Asia Pacific Alternative Investment Management firm, Artesian, has established its first New Zealand office in Auckland
with the launch of the $100 million Female Leaders VC Fund. The Fund has attracted $45M of cornerstone investment from
Australian industry super funds, Hostplus and legalsuper. The Female Leaders VC Fund will exclusively target Series A
and B rounds of high-growth female-led ventures across the Asia Pacific, with NZ a key region of focus.
Ali Clunies-Ross, Portfolio Manager for the Female Leaders VC Fund, comments, “Artesian is a global alternative asset
manager looking for market failures that result in mispriced or undervalued assets. Female-led startups suffer
underinvestment not due to a lack of talent, but from the lack of opportunities caused by cognitive biases and pattern
recognition in an industry where 97% of VCs are male. Artesian has recognised the chance to invest in an opportunity
hiding in plain sight – female led startups raising Series A and Series B funding. Artesian relishes our role as
first-movers and ecosystem builders and believe that you do not have to sacrifice market leading returns while
delivering transformational change.”
Artesian, founded in 2004, and with $900 million FUM, delivers high impact alternative investment strategies and
services, including venture capital and public and private debt, to institutional investors, foundations, family offices & corporations.
David Fendall, Artesian’s newly appointed Head of Business Development in NZ states, ”Artesian’s purpose is to deliver
exceptional risk adjusted returns while addressing the world’s critical challenges which are either existential, for
example climate change and food security, or endemic, including gender, healthcare, and education inequality. Artesian
believes that innovation and technology investment facilitate solutions at a speed and scale that matches the urgency
and magnitude of these problems”.
The investment thesis of the Female Leaders VC Fund is that talent is evenly distributed across male and female founders
(as well as investors, employees, and board members). However, there is material inequality between the opportunity
available for male and female founders in the startup ecosystem.
For example:
» startups with male-only founders receive >85% of global VC funding
» 95% of VCs are male
» male founders and employees own 89% of total startup equity
» startups with female-only founders receive <3% of global VC funding
» average deal size of female-founded startups is <0.5x that of male-founded startups
» female founders and employees own only 11% of total startup equity
This endemic gender inequality has resulted in asymmetrical capital distribution and a relative value pricing
opportunity. The Female Leaders VC Fund will address this market failure and target strong returns by providing
financial and strategic support to the unique perspectives, unexplored business opportunities and under-invested talent
of female founders in Australia, NZ, and the broader Asia Pacific region.
Artesian believes that strong community engagement with aspiring female founders and investors, including education and
mentorship, is critical to improve gender diversity and the representation of women in management positions,
directorships, and as professional investors. Artesian has partnered with Australia’s leading female focused angel
group, Scale Investors to develop programs and support to complement the investment activities of the Fund. Artesian
will look to actively engage with the broad NZ innovation ecosystem, including government organizations, universities
and research institutes, corporations and industry groups, accelerators and incubators, startups, founders and
investors, to identify, support, invest and scale ambitious female led startups.
Artesian has developed a proprietary Gender Diversity Assessment Score (GDAS) to be used during the sourcing and deal
pipeline process to establish which startups are eligible for potential investment from the Fund. Artesian hopes that
the GDAS will be adopted more broadly, across the ecosystem, to benchmark gender diversity in early-stage companies,
provide greater transparency, and a means by which to measure future impact and progress.