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Women's Entrepreneurship Day | Meet our alumni founders
Participants of a Social Enterprise and Innovation Startup workshop held at SETsquared Bath Innovation Centre specifically for female founders.
Held annually on November 19th, Women’s Entrepreneurship Day aims to empower women in business around the world by spotlighting the difficulties faced by female founders and strategising ways to overcome them. Set up by humanitarian Wendy Diamond in 2014, to date the Women’s Entrepreneurship Day Organisation has reached a reported five billion people.
A recent study by the Alison Rose Review of Female Entrepreneurship, found that only 32% of UK entrepreneurs are women and revealed a huge untapped potential for the UK economy, as well as a real need for greater support for entrepreneurial women.
Universities are ideal places to start on an entrepreneurial journey and we actively support experimentation and enterprise through our undergraduate and graduate enterprise programmes. In fact, the University of Bath comes out as ranking very highly when it comes to producing successful female startups; Fintech company Tide recently analysed all company founders (6,940 females) in the Crunchbase directory business and filtered by companies that have received more than $1 million in funding.
Of the 403 degrees obtained from UK universities by female founders, 13 were from the University of Bath giving them a fifth place in the UK.
22.4% of company founders that graduated from the University of Bath are women. This is the fourth-highest percentage of all universities in the UK.
These founders include:
Fiona Marshall - the founder of Heptares Therapeutics, which received £48,585,000 of funding.
Melissa Morris - one of the founders of Lantum, which received £10,349,000 of funding.
Juliette Gimenez- founder of Goxip, which received £6,320,000 of funding.
To celebrate this achievement on Women’s Entrepreneurship Day, we are very pleased to present our current cohort of Bath Graduate female founders who we fully expect to be next in line to keep Bath at the top of the league tables;
Nia Simpson
Compact Cane
I’m Nia Simpson – I studied Mechanical Engineering with Advanced Design & Innovation (MEng) and graduated in 2018. My degree, whilst equipping me with the skills to develop products, provided many opportunities to learn about business. In my third year, I acted as project manager and marketing manager for a ‘Group Business & Design Project’ where we wrote a business plan and developed a product for our industrial sponsor, a world-class veterinary hospital. And in my final year, taking the business module equipped me with the business basics alongside my extracurricular involvement in Enactus – a student-led social entrepreneurship society – where I helped to form a social enterprise to equip autistic students with employability skills.
Coming from an family of entrepreneurs, I thought it was inevitable that I would run my own business one day. The funding and support from University of Bath Alumni Innovation Award and SETsquared Bath gave me the opportunity, and helped hone my entrepreneurial skillset, to found my own start-up – Compact Cane. I’m really enjoying developing our discreet, pocket-sized, electronic white cane for visually impaired people. As black, female, tech founder, I love how me just doing my thing is breaking down barriers and stereotypes.
Dana Lattouf
Tickitto
At its heart, truly successful entrepreneurship is about ambition and risk-taking. After graduating in 2017 with a First-Class Degree in Bsc (Hons) Business Administration from the University of Bath, I followed the unorthodox route of entrepreneurship instead of accepting a graduate position at an established company.
At Tickitto, we are leveraging state of the art AI technology to give travellers a seamless access to remarkable experiences around the world.
The University of Bath was an excellent seedbed for my entrepreneurial spirit. It was an open environment that allowed me to become a creative thinker and experiment with different business ideas and models. I also was a member of Bath Entrepreneurs (BE). my engagement with the society helped me gain a global outlook by learning and sharing knowledge with other like-minded student entrepreneurs from all over the world.
After Graduation, I received the University’s Alumni Innovation Award bursary - which opened doors to SETsquared and the university’s innovation centre. I’m very fortunate to have had the opportunity to attend amazing workshops on business planning, pitching and funding offered by the University’s Innovation Centre. But more importantly, I’m extremely grateful to have a robust network of support and guidance that empowers female entrepreneurs on their journey.
Parimala Shivaprasad
Retra
I graduated with a PhD in Chemical Engineering in 2019. I got involved with student enterprise activities since year 1 of my PhD starting with the Business Plan Competition. I entered the competition with my idea of flower waste recycle to get an experience about developing a business plan and pitching. It was a good start as I realised it is important to have a proof of concept to demonstrate the feasibility of the idea for further support and development. I then pitched in the Dragon’s Den event and won seed funding to test my idea in the lab.
This was the turning point in the journey as in addition to validating the idea, I was able to carry out initial market research and form important links with places generating flower waste. I entered the business plan competition in 2017, but this time with a better understanding of my product and the business model. I went on to win the competition followed by the 2nd round of Dragon’s Den and the Innovation Award.
Siobain Hone (Graduate Enterprise Manager) has been a constant support since the very beginning of my journey. Her constructive feedback throughout the competition stages and after helped me progress from the idea stage to having a product MVP. She has also helped me connect with alumni entrepreneurs and business mentors which has been beneficial for the marketing and operations strategy of my enterprise.
When I moved to UofBath, I had a set goal of staying in academia after my PhD. So it was a bit daunting to deviate from the original plan. But deciding to start my own business has been a very rewarding experience as it gives me the opportunity to use my skills as a researcher to achieve impact and contribute to the society. Retra received mentions in global news media and fun fact, it exceeds the number of citations I have received so far for my research publications! This gets me through the days when I am overwhelmed with the uncertainty of the path I have chosen. I’d also like to thank my parents who have been a constant source of support throughout.
Retra wouldn’t be possible if not for SETsquared Bath and I am very proud to be associated with the incubator for the wonderful work they do to support entrepreneurs at all levels. This association has opened up new opportunities and connections which have been very useful for the progress of my enterprise and my development as an entrepreneur. I have received mentorship from student entrepreneur mentors and the resident entrepreneurs for over 3 years now, who have been a constant source of support throughout the journey. I look forward to continuing mine and Retra’s journey with SETsquared Bath in the future as well!
“I understood that women worldwide have historically been underpaid, undervalued, underrepresented, underfunded, and underestimated…and still are. I knew I had to play a role in trying to improve this situation.”