Press

PR Newswire: Silicon Valley's Portfolia Closes First Women's Health Venture Fund

We are beyond excited by the huge growth that Portfolia has had this year and we are deeply grateful for the groundswell of dynamo women who see Portfolia as the answer, the action step and the smartest way to back the companies, the products, and the world they believe in! #FemTech #InvestTogether #MarketMakers Read the full article here.

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PE Hub: Portfolia's FemTech Fund: Women investing in women's health

It’s rare to see money flow at parties. Even in investment-laden Silicon Valley, potential fund investors don’t normally mingle socially while writing checks to their hosts over cocktails and hors d'oeuvres.

But at an early-September party in Woodside, that’s exactly what happened.

Portfolia Funds, which operates a platform through which accredited individuals can invest in small venture funds, held an invitation-only event at its headquarters, a few miles down the highway from Sand Hill Road.

TechCrunch: Future Family raises $10M to make fertility treatments more affordable

Future Family,  a startup that helps families more easily afford fertility services like IVF and egg freezing, has raised $10 million in a Series A round. This round was led by Aspect Ventures, and backed by iNovia, BBG, Ulu Ventures, LaunchCapital and Portfolia. As part of the deal, Aspect Venture’s Lauren Kolodny will join Future Family’s board of directors.

The Guardian: Digital contraceptives and period trackers: the rise of femtech

Portfolia, a US-based venture platform financed nearly exclusively by female investors, created the world’s first femtech fund in June. The fund is expecting to invest nearly $4m in six top-performing women’s wellness and health startups this year.

Forbes: Three Viable Alternatives To Venture Capital Funding That All Entrepreneurs Should Know

A group of investors contribute to an investment group. Portfolia's individual investors are limited partners and the company's general partners make the investment decisions, according to Pendleton. Portfolia-backed entrepreneurs get financial capital as well as both social and human capital.

Forbes: You, Too, Can Invest Like Melinda Gates

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"Melinda Gates has been making headlines by investing in female-founded venture capital firms. She’s addressing the lack of money for female founders by putting her money where her mouth is. If you’re an accredited investor, you can, too.

Venture funds with women as decision-making partners are far more likely to invest in women-led companies, and businesses founded by women delivered higher revenue — more than twice as much per dollar invested — than those founded by men, making women-owned companies better investments for financial backers. Portfolia funds provide diversification and have six noteworthy features...." 

Read on to find out what our secret sauce is and how you too can invest smartly (like Melinda Gates). 

Forbes: How Women Angels Are Good For Innovation And The Economy

The reality is that men all too often invest in entrepreneurs that look just like them. And why is that important? Because women see market opportunities that men pass by. To open up new markets, bring out new products and get strong companies off the ground, we need more women...

Silicon Valley Business Journal: Silicon Valley's Portfolia Launches Nation's First FemTech Fund

Portfolia Funds, innovative venture investing platform, just announced the launch of its sixth fund. The Portfolia FemTech Fund will invest exclusively in emerging technologies, products and services focused on improving women's health and wellness.

Frost and Sullivan recently published a report stating that FemTech will be a $50 billion market by 2025. Spurred on by rapid innovation in the health space, a positive regulatory environment and the fact that women now control 80% of healthcare decisions in the U.S. household, FemTech is predicted to be the next big disruptor in the global healthcare market. While the benefits of FemTech are widely recognized, the market is still at an early stage.

Inc.: 7 Signs That the Investment Landscape for Women Is Finally Changing

Portfolia, which was founded to help women learn to become angel investors, announced its first exit, OtoSense, in May. It returned more than 2x to investors, but the investment is just two years old. OtoSense applies artificial intelligence to the analysis of sound. It has applications in home health care -- is that a baby crying or just someone yelling? -- but also in manufacturing, where it can help determine if a machine needs some type of repair or upkeep.

Each of Portfolia's funds concentrates on a specific sector, and can accommodate a maximum of 99 investors. They invest in "areas where we know women are the buyers, even within corporate," says Trish Costello, the founder of Portfolia, which she says "almost always" backs gender-balanced teams.

