Women Entrepreneurs

Goldman Sachs, which has funded the business and management education of 2,400 women in India, has claimed these beneficiaries have helped create around 12,000 new jobs as well as add Rs 2,800 crore in revenues to the country's economy in the past 18 months. The investment banking major first launched the graduation programme in the country in 2008. It relaunched the same 18 months ago when it claims to have funded the business and management education of 10,000 women under its 'Womeninitiative'. The numbers, it said, are based on a study carried out by the Indian School of Business (ISB) among 2,400 women entrepreneurs who participated in Goldman Sachs women initiative. The study found that these 10,000 women have doubled their existing workforce, quadrupled their revenue, and increased their productivity by five times on an average, within 18 months of graduating from the programme and most of them expect to increase hiring and grow revenue. Sonjoy Chatterjee, chairman and chief

Prime Minister Narendra Modi will address the inaugural session of the post-budget webinar on "Economic Empowerment of Women" on Friday. The webinar is being organised by Ministry of Women and Child Development and the Ministry of Rural Development. It is part of a series of post-budget webinars being organised by the government with an aim to brainstorm and firm up pathways for sustainable growth of women-owned and women-led business enterprises, and develop a strategy and blueprint for implementation of the announcement, according to an official statement. Union Minister of Women and Child Development Smriti Irani, Union Minister of Rural Development Giriraj Singh, Minister of State of Women and Child Development Mahendrabhai Munjpara will also join the inaugural session.

US-based logistics major UPS has inked a partnership with India SME Forum to train 500 women entrepreneurs in India in export and related business areas, according to a company official. The training will be provided through experts via online and offline modes, said Laura Lane, Executive Vice President and Chief Corporate Affairs and Sustainability Officer, UPS. The official was in the national capital to sign the pact with India SME Forum. "The experts will educate the women entrepreneurs of the SME segment on rules related to export, help them identity markets for their products, packaging etc.," Lane said. The company will initially train 500 women and later plans to expand the programme later, she said. Post-pandemic, women-owned businesses have increased in India, Laura said, adding that taking them to export markets will help in their economic empowerment. "Many women have started their businesses in India, but due to various reasons, they may not find the right market for

On the International Women's Day, the Kerala government unveiled major schemes to support women entrepreneurs in the State including raising of the loan limit for women under the 'We-Mission Kerala' initiative of KSIDC to Rs 50 lakh from Rs 25 lakh with a five per cent interest from April 1. Announcing the decision at the women entrepreneurs' meet organised by the Department of Industries and Commerce here on Wednesday, Industries Minister P Rajeeve said the doubling of the loan amount will help women entrepreneurs under 'We-Mission Kerala' project of Kerala State Industrial Development Corporation (KSIDC) to scale up their businesses. Also, the moratorium period under the scheme, aimed at identifying, supporting and promoting women entrepreneurs, will be raised to one year from the current six months, the Minister said. Rajeeve announced a composite grant of Rs five lakh for women cooperative societies, which will be available to the co-operative societies that commence operation i

Aside from factors such as social stigma, gender biases, insufficient capacity building and access to actionable knowledge, a pressing challenge for women entrepreneurs is access to capital, especiall

Small Industries Development Bank of India (SIDBI) will partner with the Association of Microfinance Institutions of India (AMFI) to support women entrepreneurs in the backward districts of West Bengal. Deputy Managing Director of SIDBI, Sudatta Mandal, said that the women entrepreneurs will also be helped in terms of getting market and credit linkages. Speaking at the AMFI-WB micro-finance summit here, Mandal said SIDBI has already spearheaded the project in Odisha and it has been very successful. "Six backward districts of West Bengal have been identified for this purpose and 12,000 women will be given credit so that their incomes rise. This will be a two-year intervention by SIDBI," he stated. By this intervention, the average income of women will rise by at least 30 per cent, Mandal added. Alok Mishra, CEO of MFIN, a self-regulatory organisation (SRO) in the micro-finance sector, said the basic idea is of financial inclusion which had been the focus of successive governments s

Applauding the efforts of the US-India Alliance for Women's Economic Empowerment that connects the private sector and civil society to help women grow their businesses, US Secretary of State Antony Blinken has said that Google India has committed to mentoring 1 million Indian women entrepreneurs. Launching US Strategy on Global Women's Economic Security here on Wednesday, Blinken also said that the Biden administration will promote women's entrepreneurship by addressing some of the challenges that too often hold women back, including a lack of mentorship and training opportunities. "We're working to both create and also, as appropriate, replicate efforts like the US-India Alliance for Women's Economic Empowerment," Blinken said. "That connects the private sector and civil society to provide Indian women with technical skills and networking opportunities to help them grow their businesses. At the alliance's launch, Google India committed to mentoring one million Indian women ...

