Introduction

The aim of the project is a thorough investigation of the various funding pathways for  the Women Initiative Forum.  The WIF which may be considered as a means of addressing the challenges of financing that are faced by various business owned by the women. The WIF provides ancillary products and services to the screen industry. Furthermore, the project aims to provide a SWOT analysis followed by the Revenue Chain Analysis and a project base finance revenue stream for the Women Imitative Forum.

Women Initiative Forum

The Women’s Initiative Forum is a group of networking, which was created with the purpose to run the Women’s network, women’s initiative (Mijid, N. 2017). Their goal is mainly the improvement of the effectiveness of the initiatives by harnessing the knowledge collected by the group (Manolova, T. S., Brush, et al., 2017)

Challenges Faced by women

Most of the women are often found in a male dominated society, which hinders them to start their venture (Greene, P. G., & Brush, C. G. 2018). The women owned firms; mostly entrepreneurs know how difficult it is to raise capital from reliable sources (Lindio-McGovern, L., & Wallimann I. 2016).

Various Funding pathways

There are various pathways for funding which are as follows:

500 Women: 500 Women, is a classification of 500 start-ups, which focus on the enterprises owned by the women. In recent years, they have invested around a million dollar in ten companies, thus encouraging women entrepreneurship.

Belle Capital USA: The main goal of Belle Capital USA is the enhancement of the power of the enterprises that are run by women. They hit the Technology enabled products prevailing in the market, with women founders.

Golden Seeds: Golden Seeds is a set of investors who look for the businesses that are led by the women, with high potential. Since 2005, Golden Seeds have invested around $90 million in more than 85 enterprises that are led by the women entrepreneurs.

Pipeline Angels: Pipeline Angels is again a funding organisation, which bridges the gap between the new and the seasoned women investors. Their organisation was established in 2011, since when they had invested in over $2 million in around thirty companies.

Amber Grant: The Amber Grant was launched in the year 1998, by Womensnet.com in honour of Amber, who passed away at the age of nineteen. It was because she was unable to fulfil her dreams, the Amber Grant offer a number of $ 500 Grants monthly.

SWOT Analysis

Strengths:

The possible strengths to the following report are that women entrepreneurs who are termed as innovative, confident, creative who have the capability of achieving self-economic independence, generate opportunities for employment. Most women prioritise working from home and their urge to work motivates them towards self-employment.

Weaknesses:

There are many women in the world who do not get adequate support from their family to start a business, which lets them to decide to back out from the proposal. The biggest deterrent to woman is the fact that they are woman. The support given to women is less compared to what is given to a male entrepreneur. Therefore, WIF might face challenges relating to the same while starting the project.

Opportunities:

Inculcation of entrepreneurial values by women and their involvement in business dealings is considered one of the greatest opportunities. Women have another great opportunity that is they can reach areas which everyone does not have access to. It includes the rural areas, where people do not have access to the basic needs. Therefore the WIF can use this opportunity to fund the women entrepreneurs (Baporikar, N. (Ed.). 2015).

Threats:

Few of the biggest threats to WIF in funding the women entrepreneurs can be the discrimination of credit and Non Cooperative officials. The poor and insecure infrastructure and dealing with the male workers tend to threat the women entrepreneurs in achieving their goals. There are many women, who dream to become entrepreneurs but ultimately they give emphasis to their family ties and relationships. It hinders the confidence that they have on women and take the initiative in funding their venture with adequate capital. Therefore, it is a big threat for WIF in starting such a project base (Ramadani, V., Gerguri-Rashiti, S., et al., 2015)

Revenue Chain Analysis

Based on the research for the project of WIF it is seen that Golden Seeds is the best funding pathway for WIF. The reason for the same is, it a funding entity, which wholly targets to fund the enterprises that are run by the women, unlike the other enterprises who also invest in to enterprises, which are not run by the women. Golden Seeds also had invested around $90 million to 85 enterprises, which goes without saying that they have the potential to invest even more provided the number of women entrepreneurs increase. The firm aims to invest in companies, which are C Corporation, or the ones, which are willing to convert in to the same. There are estimations, which have shown that Golden Seeds have an annual turnover of around $14.9 million.

Conclusion

According to the report, a conclusion can be drawn that WIF has taken a great initiative in funding the women entrepreneurs, who face challenges about funding. The SWOT analysis provides a contradicting analysis that women themselves are the strength as well the weakness.  They can have access to various areas in the rural areas, which are not in the access of rural people.

 At the same time, women are put down because they are in a society, which until date is male dominating. Keeping in to consideration all the factors Golden Seeds have been chosen as the appropriate organisation, which aims towards the empowerment of the women entrepreneurs.

 

 

 

References

Baporikar, N. (Ed.). (2015). Handbook of research on entrepreneurship in the contemporary knowledge-based global economy. IGI Global.

Greene, P. G., & Brush, C. G. (Eds.). (2018). A research agenda for women and entrepreneurship: Identity through aspirations, behaviors and confidence. Edward Elgar Publishing.

Lindio-McGovern, L., & Wallimann I. (2016). Globalization and third world women: Exploitation, coping and resistance. Routledge.

Manolova, T. S., Brush, C. G., Edelman, L. F., Robb, A., & Welter, F. (Eds.). (2017). Entrepreneurial Ecosystems and Growth of Women’s Entrepreneurship: A Comparative Analysis. Edward Elgar Publishing.

Mijid, N. (2017). Dynamics of female-owned smallest businesses in the USA. International Journal of Gender and Entrepreneurship, 9(2), 157-170.

Ramadani, V., Gerguri-Rashiti, S., et al., (2015). Female entrepreneurship in transition economies: Trends and challenges. Springer.