Breaking Barriers: The First Female-Led VC Firm in Switzerland

Listen to Jacqueline Ruedin Rüsch, Founding GP, and Angelica Morrone GP from Privilège Ventures, Switzerland's first female-led VC firm. Jacqueline and Angelica reflect on their experiences as women in the male-dominated venture capital (VC) industry. They discuss the unique perspectives women bring to the table, particularly the value of diverse viewpoints in decision-making while highlighting the challenges of networking and establishing credibility in a predominantly male environment.

Jacqueline is a Founding General Partner of Privilège Ventures, a Swiss VC firm specializing in seed and early-stage investments. She has over 20 years of experience in finance. She covered several positions in primary Swiss banks before starting her own company, a financial education firm in 2011. In 2016, she also founded Privilege Ventures.

Angelica’s career includes tenure at Fiat USA as Director of Investor Relations, Sales, and Trading at Morgan Stanley, followed by her co-founding her own asset management company which to date has invested and managed a compounded USD 2 billion. Angelica has been an Angel Investor for the past 20 years.

This 0100 ESG & Impact Talks delves into their investment strategies, emphasizing the benefits of gender-diverse teams and focusing on sectors like climate tech, agri-food tech, and health tech, aligning with their mission of positively impacting people and the planet. The conversation also touches on the importance of perseverance in the long-term VC landscape, the ongoing efforts to support more women entering the industry, and a call for investors to back purpose-driven initiatives.

As a woman leading a venture capital firm, what unique perspectives do you bring to the table? What challenges have you encountered that you believe are specific to women in this industry?

(JR)So, I would say in the venture capital world, personally, I have found something very similar compared to what I found in previous years in the financial world, because venture capital is still a business dominated by men. There is nothing wrong with this, and I have to say it has been always a great pleasure working with men for over two decades.

But indeed, we still have these differences around the table, I would say. This, I think it's on one side an opportunity for women because we can actually bring to the table another perspective, which I think can add value when you have a conversation, because we have a different way of, let's say, start a topic, look at the challenge, another perspective, and that's adding value. On the challenging side, probably what we have not been so good in the past historically is in networking.

Men are better at networking than us as women. So, we are learning. I think the new generation is definitely better, but still, it's not always that easy, especially when maybe ou are the only one or among a few women in, let's say, a big setup conference and everyone is a male.

Sometimes it's not easy, especially if you are alone, to really jump into the conversation. So, definitely, these can be a challenge. Another thing that probably is not related only to women, but especially when you are a younger professional, is credibility, right? So, when you are a young professional, it's harder to being accepted and be credible.

If you are a woman, sometimes it's a bit harder. So, you have to show stronger, you have to work harder to really show that you can bring value, that you are a professional. And sometimes this credibility is not always easy to have it.

Do you think it's harder for women to be credible than for men? I think it can be. It really depends how you are as a person. So, I believe sometimes it's also us as women, how we come across.

(JR)Sometimes we are not confident enough and if you are not enough confident, of course, it's harder to be credible because you don't believe in yourself, you know, to start with. So, sometimes I think it's really that part. You mentioned something very interesting, which is networking, right? I'm part of 0100 conferences.

What we do is try to enable these networking opportunities. So, why do you think it's harder for us to do the whole networking part when it's essential for this industry that's all about you being able to develop networks and trust and meet the right people? I think it's the nature, how we are, right? Because men are more used, not only in the VC industry. Here, I'm really talking about the ability of men to really network and they've always had their clubs.

They've always been able to network and so on and if you are alone as a woman in a conference, right, where you have and especially, let's say, you are maybe young in the industry and starting maybe your career from, you know, just a few years and you have groups of men that maybe know each other. They share some interest and so on. It's not easy to just, you know, go and outreach and just say, hey, you know, I'm Jacqueline, may I join the conversation? And maybe they're just talking about other topics.

So, it's not necessarily always that easy. Of course, as we see more and more women in the industry, it's becoming more, let's say, it's becoming easier. But sometimes, it can be a challenge. 

I'm not saying it is always and certainly, it's not for everyone. But it may be a little bit more challenging. And being there, both of you, very successful professionals, it's a very impressive experience and seniority in the industry.

Angelica, maybe we can use the microphone now. Maybe you can tell us a little bit, like, have you ever felt like an outsider in this world? What are your thoughts on this?

(AM)Well, thank you, Laura. Basically, what I always say is that finance, strangely enough, is a very democratic sector.

 Because most of us professionals are based, we earn money and we are retributed based on our achievements and on our performance. So, it is less normal for women to have salary disadvantages in finance. Having said that, since when both Jacqueline and I started in finance, there were even fewer women.

