Women of Influence: Venture capital

Ahu Büyükkuşoğlu Serter
Arya Women Investment Platform

A serial entrepreneur and investor, Istanbul-based Ahu Büyükkuşoğlu Serter is the founder of the Arya Women Investment Platform, which supports female founders and invests in women-led businesses. Last year, she established the Arya Venture Capital Investment Fund, which the platform believes to be the first gender-lens impact investment fund in Turkey. She also serves on the boards of several companies, as well as a number of technology start-ups. Through her efforts to close the gender gap, Büyükkuşoğlu Serter is setting a “new standard for female leadership and responsible investing in Turkey and beyond”, says a peer. 

Maëlle Gavet
Techstars

Maëlle Gavet was appointed as chief executive of pre-seed investor Techstars in 2021. Under her leadership, the firm has since closed its latest institutionally backed fund on $150 million, has grown its portfolio to more than 3,600 companies and now runs 54 accelerator programmes. One of Gavet’s focus areas is supporting founders who have historically been overlooked in the tech and venture ecosystem. In 2022, Techstars partnered with JPMorgan on the $80 million Advancing Cities Fund, which aims to create opportunities for underrepresented entrepreneurs. Of the 59 companies the fund invested in last year, 50 percent of the founders were diverse and 25 percent identified as women.  

Cristina Apple Georgoulakis
Seven Seven Six

Cristina Apple Georgoulakis joined Seven Seven Six in early 2022 following a one-year appointment as an operator-in-residence. In her current role as portfolio and founder outcomes partner, Georgoulakis works towards aligning founder and firm incentives while also managing the portfolio outcomes team. Her remit includes creating optimal journeys for founders to follow with tailored touchpoints, and developing a ‘Founder Voice’ report to collect, share and action any feedback. During her time at the firm, Georgoulakis has closed four deals, led 30 workshops and served more than 100 founders through check-ins and support meetings. 

Seyonne Kang
StepStone Group

Previously at Greenspring Associates before its merger with StepStone in 2021, Seyonne Kang is a partner in the firm’s venture capital and growth equity team. Over the past 12 months, she has played a decisive role in a number of investments, including a $20 million Series A funding round for Draftea, a fantasy sports platform for Spanish speakers, and a $25 million investment in Timescale, an open source, time-series database company. Kang also co-heads StepStone’s Diversity Fund Committee and she has led investments in four emerging managers since March 2022, three of which are led by diverse partnerships, and one of which focuses on sustainability. 

Nisa Leung
Qiming Venture Partners

Nisa Leung, managing partner at Qiming Venture Partners, was an early proponent of China’s healthcare innovation scene. Today, she heads healthcare investments at the firm, with nearly 200 portfolio companies spanning the biopharmaceutical, diagnostics, medical devices, services and healthtech sectors. Leung has supported her team and the firm’s fundraising and investment activities through challenging macro conditions, while also guiding portfolio companies through IPO processes. Last July, Qiming held the final close for its USD Fund VIII on $2.5 billion and held a first close on $700 million for RMB Fund VII. Leung also promotes the DE&I agenda – as of 2022, over half of Qiming’s team members and 40 percent of partners are women. 

Shing Lo
Latham & Watkins

A partner in law firm Latham & Watkins’ London office, Shing Lo has worked with a range of VC funds and tech companies over the course of her career. Recent mandates include representing artificial intelligence-based contract management platform Robin AI on its $10.5 million Series A round and advising venture firm Atomico on a $120 million Series C funding round for HR tech platform Factorial. Her dedication to supporting female founders and investors in the European tech ecosystem shines through at all levels. For example, Lo was instrumental in stocking Latham’s London office with sanitary products from a femtech start-up led by two women from minority backgrounds. 

Felicity O’Kelly
Climate Investment

As a principal at Climate Investment, previously known as OGCI Climate Investments, O’Kelly is focused on driving change in the climate tech venture space. She recently sourced, led, structured and closed the $30 million Series B funding round for Aeroseal – a patented sealing solution that can reduce building energy consumption by 30 percent – alongside other climate investors. O’Kelly also champions greater diversity within the climate tech landscape. She is a founding investor supporter at Climate Mosaic, a consortium that aims to empower underrepresented founders and investors tackling the climate crisis.

Evgenia Plotnikova
Dawn Capital

General partner Evgenia Plotnikova has helped raise more than $1 billion for Dawn Capital’s portfolio companies since joining the firm in 2018. Drawing on more than a decade’s experience, Plotnikova leads on software-as-a-service deals and plays an instrumental role in advising Dawn’s portfolio of 40 companies on how best to navigate and scale in the current operating environment. As well as overseeing the day-to-day firm strategy and development of the team, Plotnikova is dedicated to maintaining Dawn’s diversity and culture, and also shares her expertise with aspiring tech entrepreneurs through her role as a Techstars mentor. 

Rudina Seseri
Glasswing Ventures

Rudina Seseri is founder and managing partner at Glasswing Ventures, which invests in start-ups that apply artificial intelligence and frontier technology to enterprise and cybersecurity markets. In the past year, the firm closed its second fund on $158 million in capital commitments, and provided pre-seed and seed funding to 11 AI start-ups. Glasswing was one of the earliest VCs to become a signatory to the UN Principles for Responsible Investment, and Seseri’s DE&I efforts have helped ensure diverse leadership is a priority at the firm and throughout its portfolio. In 73 percent of its new investments in 2022, at least half the founding teams were from underrepresented backgrounds. 

Noor Sweid
Global Ventures

Noor Sweid is managing partner and founder of United Arab Emirates-based Global Ventures, which she launched in 2018 to help emerging market entrepreneurs access capital and scale their businesses. The firm has since raised $200 million and deployed around $80 million across almost 60 investments. Last year, Global Ventures led investments in 11 companies, while its existing portfolio raised $1.7 billion in new capital. Promoting women’s participation is also a priority for Sweid, and in 2019 she helped create the ‘Female Founder Office Hours’ initiative, alongside Playfair Capital, aimed at building an investor community for female founders in the region.