All Raise CEO says VC’s smartest firms are betting on diverse leadership

Equity

TechCrunch

Founders, Silicon Valley, Finance, Ipo, Vc, Technology, Business News, Startups, Business, Venture Capital, News, Stock Market, Entrepreneurship, Techcrunch

4.2 • 365 Ratings

🗓️ 13 August 2025

⏱️ 30 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

Women are making real progress in venture capital, according to a new report from the nonprofit All Raise. The percentage of women and nonbinary partners at top firms has doubled in recent years, even as the market cooled. On this week’s Equity, All Raise CEO Paige Hendrix Buckner joins TechCrunch’s Dominic-Madori Davis to unpack what’s driving that momentum, and where the industry is still falling short. Pay gaps persist, and the largest firms still have few women in senior partner roles, but there are signs of meaningful change ahead. Listen to the full episode to hear: How investors are responding to the current DEI backlash The impact that women starting their own firms are having on the industry What progress All Raise hopes to see in the next five years Equity will be back Friday with our weekly news roundup, so stay tuned. Equity is TechCrunch’s flagship podcast, produced by Theresa Loconsolo, and posts every Wednesday and Friday. Subscribe to us on Apple Podcasts, Overcast, Spotify and all the casts. You also can follow Equity on X and Threads, at @EquityPod. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Transcript

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0:00.0	This is a paid ad by Fidelity Private Shares.
0:03.0	A messy or missing cap table might not just slow you down.
0:06.0	It could cost you your next fundraising round.
0:08.0	Hello and welcome back to Equity, TechCrunch's flagship podcast about the business of startups.
0:24.9	I'm Dominic Madurai Davis, and this is the episode where we bring on industry experts to help us explore trend in the tech world and deep dive.
0:32.1	The power structures of venture capital are shifting, and the numbers prove it.
0:36.0	Representation at the top has doubled since 2018, with nearly one in five senior roles now
0:40.7	held by women.
0:41.7	It's a story of real progress, but also of problems that refuse to budge.
0:45.8	At the mega funds managing billions, it's still mostly a boys club.
0:49.2	Just three women holding managing partner roles at the largest funds compared to 87 men.
0:53.9	So what's fueling the momentum and what's keeping the glass ceiling firmly in place at the largest funds compared to 87 men. So what's fueling the momentum
0:54.9	and what's keeping the glass ceiling firmly in place at the top? To dive into it all,
0:59.2	I'm joined by Paige Hendrix Buckner, CEO of All Race, the nonprofit working to accelerate the success
1:04.4	of female and non-binary investors and founders. Paige, welcome to the show. Hey, so good to see you,
1:09.4	Don. Thanks for having me. Yes, I'm excited for this conversation.
1:12.4	Can you just tell everyone a little bit about you and how you found yourself at Allraise and also what Allraises? Yeah, absolutely. So, hey, everyone. So great to chat with you, Dom. I was telling you just before we recorded how much I love following your work. So it's exciting to be here. So Al-Rase is a nonprofit that is focused on
1:29.0	helping women in non-binary VCs get a seat, keep their seat, and be wildly successful. And we
1:34.1	were started because we recognized that there was this disparity in two big places, lots of places,
1:39.0	but two that we were tracking against. One is the percentage of women and non-binary folks in partner plus roles at U.S.-based
1:46.0	VC firms. And number two is the amount of funding that goes to women and non-binary founders
1:51.0	at the earliest stages. And where we are focused today is on the VC side of the equation.
	...

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