Sometimes, we have advantages because if you are lucky enough to have a good mentor that can take you up under his or her wing, they can show you the way and they can make you feel part of something. Other times, it feels like it's an uphill way to learning the ropes, as they say in English, to learning how to move around, how to speak with people. But I believe this is true in every single field in the world.

 So, it's important to use every opportunity to network, to know people, to understand really what is the lingo and what is the modus operandi that is prevalent in the industry. VC or any other. Awesome.

So, maybe we can go deeper and talk specifically about being a women-led VC firm. How do you think this influences your investment strategies and decisions? And where, if you feel that there are particular sectors or types of companies that you feel more inclined to support because you are a women-led VC firm?

(AM) I'll be happy to start and please, Jacqueline, jump in at any point. So, first of all, it's important to point out that both Jacqueline and I come from a financial background, but also an entrepreneurial background because we both had our own firms that we brought on and managed for a long time.

So, that gives us both an entrepreneurial mindset, but with the financial background and the financial structuring, which we believe is so important when you're setting up a portfolio of companies. Any portfolio of companies in a VC firm is something that has to be constructed based on a very solid strategy. So, we do a lot of portfolio modeling and in our portfolio strategy, we have a certain structuring, which is based on many different criteria.

And it's extremely important to keep that discipline so that every single investment is made according to the criteria. In terms of the sectors that move us particularly, we have this incredible luxury of having invested in at least three funds before as privileged ventures and in many other venues individually. The fourth fund, which is the fund that we are fundraising for right now, it's a very interesting one in our opinion, because it tries to leverage on the advantage of having gender diverse teams.

So, we're looking for co-founders who are both males and females. And if we can have both at a significant percentage, it's extremely important because they can both add value. And it has been statistically proven that there are some great advantages in terms of both increased returns and faster exits.

So, this is what we bring to this fourth fund. The sectors in which we're interested in move on three main verticals, but everything has an overlying umbrella. And the umbrella is we, as you read in Jacqueline's bio in particular, we are particularly interested in companies that have the calling of making a difference, making a difference for people and the planet, for our generation, and for the future generation.

And how do we do that? We do that by concentrating on the three pillars that really gather all of the companies that can make such a difference. So, we are interested in climate tech, agri-food tech, and health tech. And Jacqueline, I will leave it to you if you would like to add a bit more to this.

(JR)Thank you, Angelica. I think the sectors that we are interested in are quite big. But for us, what is important without maybe being too specific and going really into the details of the criteria of investments and so on and the different sectors, what I think it's important for us, you said, what moves us, it's really what resonates us, right? If I want an investor to invest in our funds, I need to believe in what I am investing, right? Also, both Angelica and I are investing ourselves alongside our investors in the funds.

So, for us, it is really important not only the return, which remains, of course, as it is a financial product, the most important criteria that investors would look at but also the kind of impact that we can have on people and planet and the future generation. So, that's certainly something very important to both of us.

And is this fund, at least this fourth one or maybe all of your funds, are they equal funds in terms of Article 9, Article 8? 

(JR)So, the first three funds were not. This current fund is in Article 8, yes.

Perfect. And when you mentioned that one of your major interests is to have this diversity, of co-founders, male and female, specifically for this fourth fund. How were the previous ones and what are the challenges when you put this specific requirement? Now, I mean, there must be a reason why you have to put this requirement in this specific fund.

(JR)So, in the previous funds, we didn't have this requirement in terms of investment, but we did have several companies that had a gender-mixed team. And so, we experienced ourselves why having around the table a gender-mixed team actually usually brings better results.

So, that was observed by us. And then we started to think, OK, is this something that brings value? We have always believed a lot in complementarity, in differences in the background, sometimes really coming from different countries. I mean, whatever you have as a diversity in a team usually adds value, right? The reason why we wanted to bring also this lens is because we strongly believe in inclusivity and equality.

But there are also specific financial reasons. So, we see this as an investment opportunity. There have been several studies that have shown this, just to mention one, for example, from McKinsey.

They have shown that for every dollar of funding, gender-mixed startups generate 2.5 times higher revenues over five years. So, that's a lot if you think, right? Because 2.5 higher revenue, I mean, it's kind of amazing, right? Other studies, for example, from BCG or so, have also shown that the average exit time for companies is lower than one year. So, it's 6.4 years compared to 7.4 years when you have gender-diverse founding teams.

So, for us, it's quite interesting because as a VC fund, we want to generate higher returns in the shortest possible time. But the fact that you have to put this as part of the requirements, what does it say? It says that maybe if you don't put it, it's pressure startups out there to try to put efforts to be more gender-balanced. What's your opinion when it comes to that? So, basically, the way we feel is that the startup world has been a little bit more dominated by men than women for a number of different reasons.

So, the fact that we are actively looking for a gender-mixed team wants to encourage many teams who do acknowledge the fact of diversity and inclusion as an added value. We want to encourage them to come forward. It is also important to think that in sectors such as deep tech, it is mostly men who are the founders or the co-founders.

