A report dropped this week that is worth more than a quick scroll. The Rise Report of Female Entrepreneurship 2026 surveyed 2,225 female founders across the UK – women who between them turn over £1 billion and employ 9,300 people.

What makes it different from the usual research is that it asked 11 open-ended questions rather than tick boxes, generating 436,000 words of founder experience. That is a lot of honesty in one document, and it shows.

The £310 Billion Case for Backing Female Founders

If women started and scaled businesses at the same rate as men, it could add £310 billion to the UK economy. The report makes clear that closing the gap is not just the right thing to do – it is the economically sensible one.

Currently, only 2% of venture capital goes to fully female-founded businesses, with over 80% directed to all-male teams. For Black female founders, that figure was 0.02% across the entire decade from 2009 to 2019. Progress is being made – the Invest in Women Taskforce has pooled £635 million specifically to fund female entrepreneurs via female investment managers – but the numbers still have a long way to go.

Which brings us to marketing. Because if the investment is not coming through the front door, visibility becomes even more important. The report found that 80% of consumers say they would rather buy from a business whose founder they follow online. Your voice and your story are not vanity – they are commercial strategy.

What Female Founders Say Success Looks Like

The report’s 4 Ss of success are worth knowing, not least because they challenge the assumption that women build businesses primarily for passion or purpose:

  • Stability and profitability – 53% prioritise consistent revenue and financial security
  • Scale and exit – 38% are building to grow, acquire or exit
  • Social impact – 28% want to make a measurable difference
  • Self – 21% include work-life balance and wellbeing as a core measure

More than half of female founders are focused on profitability. More than a third have exit ambitions. Commercial success is not an afterthought – it is the point.

Why Funding Remains Such a Sticking Point

45% of respondents named funding access as their biggest barrier, and the detail behind that figure is worth sitting with.

On public funding, 78% of those who shared their experience were negative about it. The median time to complete Innovate UK’s Women in Innovation grant application was 60 hours – before knowing whether the application would be successful. On private finance, 72% reported negative experiences, with complexity, ghosting and investor misalignment coming up repeatedly.

The report does not suggest that female founders are put off by hard work. What they are asking for is clarity, transparency and a process that does not feel designed to wear them down.

The Support That Makes a Difference

When founders were asked what had helped most on their journey, the answers were consistent across the board.

Peer and founder networks topped the list at 39% – other founders who have navigated similar challenges and will give you a straight answer. Mentorship and coaching came in at 32%, with respondents valuing guidance from people with relevant, sector-specific experience rather than generic advice.

78% of respondents cited human connection as central to their journey. The right network is not a nice-to-have. For most of the founders in this survey, it was the thing that kept them going. We would add that showing up consistently online – in your own voice, without the corporate gloss – is one of the most scalable ways to build those connections when you cannot be in the room in person.

The Loneliness Figure Worth Knowing

One in seven female founders say loneliness and isolation is their biggest challenge – a figure that could represent around 230,000 businesses across the UK. What the report also found is that founders of larger businesses report similar levels of isolation to those running small ones. Scaling does not automatically solve it. If you have ever felt like you are making decisions in a vacuum, the data suggests you are far from alone in that.

The Childcare Numbers That Keep Coming Up

UK founders spend roughly three times more of their income on childcare than founders in Canada. The estimated cost to the UK economy of not addressing this is up to £38 billion in annual gross value. For a lot of female founders, the tension between growing a business and managing the cost of childcare is not abstract – it is a decision they are making every month.

What the Report Is Asking For

The founders surveyed were clear on what needs to change:

  • Simpler, more transparent grant processes with realistic application times
  • Mentorship matching with people who have relevant lived experience
  • Networking that fits around caregiving responsibilities, not the other way around
  • Removal of the seven-year EIS company age limit, which disproportionately affects founders who bootstrapped longer
  • Mandatory gender-split reporting for VC portfolio allocation

The full report is at therisereport.co.uk. Read it, share it, and if it prompts a growth strategy conversation about where your business goes next, we are here for that too.

24 Fingers is a female-led digital marketing consultancy working with founders across the globe. Also lonely sometimes, also working hard to scale.