Forbes: How Women Angels Are Good For Innovation And The Economy

The reality is that men all too often invest in entrepreneurs that look just like them. And why is that important? Because women see market opportunities that men pass by. To open up new markets, bring out new products and get strong companies off the ground, we need more women...

Women PE Briefs: In the Spotlight...

Portfolia, Inc., an investment organization largely comprised of women, received important news at its investor summit in Boston last month: its first exit. OtoSense, which Portfolia invested in two years ago, was acquired by Analog Devices.

“We popped open some champagne,” Portfolia Founder and CEO Trish Costello tells Women’s PE Briefs. Terms of the transaction were not disclosed, but Trish said Portfolia generated nearly 2.5-times its money on the exit. Based in Palo Alto, OtoSense is a developer of sound recognition software that turns sounds and vibrations into actionable meaning.

Silicon Valley Business Journal: A decade of influential women: Silicon Valley's 2018 Women of Influence announced

For the past 10 years, the Silicon Valley Business Journal has honored a class of influential businesswomen in our area.

We culled through almost 300 nominations to finalize this list of 100 influential women. Nonprofits, startups, manufacturing, aviation, legal, finance and even plastic surgery are represented this year. All of the women have made an impact at work and in their communities.

Barron's: The View From Silicon Valley

Silicon Valley may consider itself at the forefront of innovation and social causes, but it can be an insular place.

A general absence of women in positions of power at tech companies and venture-capital firms reflect the young-boy network that has reigned for decades. The cabal just doesn’t just look alike but thinks similarly – down to their left-of-center views and taste in music.

“The venture world needs to be disrupted,” says Trish Costello, Chief Executive Officer of Portfolia, an equity crowdfunding platform that focuses on building a community of women-led companies and investors.

Forbes: How More Women Are Stepping Up To Fund Women Entrepreneurs In 2018

The total number of women VCs precipitously dropped by 40% between 1999 and 2013, according to Diana Report Women Entrepreneurs 2014: Bridging the Gender Gap in Venture Capitalby Babson. No surprise that the percentage of women getting venture capital didn’t improve much in the years that followed. Women-led companies received 13% of capital in 2013 and 14% in 2017*. They accounted for 16% of deals in 2013 and 17% in 2017*, according to Pitchbook. Women CEOs received 9% of capital in 2013 and 7% in 2017*, as well as 9% of deals in 2013 and 9% in 2017.During the past few years, women started taking things into their own hands by starting their own funds. Some specifically invest with a gender lens.

Forbes: 10 Investors Who Are Authentically Committed To Funding Female Founders, Part 1

Half-hearted decency pledges, unkept promises to implement gender bias training, vague commitments to become more accessible, with so much noise and so little action, it’s hard to stay optimistic about the state of venture capital. As an industry, it’s clear that we need proactive investors who are not only willing to lead the charge, but also to recruit peers to change the ratio of female investors and investments in female entrepreneurs. Participation must include all levels of VCs, from early stage scouts and micro funds to larger late stage funds.

Huffington Post: The Future Of The World Is At Stake

This summer’s avalanche of sexual harassment scandals at Uber and several prominent American venture capital firms have made front-page news around the globe. Unfortunately, for women in other countries, the story is also the same. In late July, the board of Kenyan software company Ushahidi fired Daudi Were, executive director, after an investigation of sexual harassment by a former employee. She published details online, recounting the disturbing impact of his actions. Eleven other women experienced similar incidents.

Access to capital is unmistakably powerful. Trish Costello, founder of Portfolia, a crowdfunding website that aims to create a new class of women investors, said that, “The goal is to design spaces that work for women in terms of investment vehicles. Men say that there are no female VCs and that is why there is a leaky pipeline, but that simply is not true.”

Canadian Business: Three essential strategies for women entrepreneurs now

When it comes to financing business growth, the stats are grim: “Women raise 50% less capital than men do,” explained Geri Stengel, president and founder of digital media and market-research agency Ventureneer and a Forbes columnist whose writing focuses on successful female entrepreneurs, during a breakout session, “And, often, capital means success.” Venture capital firms, in particular, have long been overwhelmingly averse to funding female-run enterprises, “and I don’t see a trend line for any significant change,” added Trish Costello, CEO and founder of Portfolia, a platform designed to help women invest in entrepreneurial enterprises.