There are fewer women and when women are there, sometimes they tend to be co-founding between women. We feel that there is a true value in the gender-mixed and that's why we wanted to make it very explicit for this fund. As Jacqueline mentioned, we looked at some very relevant studies from Boston Consulting McKinsey and there is statistical evidence of the value of the gender mix.

So, we wanted to make it very explicit. And do you feel right now, when you are looking for potential startups, have you had to say no to many of them because they don't have this basic requirement? Well, as a GP in a VC, you do say a lot of no's and that is not necessarily related to the gender or the other things. We have some criteria and usually the most important thing is that the team is competent to carry on the project.

The gender mix comes immediately afterward. So, yes, we do have to say a lot of no's. That comes with the fiduciary duty that we have to the investors and to the fact that we invest alongside them in the best possible companies out there.

And let's talk a little bit more about the both of you as GPs. You are the first female-led VC firm in Switzerland. How are the conversations with your LPs? I mean, when you're looking for LPs, you talk to different branches from family offices or more institutional.

(AM)First of all, what's your strategy when it comes to that? And also, what are the benefits, the challenges when you have a very female-driven team? You are not only women, you have men in your team, but the partners are mainly, mostly women, right? Yes, correct. You know, it's an interesting question because I think Angelica and I, coming from the financial world, I think it's not a challenge for us. I mean, we have started, as Angelica was mentioning before, in a moment when you had really few women in the industry.

So I think for us, it really doesn't make any difference that I have personally, and I will let Angelica comment on this. I've never had any issue on, you know, sitting on a table where I was the only woman and even when I was younger. So to me, frankly, it's not a challenge. 

On the opposite, sometimes my counterparties are even nicer than they would be with the men. So there are some advantages. And as long as you are professional and knowledgeable and you know what you are talking about, then you have credibility.

And then it's not talking about male or female. It's talking about two professionals sitting at a table and discussing about business. Well, first of all, I had a very similar experience.

The most important thing that any professional can do is to establish authority over a certain topic, is to establish competence. Then, of course, being a woman sometimes puts you, as Jacqueline was saying, in an advantageous position because people tend to be a little bit more, have more regard for that position. At this stage in our lives, we have many years of experience under our belt.

So it isn't a problem to sit with just about any other counterpart. And we have both had the experience of sitting on boards where we were the only women. And you can add a different perspective.

You can make a difference. We believe that you can have an analytical empathy that is particularly valuable in making investment decisions and sometimes in guiding founders in making some tough decisions. So we feel that it is an advantage to bring this kind of a different perspective to any situation. 

And how do you think we can bring more women into this specific sector? I mean, in general, there's less women in the financial services world, right? It's been growing, as you said, but when you started, there were just a few. Now this is growing. But what can we do to have even more? So this is no longer a topic.

(JR)What I have seen lately, there are a lot of women, younger women who are attracted by this industry. And it is very easy to understand why, because I think this industry is, let's say, very different than others, because it has specific characteristics that you may not find in other, let's say, financial pockets because it allows actually to be in the VC world, either if you come from a financial background or if you come also from a scientific background. And that, I think, makes the VC industry very interesting on one end.

Also, the fact that you really can invest on something more tangible, right? It's really, you invest in the real economy, right? If you do investments in the financial world, it's more a financial instrument, is a bit more, let's say, dry, while here you work, especially at the stage where we invest, which is the early stage. You really invest in people, first of all, and people that are building products and services that are useful for the world, right? And for other people. So I think this makes this industry very attractive.

And that's why I believe we see more and more women in this context. What we have seen also is that as a woman is in this industry, sometimes after a while, she may not be interested anymore to stay in the industry anymore because some VC firms may have a longer period before you can get some reward. But this is not only for women.

It's just because the VC industry is a very long-term journey, I would say. Sometimes this is underestimated by people who start in this industry. And then maybe some other specificity, because again, to become a partner in a firm, it will actually require a lot of years.

And sometimes maybe people are just, they just don't have the patience to be there, to stay there, to be there for an entire cycle before you can prove what you have been able to build. Yeah, I think that a lot has been done in terms of education so that more women study more technical matters and, of course, finance. So we all know about many STEM initiatives starting in middle school, which really help girls, younger girls, to decide whether they want to study technical topics.

And in fact, in universities right now all over the world, we have almost equal numbers of males and females studying scientific topics and matters. The problem, and also we have many young employees who go at similar stages and they start to grow. As we were saying before, VC has a long life cycle.

So in many other funds, you can prove your track record in two or three years. In a VC firm, it takes 10 to 12 years, maybe even 15. So it takes a lot of conviction and staying power.

