While it is not always helpful to view female achievement in contrast to that of their male counterparts, it is undeniable that women have struggled more to achieve the same financial independence and opportunities as men. You only have to look a hundred years into the past to see a time where women were not able to vote and even know the gap in earnings between the genders is a reflection of the inequality that still envelops the modern era. When you consider that, although women are currently leading the way as far as starting businesses (female entrepreneurs currently increasing at over double the rate of men), male entrepreneurs still on average boast a greater revenue and number of businesses. However, the record number of women entering the world of businesses is a sure sign of changing times. But the success of female entrepreneurs varies across the world’s countries, and even within the cities of those countries. So, which cities are the best for females to start a business?
In order to discover which cities were the best for female entrepreneurs, five pillars were used to categorise the successes of various cities, producing more detailed and reliable findings. The pillars devised by Dell (the company who set out to create the index of cities for female entrepreneurs) were: culture, technology, markets, capital and talent. The index also provides an overall list of the best cities, taking all the variants into account. While the top cities may not come as such a surprise – London, New York, etc – some cities in the index might turn your head. For example, Singapore – having recently invested in nurturing and developing young female entrepreneurship – appears in the lists for culture, marketing and talent as well as ranking seventh overall. Using the index below, you can see which other cities made the list, perhaps it’s a city local to you.