Get Guardian on GoogleA new report on the state of startup funding across the African continent revealed a sobering reality: despite years of advocacy for gender parity, the financing gap for women founders has not only persisted, but it has widened.
In a follow-up to the 2021 analysis, titled ‘Crumbs, Basically’, the latest data from 2025, according to Africa: The Big Deal, showed that solo women founders and all-female teams still receive less than one per cent of total venture capital.
More alarmingly, the share of funding going to gender-diverse teams (those with at least one woman founder) has plummeted from 18 per cent in 2021 to just eight per cent in 2025.
While 2024 was previously considered a dismal baseline, 2025’s figures suggested a structural regression in how capital is allocated.
The report noted that in 2021, All-Men Teams got 81 per cent and in 2025, it increased to 91 per cent. For Gender-Diverse Teams, in 2021, it was 18 per cent, but dropped to eight per cent four years later. For All-Women Teams, in 2021, it was less than one per cent, in 2025, it maintained the status quo, remaining at less than one per cent.
The disparity, according to Africa: The Big Deal, is even more pronounced at the leadership level. It disclosed that only 2.2 per cent of total funding went to startups led by a woman CEO, the lowest proportion recorded since tracking began in 2019.
This decline comes despite a slight year-over-year increase in the absolute dollar amount invested in women-led firms, which rose from $152 million to $275 million.
One of the few areas where women founders saw significant success was in non-dilutive funding. Women claimed 20 per cent of all grants and gender-diverse teams secured 42 per cent. However, grants remained a drop in the bucket of the overall ecosystem, representing a mere 1.5 per cent ($46 million) of the total $3.2 billion “invested” on the continent last year.
Despite the systemic hurdles, several women-led ventures secured significant rounds in 2025, proving that the talent pipeline is robust even if the capital flow is restricted. Notable raises include: Nour Taher (Intella): $12.5 million Series A; Emily McAteer (Odyssey Energy Solutions): $7.5 million debt facility; Petro Terblanche (Afrigen Biologics): $6.2 million grant and Joanna Bichsel (Kasha): $4 million equity.
The author of the research, Max Cuvellier Giacomelle, said: “While this is always a bit of a depressing post to write… we continue to believe it is critical to shine a light on these numbers.” He noted that the share of ventures with a woman co-founder is at its lowest since 2021.
The report concluded that the primary bottleneck remains “check size.” While 14 per cent of individual startups raising $100k or more were led by women, they struggle to close the massive multi-million dollar rounds that dominate the total funding percentages.
