A new Pitchbook report found $4.3 billion in funding to women-fronted biotech companies across 121 deals. The increase comes as sociopolitical headwinds slam into initiatives to support women and minorities.
Funding for female-fronted companies across all industries rose 27% year-over-year in 2024 to $38.8 billion, with biotech proving to be a particularly bright spot, according to a new report from Pitchbook. But with the sociopolitical winds towards DEI initiatives changing, the authors of the report wondered how long the progress will last.
“President Donald Trump’s executive order to end DEI initiatives and related ongoing legal battles will take some time to settle and be reflected in funding figures,” the authors wrote. “However, it is notable that the entry points for underrepresented founders may narrow again in the face of new challenges, at least until legal precedent is decided.”
The $38.8 billion came from fewer deals compared to 2023, with the total number of transactions shrinking 13%. The report found that overall, female founders had a smaller share of the total U.S. venture capital funding for the year in deal count and value. Women secured a record 24.3% of total VC exits, which Pitchbook called “a positive signal particularly for investors who work with these founders.”
“Gains, though uneven, were made by female founders in 2024,” the report said.
The report saw similar trends when zooming in on the biotech industry; Pitchbook found $4.3 billion in funding to female-fronted companies across 121 deals. This compares to $3 billion over 130 deals the year prior, or 8.5% of the overall funding in the sector.
“The healthcare and biotechnology sectors present a somewhat more encouraging picture for female founders,” wrote Kristen Craft, vice president of Fidelity Private Shares, which was one of the sponsors of the report.
But biotech is still far from the pandemic-infused sugar rush of 2021, when $8.6 billion was directed towards female-fronted companies across 234 deals. Even with that anomaly, funding for women-fronted companies in biotech has been climbing since 2014, when just $600 million was handed out to these companies over 56 deals.
Craft particularly lauded the Boston region as a hive of activity for female-led startups in biotech.
“Boston has emerged as a particularly vibrant hub for female biotech founders, with women-led companies securing a sizable share of the region’s early-stage life sciences investments, outpacing the national average. Boston also boasts a wealth of resources and communities to support female founders,” she wrote.
Despite the positive news from the report, disrupting the largely male-led biotech industry remains challenging. Data compiled by BioSpace shows that women-fronted companies are declining in biotech. Just nine new biotechs out of 102 since October 2023 were fronted by women. There is organizing that hopes to address the issue, with groups like the Biotech Sisterhood pushing for leadership in the industry.
But there’s a long way to go for female-fronted companies across all industries. Craft noted that these start-ups have secured just 2% of all venture capital funding over the past decade. With policy shifts erasing DEI initiatives, the future remains uncertain for female founders.
“Female founders will undoubtedly continue to innovate and raise new capital in the year to come, but a more even demographic split for VC investment remains farther on the horizon,” the report said.