In terms of being a female, even if many, many initiatives are coming to the fore, it is still a little bit more difficult to try and build a family and be an active professional. All the women who have been able to do that have my utmost respect because it takes a huge amount of balancing act and sometimes sacrifices. So it is being in the VC world, like being in any other profession, I guess, takes a lot of time.

And sometimes women have to make choices and it's not always easy to do what they really love to do while still wanting to be mothers and having a loving family. So there is a lot that still can be done in terms of government helping in reaching a good life balance. As women in finance, what we do is we do a lot of mentoring to younger professionals we speak a lot at events and we try to make people understand that the beauty of VC and of finance also comes with a fair share of sacrifices and hard work.

But in general, as you were saying, it's hard for every woman to actually be able to balance the whole professional development and the personal development. So I think it's something that we have to work as a society, as you said, with something that we all have to try to at least make it easier. Right. And if you want to say something about where we go, because we're running out of time, but maybe what would you say? I mean, you're fundraising right now, right?

Yes. So what would you say, for example, if I was an LP, which I'm not, but what would you say? Like, OK, what makes privilege to invest in as an LP? What would I say to you? I would say that you should invest your money in something that can make this world a better place for you and for the next generations. If you believe in equal opportunities, that's the place where you should invest your money.

And this will also give you an incredible return.

Perfect. I mean, I don't know, maybe I'm being too "girl power" here. No, but I think that has to mean something, no? The fact, I mean, you started this privilege back in 2016, right?

(JR) Yes, yes, exactly. Exactly. And that was the desire to invest in the real economy and really in something that could resonate with my values.

And that's how I got started, right? Really with, you know, when you see founders that are building technologies that can improve, for example, a patient's life or, you know, can prevent a disease or, you know, I could tell you other things. This is something that matters to me. Of course, it does matter the result.

That is kind of obvious. But if I can have a return, and by the way, VC actually does give you a higher return than other asset classes and actually adds, you know, improve your risk-return profile in your asset allocation. And if you can have these aspects, so the financial part with really the impact that you can have and the legacy you can have, well, to me, that's kind of, you know, closing the circle.

Yeah, but as you said, you just had this idea and you just went for it. You were the first one. I don't know if that actually, how was that taken at the time? Do you remember using actually this fact as something positive or maybe not? You know, how was it when you just decided, OK, I'm going to go for venture capital? Yeah, as you say, I mean, I didn't start this just as, OK, I'll do this.

I mean, I've spent three, four years researching and deciding, you know, I was managing a wealth management firm. So I was, you know, investing in traditional asset classes. And I was moved by the desire to really diversify my clients' assets.

That's how I started. So I invested a couple of years on, you know, really going deeper first in the private equity world and then in the VC world and then in the VC world deeper again. And that's when I decided, OK, for me, the early stage is where I want to invest.

And there were several reasons. And so when I started this and had conversations with my peers, so other wealth managers at the time, there was no high conviction that this was a place where to invest money. You know, at the time, there were not so many VCs around and wealth managers were really more traditional in terms of.

So I would say it was difficult to find interest outside. But my advantage at the time was that I was not raised from the outside. You know, it was really for myself and my clients.

So it gave me, if you want, an easier way to start because, you know, I was not outside fundraising, you know, worldwide or whatever. But there was less interest, I would say, among wealth managers or family offices in Lugano at the time, certainly, but in general in Switzerland. And this has evolved nicely, I would say, to the fact that we have many more venture capital firms, which I think it's absolutely important.

And I'm very glad about this. And about you Angelica, because you also, have this financial services background, but then you are also like known in the startup world, right? So when did you make that switch? How did you go from, I think, wealth management as well, right, before? Or what was your background before the beginning?

(AM)I've been in hedge fund management most of my life. The people who invest in hedge funds are usually qualified investors and institutional investors.

So the first period in my career really gave me a chance to understand the world of fund management and everything that it entails, even with a different strategy. About 12 to 14 years ago, I became very interested in angel investing and exactly for the same reason as Jacqueline mentioned, which is investing in companies that were aligned to my values and doing it directly, trying to have a direct link of communication with the founders was extremely important for me. Now, being an angel investor is extremely rewarding and it's a vital link in having a startup grow.

But the more time went on, the more I missed a little bit of the fund structure and of what happens in terms of having a diversified strategy. And actually, Jacqueline and I started speaking. We knew each other, we had known each other personally, and we started speaking because I was actually interested in investing in the fund.

And the more we spoke, the more I realized that our interests were aligned even in the actual fund management and in working together. So the switch was really something that came very naturally. And I see it as a good progression in the way my financial interests have developed over the years.

And finally, before we leave, you invest only in Switzerland?

No, we actually invest both in Switzerland and in Europe. It's about 60% in Europe and 40% in Switzerland. We're looking for the best possible opportunities out there.