Helen Oldham on Why Female Founders Are Smart Money—And How to Prove It with Data
Welcome to our Women in VC Q&A series, where we spotlight the trailblazers reshaping the venture capital landscape through innovative approaches to gender-smart investing. Today, we're thrilled to feature Helen Oldham, Co-Founder of Lifted Ventures, whose groundbreaking work is proving that backing female founders isn't just the right thing to do—it's smart business.
Helen's journey represents a paradigm shift in how we think about venture capital and regional investment. Alongside co-founder Jordan Dargue, they have spent over 17 years in the regional early-stage equity environment, developing what Lifted Ventures calls the "flywheel approach"—a unique model that combines angel networks, VC connections, education, and intersectionality blueprints to systematically increase capital flow to female founders.
What sets Lifted Ventures apart is their data-driven approach to dismantling the myths surrounding female founders. Through Lifted Ventures and The Lifted Project (co-led with Zandra Moore MBE and backed by Lloyds Bank), they're building comprehensive datasets that reveal the hidden potential of regional female founders. Their work demonstrates that female founders are not only more likely to exit but do so more quickly than their male counterparts, generating twice the revenue per pound invested.
Lifted Ventures' impact extends far beyond individual investments. Through the Lifted Angels network, they've facilitated over £7 million in capital across 22 founders, while their Lifted Angel Academy has educated over 120 women about accessible angel investing—starting from as little as £2,000. Their annual Athena VC conference has become a cornerstone event, bringing together over 170 women in venture capital and corporate finance to collectively amplify their voice in the industry.
In this candid Q&A, Helen shares insights from their journey from talking about "barriers" to showcasing "business benefits," reveals surprising data points about regional female founders, and offers strategic advice for women in VC looking to transform their firms' investment thesis from diversity as a "nice-to-have" to diversity as a competitive advantage.
Your "flywheel" model combines angel networks, VC connections, education, and intersectionality blueprints in a unique approach. Which component of this flywheel has been the most critical accelerator for change, and how do you measure its impact beyond just funding amounts?
Jordan Dargue and I have spent over 17 years collectively in the regional, early stage equity environment, and over five years developing our flywheel approach to supporting regional female founders. At the very heart of our model is our lively angel network; a group of predominantly women, and advocate men who back female founders of start ups from outside of London and the South East. So far Lifted Angels have backed 22 founders and helped to raise over £7m of capital. The accessibility and tax efficiency of angel investing is vastly underplayed in women's business networks; too few women are aware that they could be investing in female founders without having to have hundreds of thousands of spare capital, our investments can start at as little as £2k, and aggregate up to significant amounts when we invest alongside each other. That's why we developed the Lifted Angel Academy, to help educate women about every aspect of effective angel investing. We've had over 120 attendees to our free to access angel programmes so far!
As Co-Leader of The Lifted Project, you're taking a data and ecosystem approach to increasing capital for female founders in UK regional cities. What specific data points have surprised you most about regional female founders, and how might this reshape national investment strategies?
The Lifted Project is an organisation we have formed in collaboration with Zandra Moore MBE, backed by Lloyds Bank, to support later stage, high growth female founders from the regions. The Lifted Project is taking a data and community led approach to creating the right environment for high growth, women led organisations to thrive in the regions. In time this will include a regional dataset on the hidden female founders who are making huge progress out of the limelight.British Business Bank research demonstrated that female founders are more likely to exit, and to exit more quickly than their male counterparts, so across both Lifted Ventures and The Lifted Project we want to make it understood that backing women isn't altruism, or a good thing to do, it makes cold business sense.
You've moved from talking about "barriers" to showcasing "business benefits" - with female founders generating twice the revenue per pound invested. What's your advice for women in VC who want to shift their firm's investment thesis from diversity as a "nice-to-have" to diversity as a competitive advantage?
The decision making process and power balance inside VCs is complex and the result of systemic barriers which have existed since the dawn of Venture Capitalism in the 1970s. Ideally what's required is greater representation at a senior level inside VC firms, and more importantly for their backers, the LPs, to have gender as a key outcome for the deployment of their funds. At Lifted Ventures we are building an ecosystem of women in Venture Capital who can come together collectively to have more of a voice, and to cheer each other on. Our Athena VC conference held in May 2025 was attended by over 170 women in VC and corporate finance. Together we can accelerate the pace of change.
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