Indian society may be more advanced than we think it is

Gender diversity in boardrooms is picking up, though at a slower pace, with women accounting for nearly 18 per cent of the directorships in the top 500 NSE-listed companies at the end of March this year, according to a study. In the study titled 'Corporate India: Women on boards', proxy advisory firm Institutional Investor Advisory Services (IiAS) on Tuesday said that at a global level, boardroom diversity continues to improve with an average of almost 24 per cent female representation in corporate boardrooms. "India also has progressed in appointing women on company boards; from 6 per cent in 2014 to 14 per cent five years ago. Women now account for 17.6 per cent of directorships of the Nifty-500 companies. "Although the number of women directorships is increasing, the pace of new appointments has faltered with just an aggregate 1 per cent increase over the last three years. Based on these current rates, India will take till 2058 to achieve 30 per cent gender diversity on boards,"

For most women chief executive officers (CEOs) in India, the real job begins after overcoming this one big additional hurdle - to be accepted as the leader

Jammu and Kashmir rural livelihoods mission (Umeed) and e-commerce firm Meesho have signed an agreement to support the growth of 1,800 self-help group (SHG) members by providing them an online platform to launch and grow their business and empower rural women entrepreneurs. The memorandum of understanding (MoU) was signed and exchanged in the presence of Lieutenant Governor Manoj Sinha here at Raj Bhavan on Thursday. Congratulating women entrepreneurs of self-help groups (SHGs) and Meesho officials, the Lt Governor said the partnership will help in building lives and livelihoods for rural communities and provide greater access to economic activities, and financial independence to rural women entrepreneurs. The partnership of rural livelihoods mission and e-commerce giant Meesho is a significant step in making niche products of Jammu and Kashmir available to the wider customer base, providing SHGs global market to grow their business, and making them Aatmanirbhar, he observed. From

Three top Indian businesswomen are featured in the Forbes Asia November issue highlighting 20 Asian women who came up with varying strategies that helped their businesses soar despite the uncertainty of the new normal and three years of Covid-19. Soma Mondal, the chairperson of Steel Authority of India Ltd, Namita Thapar, executive director at India business of Emcure Pharma, and Ghazal Alagh, co-founder and chief innovation officer of Honasa Consumer, are on the list. Some of these women operated in hard-hit sectors such as shipping, property, and construction, while others continue to innovate in areas such as technology, pharmaceuticals, and commodities, Forbes said in a press release on Tuesday. The Asia-Pacific region this year has mostly moved on to a post-pandemic era where governments, people, and businesses are learning to live with Covid-19, it said. The other women on the list are from Australia, China, South Korea, Indonesia, Japan, Singapore, South Korea, Taiwan and ..

Zuckerberg also toured several startup and venture capital offices and met many investors and founders in Bengaluru

The scheme was started in 2019, and till now, 1,141 women entrepreneurs, SHGs and clusters have been sanctioned loans of more than Rs 57.60 crore in urban and rural areas

President Droupadi Murmu will launch a start-up platform for women entrepreneurs created by Gujarat University here on Tuesday. On the second day of her two-day visit to Gujarat, the president will also inaugurate or lay foundation stones of various projects related to education and tribal development at a function at Gujarat University. 'Her Start' is an initiative of the varsity for women entrepreneurs. Murmu is on her first visit to Gujarat after becoming president. On Monday she inaugurated or laid foundation stones of projects worth Rs 1,330 crore at a function in Gandhinagar. She also offered a floral tribute to Mahatma Gandhi at Sabarmati Ashram.

Finance minister Nirmala Sitharaman on Friday urged women entrepreneurs and corporate leaders to take up leadership roles. Addressing a women directors' conclave at the BSE headquarters here, she said there is not enough number of women leaders in the corporate world because they are saddled by an inherent feeling that they need to prove themselves time and again to be in the leadership role. And the only way out is mentoring and more women to become board members. Urging corporates to have more females on their boards, she said globally it has been proved that companies with more women leaders on their boards are more profitable and more inclusive. Women are not asking for gender parity and inclusivity, the minister said. "You want for profit, get us in. You cannot ignore us anymore," she added. Underlining the existing regulatory framework on women's presence on the boards of listed companies, the minister said now it's up to the companies concerned to walk the talk, the governm

Majority of the women entrepreneurs face challenges in availing loan services from nationalised banks, according to a study. The study was conducted by Bharatiya Yuva Shakti Trust (BYST) and saw the participation of 450 women entrepreneurs from three cities -- national capital region, Chennai and Pune. During the study, it was also found that about 60 per cent of these entrepreneurs faced problems in accessing critical financial services. "Eighty-five per cent of women entrepreneurs faced challenges in availing loan services from nationalised banks," the study claimed. It was conducted during the course of a three-year BYST Women Entrepreneurship Development Programme to set up profitable businesses in Chennai, Pune, and Delhi-NCR. "Public sector banks are happy to welcome loan applications of BYST assisted, under-privileged entrepreneurs who are well-trained...and duly scrutinised by our expert panel before submission to the banks," Lakshmi Venkataraman Venkatesan, Managing Trust

Programme will help women, persons with disability, and people from the LGBTQIA+ community

Who is Neha Narkhede?

Pune girl Neha Narkhede (38) has joined the ranks of India's wealthiest women. Narkhede is ranked eighth on the Leading Wealthy Women 2021 list compiled by research firm Hurun. Find out more about her

According to LinkedIn data, published in the World Economic Forum's 2022 Global Gender Gap report, the share of women founders grew 2.68 times between 2016 and 2021