Lendable, a leading provider of debt financing to fintech companies in frontier and developing economies.
Lendable gives unbanked and underbanked communities access to innovative financial services and products. It has paid out more than $225 million to fintech firms in over 14 countries. Ratner’s work requires her to improve the company’s portfolio to keep pace with geographic expansion, while ensuring that the quality of activities remains consistent. Ratner studied philosophy and performing arts at Oxford Brookes University.
Upasana Taku Co-Founder of MobiKwik Scales to 120 Million Users After Starting as a Startup
“My co-founder Bipin and I started this digital wallet in 2009, when India was completely a cash economy,” says Taku. She adds that despite many people opposing her starting a business, the negative commentary and discrimination only served to inspire her. It was self-funded for its first four years, spending less than $100 million since launch, to reach its current size of 120 million registered users. Now, the firm is focusing on Buy Now, Pay Later (BNPL) for day-to-day payments and has 24 million of the most pre-approved BNPL customers across India.
Julie Watts, Head of Onboarding Management at Kurtosys, helps deliver a DXP for financial institutions
Julie Watts is Onboarding Management Director for Kurtosys. She assists financial services organizations in achieving continuous improvement with Kurtosys Cloud, a digital experience platform (DXP) designed specifically for the demands of the fintech sector. Design and customization of websites or digital marketing tools, documentation and customer reporting portals are common tasks – managed by the platform.
Watts is a veteran in the sector. She has over 25 years of expertise in financial services technology, along with experience in project management and a thorough understanding of data, technology and UI/UX. Prior to joining Kurtosys, Watts was a vice president at Thomson Reuters and head of GRIS administration for Merrill Lynch.
Katie Palencsar, of Anthemis Group, invests in early-stage female fintech companies
Previously, Palencsar developed and managed Unbound Concepts, a data SaaS business, from conception to sale. In addition to providing free software tools to more than 40,000 instructors, worldwide distributors and privately held and publicly traded publishers used the company’s computer services. Certica Solutions bought the start-up in 2017.
At the time, Palencsar was involved in a number of initiatives. “I realized two things really fired me up: early-stage companies (starting with a pitch deck and a dream); and drive capital and support to female entrepreneurs, she says.
She was fascinated when the opportunity arose at Anthemis Group to create the Female Innovators Lab in collaboration with Barclays. It will also enable her to engage with early-stage businesses, where she can use her operational knowledge and skills to help and support female entrepreneurs as they go along.
Julia Markiewicz, co-founder of Silent Eight, conducts AI research in fintech
Julia Markiewicz is the Chief Operations Officer and co-founder of Silent Eight, a technology startup that leverages AI-powered methods to combat money laundering and terrorist financing. Markiewicz has a master’s degree in social policy and is enthusiastic about innovation and inspiring others to reach their full potential.
Her distinctive leadership style is the driving force behind Quiet Eight’s strong focus on R&D and the growth of the team’s regional footprint. She is based in Singapore. Markiewicz is a member of both 100Women in the Fintech Directory as well as RegTech Women’s founding membership.
Natasha Jethanandani, co-founder of neobank Kaleidofin, advocates financial inclusion
“The need for innovation in financial services is much greater for these 500-600 million segments rather than the 50-100 million customers in the high-income groups,” says Jethanandani, co-founder and CTO of Kaleidofin.
Unfortunately, it is challenging to reach out to informal customer groups. For example, the client base is quite diverse in terms of states, jobs, income levels and goals. Consumers often have little understanding of financial records and are also influenced by previous experiences from society. Offers must be created that are easy to understand, easy to use and individualized for each consumer.
In less than five years since its establishment, Kaleidofin now serves over a million customers in semi-urban and rural India spanning 230 districts in 14 states.
Odunayo Eweniyi, co-founder of PiggyVest, champions the cause of equality for women in Nigeria
Odunayo is the co-founder as well as the Chief Operating Officer of PiggyVest, Nigeria’s premier digital savings and investment platform. It is a safe online savings system that encourages value creation by combining discipline and adaptability to help you accumulate funds.
She was selected as one of Forbes Africa’s 30 Under 30 Technology Leaders for 2019 and one of Quartz Africa’s 30 Innovators for 2019. She co-founded The Feminist Coalition in 2020, a coalition of young Nigerian feminists that aims to achieve equality for women in Nigerian society, focused on education, financial independence and inclusion in public office.
Sonia Dorais, CEO of Chaser, is driving growth for the financial process automation company
Sonia Dorais is CEO of Chaser, the industry-leading provider of credit management services and accounts receivable automation solutions. As a result of Dorais’ leadership as well as the new strategic vision for Chaser in her first year as CEO, the company’s sales increased by 103% and the total addressable market grew by 700%.
Through his leadership, Chaser has helped companies recover over $10 billion in delinquent payments. Prior to this position, Dorais oversaw the expansion of a number of fintechs in Canada and the UK specializing in the automation and digitization of accounting and finance functions.
Conclusion
According to 2021 research, women make up 19% of fintech company executives, 11% of board members and 1.5% of founders, but receive only 1% of total venture capital. Women make up around 30% of the entire fintech workforce. This is a small number, but the pandemic was difficult for all women in the workforce.
Between February 2020 and January 2022, millions of women left work to take care of their children, even as schools and kindergartens remained closed. Now that things have started to improve, there are indications that women are returning to the workforce. For others, the workplace has improved significantly since the days before the pandemic, as remote work and flexible schedules have become more widely accepted.
Despite the lack of quantifiable evidence on the status of women in fintech in 2023, there are several reasons for optimism. Sarah Ratner, Upasana Taku, Julie Watts, Katie Palencsar, Julia Markiewicz, Natasha Jethanandani, Odunayo Eweniyi, Sonia Dorais and many others are not only trailblazers in their respective industries; they are also community icons.
For the sector to progress towards a sustainable future, it is crucial that the glass ceiling is continuously – and proactively – broken through, with “just a little help” from organizations and local communities.
Read our exclusive interviews with Yunha Kim, CEO and Founder, Simple, Ashley M. Fox, Founder, Empify, and Theodora Lau, Founder, Unconventional Ventures, for more such insights on the occasion of Women’s History Month.
