Specialist asset manager Anthemis’ Female Innovators Lab (FIL) has received additional investments from institutions including Visa and BMO, which sees the fund become the largest early-stage FinTech fund dedicated to companies founded by women.
Anchored by Barclays, with investment from Aviva, the fund now totals $50m.
With this latest raise, the Fund will invest in additional early-stage companies and continue its focus on designing, sourcing, and scaling female-founded embedded finance startups.
Launched in 2019 and led by Anthemis’ global head of venture studio, Katie Palencsar, the FIL Fund actively invests in women-led startups across North America, UK and Europe.
FIL’s approach is modelled on Anthemis’ embedded finance investment thesis, targeting business models that deploy financial services within a diverse set of industries including sustainability, beauty, ecommerce, and more.
Through the venture studio and fund, Anthemis has sourced over 1,500 early-stage female-founded companies and shaped and funded portfolio companies.
As one of the earliest asset managers to establish a diversity and inclusion mandate, Anthemis is uniquely suited to lead FIL. Women account for 69% of the people across investments, 48% of portfolio company founders are women or people of colour and 58% of all employees at Anthemis are women.
Palencsar said, “Women are half of the world’s population, they control 70% of global household spending, profits are higher when they’re present in the c-suite, and the startups they build have a more rapid path to exit – but somehow, women-led companies still raised just two percent of all US venture investment last year.
“Female founder businesses are a massive market opportunity, yet chronically underfunded. FIL is purpose-built to seize that opportunity, helping women develop high-growth, high-impact startups at the intersection of finance, technology, and society.”
Last year, FinTech Global sat down with Ruth Foxe Blader, a partner at Anthemis to discuss the InsurTech industry.
Keep up with all the latest FinTech news here.
Copyright © 2023 FinTech Global
