International Women's Day Issues Wake-Up Call

On International Women’s Day, the message from one Australian life science leader is blunt: the funding gap for women’s health research is not just a problem, it’s an embarrassment. Stuart Dignam, CEO of MTPConnect, wrote in a recent opinion piece that only five percent of global research and development spending goes to women’s health. Of that tiny slice, four out of five dollars are directed at women’s cancers, leaving just one percent for every other condition affecting women.

The numbers for female founders in Australia’s startup world are just as stark. Only 22 percent of Australian startups are founded by women, according to a report. Globally, the share of female founders has been shrinking since 2021. Funding is getting harder to secure. In 2024, just 15 percent of Australian startup funding went to teams with at least one female founder, down from 18 percent the year before.

Even getting a pitch meeting is becoming more difficult. Data for 2024 showed that only 31 percent of startups that pitched to an investment committee had a woman on the founding team — a drop of six percent from the previous year.

Leadership numbers don’t look much better

In STEM fields, women hold just 26 percent of senior management roles and only 10 percent of CEO positions, according to one monitor. On corporate boards, another report states that only one in ten of the country’s top 200 listed companies has a female chair, and women make up only about 35 percent of directors on ASX 200 and ASX 300 boards.

Dignam argues this pattern of underrepresentation and underfunding is not just a fairness issue. It’s an economic one. A 2024 report estimated that closing investment gaps in women’s healthcare could boost the global economy by $1 trillion annually by 2040.

The 3 Ps — population, participation, and productivity — are the building blocks of GDP per capita, he notes. More funding for women’s health research, more female founders, and more venture capital for their companies could improve health outcomes while driving economic growth.

Some Australian life science companies founded by women are already making global contributions. Dignam’s list includes SpeeDx, Laronix, Opthea, Currus Biologics, Navbit, Aravax, Hemideina, Presagen (now Qubigen), Alyra Biotech, Kali Healthcare, Baymatob, Carina Biotech, and SDIP Innovations. But these successes remain the exception rather than the rule.

At MTPConnect, the CEO says the organization is strengthening eligibility criteria.

Dignam’s call to action is directed at everyone in the sector: pharma, biotech, medtech, finance, venture capital, research, academia, and government.