Funding Women's Health Startups with Roxanne Leduc | Blush & Bloom Podcast | Ep. 57

On this week's Blush & Bloom, Gigi Kenneth sits down with Roxanne Leduc, CEO and Founder of Cap Inclusive and founder of the FemTech Breakfast Club, to talk about funding women's health startups. Roxanne spent years in venture capital before launching Cap Inclusive, which helps HR teams attract, retain and grow underrepresented employees, and the FemTech Breakfast Club, which puts women's health founders in front of rooms full of investors. Her argument: inclusion is a data problem, and when you measure it, it pays.

In This Episode, We Cover:

• How Roxanne went from venture capital to founding Cap Inclusive
• What her research on the gender gap in venture capital revealed about parenthood and careers
• What inclusive investing looks like in practice
• The bias women's health founders face when they pitch
• Whether founders should brand their startup as FemTech
• How AI could help close the women's health data gap
• Her fundraising advice for women founders

From venture capital to Cap Inclusive

Roxanne's path to founding started in venture capital, where she saw how capital was distributed and how power dynamics between founders and investors shaped who got funded. She led a study on closing the gender gap in VC, meeting more than 100 women in the industry, and found that the changes needed were simple. When diversity, equity and inclusion are viewed through a data lens, she says, the results show up as lower turnover, better performance and stronger returns. Six months after asking her boss for time to explore it, Cap Inclusive launched.

What does the gender gap in venture capital look like?

Roxanne's research put a number on the cost of parenthood. Across positions from analyst to partner, women in venture capital who had children took six to seven years longer to reach the same title as women peers without children. Half of firms had no parental leave policy, leaving the first woman to get pregnant to negotiate one herself. Her fix: a clear policy, flexibility, and making sure women know a family and a VC career are compatible.

What is inclusive investing?

For Roxanne, inclusive investing means making the process as founder friendly as possible. That starts with asking founders what barriers they face, who they want to meet and when they can attend events. At Panache Ventures, her team launched a daytime mocktail networking hour so parents could come without arranging childcare, creating a safer space for founders to connect with investors. Simple solutions, she says, to a very complex problem.

Why is funding women's health startups harder?

There is an extra layer of bias on top. Roxanne points to studies showing that when a woman launches a women's health company, she is often perceived as doing it for the greater good rather than as a smart business decision. When a man launches one, it is so rare that investors assume he must be onto something. With around 80 percent of investors in Canada being men, she says, founders need to make sure the problem lands with people who will never experience it, and talking about families is one way in.

Should founders brand their startup as FemTech?

"I always say that you need to understand the rules of the game if you want to trick it," Roxanne says. For some investors, FemTech or women's health is a red flag, so founders can adapt the pitch to the person in the room. She shares how Andrea Barrica, founder of the sexual education platform O.school, heard many rejections before shifting her pitch and bringing the problem to life in person.

AI and the women's health data gap

Roxanne calls AI a blessing and a curse. Models depend on datasets, and women's health has very few large ones. At the same time, at-home testing is creating new data that AI can help researchers make sense of. She hopes AI will also make it easier to include women in clinical trials, which often leave women out because hormonal cycles add complexity to the analysis.

FemTech fundraising advice for women founders

After a pitch, Roxanne suggests two questions. First, ask what specific metrics you need to hit for the investor to invest, which puts the burden on them to name a milestone. Second, ask about their internal process: who else needs convincing, how decisions are made and how long they take. Then follow up at the right time, like any sales cycle. Looking ahead, her message to the industry is direct: "We need to be bold," and stop treating women's health as a niche market.

FAQ

Who is Roxanne Leduc? Roxanne Leduc is the CEO and Founder of Cap Inclusive and the founder of the FemTech Breakfast Club. She previously worked in venture capital, including at Panache Ventures, and has published research on closing the gender gap in VC.

What is the FemTech Breakfast Club? The FemTech Breakfast Club helps women's health founders get funding by giving them space to pitch to rooms of around 100 venture capital investors. Healthcare professionals, founders and investors meet as peers, and the club plans to open angel investment opportunities.

What does Cap Inclusive do? Cap Inclusive works with HR teams to find where underrepresented employees have a different experience, then pinpoints actions that raise engagement and lower turnover. For one client, that meant $270,000 a year in turnover savings.

What should founders ask investors after a pitch? Ask which specific metrics you need to hit for them to invest, and ask how their decision process works, including who else needs to approve and how long it takes.

Listen and connect

Listen to the full conversation on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, or YouTube. Connect with Roxanne Leduc on LinkedIn and learn more about Cap Inclusive. Explore more conversations on the Blush and Bloom podcast hub, including Ep. 55 on building a femtech venture studio, and at Asele.

This episode is for general informational purposes and does not constitute medical, legal, or regulatory advice.