WEBVTT - How Melinda Gates Is Tackling Tech's Gender Problem 0:00:03.080 --> 0:00:06.880 Before she became one of the world's most influential philanthropists. 0:00:06.920 --> 0:00:10.200 Before she even started working in the tech industry, Melinda 0:00:10.240 --> 0:00:12.680 Gates was a high school student at an all girls 0:00:12.720 --> 0:00:18.439 Catholic school in Dallas, Texas. One of the teachers, they're 0:00:18.480 --> 0:00:21.400 the math teacher, who I really admired a lot and 0:00:21.400 --> 0:00:24.080 worked with a lot. She went to a conference and 0:00:24.320 --> 0:00:27.040 she saw these Apple two's had just come out, and 0:00:27.120 --> 0:00:29.080 she was so excited about them. She came to the 0:00:29.080 --> 0:00:31.639 hen principle, who happen to be a nun, and said, 0:00:31.680 --> 0:00:34.360 we'd have to get these for the girls. The Apple 0:00:34.400 --> 0:00:37.280 two was an early personal computer, is the first of 0:00:37.320 --> 0:00:41.720 its kind intended for ordinary consumers instead of business professionals 0:00:41.800 --> 0:00:45.400 or hobbyists, and it was pretty expensive. The cheapest one 0:00:45.479 --> 0:00:49.400 retailed for about dollars back then, which is about five 0:00:49.400 --> 0:00:53.440 thousand dollars in today's dollars, which meant that as a teenager, 0:00:53.680 --> 0:00:57.760 Melinda got a head start tinkering with technology. And so 0:00:57.840 --> 0:01:00.480 she got several of the girls who were in math 0:01:00.520 --> 0:01:02.200 class and asked us if we wanted to sign up 0:01:02.200 --> 0:01:04.600 for her new computer class she was going to start, 0:01:04.600 --> 0:01:07.040 and that's how I got hooked. Melinda went on to 0:01:07.160 --> 0:01:10.839 major in computer science at Duke University, and back then 0:01:11.000 --> 0:01:14.760 that actually wasn't such an unusual choice for women. In 0:01:14.800 --> 0:01:18.400 the early eighties, women made up nearly forty of computer 0:01:18.520 --> 0:01:23.160 science graduates. But as Melinda entered the tech industry, rose 0:01:23.200 --> 0:01:26.560 through the ranks and then focused her attention on philanthropy, 0:01:26.720 --> 0:01:30.400 she watched the world change. Today, the share of female 0:01:30.440 --> 0:01:34.319 computer science grads is down to less than and tech 0:01:34.360 --> 0:01:44.640 has become a hostile industry for many women. Hi em 0:01:44.640 --> 0:01:48.400 Aiito and I'm Emily Chang, and this week Undecrypted, we're 0:01:48.480 --> 0:01:51.040 asking who has the power to make Silicon Valley a 0:01:51.080 --> 0:01:54.600 better place for women? Was a year of reckoning for 0:01:54.760 --> 0:01:59.280 male dominated Silicon Valley, particularly for venture capitalists who have 0:01:59.400 --> 0:02:02.880 an outside i share of power in the industry. With 0:02:02.960 --> 0:02:07.320 their money, these investors decide which startups thrive in which die. 0:02:08.040 --> 0:02:10.760 Several of them last year were accused of abusing their 0:02:10.760 --> 0:02:14.720 positions of power to pursue female entrepreneurs. As I was 0:02:14.760 --> 0:02:17.480 writing my new book ro Topia, breaking up the Boys 0:02:17.520 --> 0:02:21.560 Club of Silicon Valley, I looked and looked and looked 0:02:21.840 --> 0:02:24.880 for people who could change the status quo. And I 0:02:24.919 --> 0:02:27.360 started thinking about one group that pulled a lot of 0:02:27.400 --> 0:02:31.120 power over those venture capitalists, the people who give venture 0:02:31.120 --> 0:02:34.560 capitalists the money to invest in startups in the first place. 0:02:35.639 --> 0:02:39.000 Blinda Gates is just one of those investors funding venture 0:02:39.040 --> 0:02:42.840 capital firms with the aim of getting more women into technology. 0:02:44.120 --> 0:02:46.440 I recently sat down with Melinda for my long form 0:02:46.480 --> 0:02:49.480 interview show Bloomberg Studio one point out to talk about 0:02:49.560 --> 0:02:52.240 all of this today. You'll be hearing parts of that 0:02:52.280 --> 0:03:07.560 conversation stay with us. After Melinda finished college, she got 0:03:07.560 --> 0:03:12.160 an MBA from Duke's Business School. She joined a software 0:03:12.200 --> 0:03:16.560 company called Microsoft. It was an exciting time to be 0:03:16.600 --> 0:03:20.280 in the tech industry. The year before Microsoft had gone public, 0:03:21.040 --> 0:03:26.359 and two years before that, on January four, Apple Computer 0:03:26.400 --> 0:03:31.359 will introduce Macintosh and you'll see why nine Apple had 0:03:31.400 --> 0:03:36.720 started selling its Macintosh computer at Microsoft. Melinda's computer signs 0:03:36.800 --> 0:03:40.960 background helped her advance quickly. Soon she was managing teams 0:03:40.960 --> 0:03:45.480 of programmers and developing products like publisher in Carter and Expedia. 0:03:46.360 --> 0:03:49.160 But in the broader industry, Melinda could feel how alone 0:03:49.200 --> 0:03:53.080 she was as a woman in tech. I go present 0:03:53.200 --> 0:03:54.760 and you could tell like I would show up at 0:03:54.760 --> 0:03:58.800 a user group that is nine Mail, and they'd be 0:03:58.880 --> 0:04:01.480 like this woman's to present to us. What does she 0:04:01.760 --> 0:04:05.840 what could she possibly know about this product? Computer science 0:04:05.920 --> 0:04:08.920 wasn't always the boys club that it is now. In 0:04:08.960 --> 0:04:13.120 the NI and fifties, women played vital roles programming computers 0:04:13.160 --> 0:04:16.960 for NASA and the military. But actually a tech became 0:04:17.080 --> 0:04:20.719 more male dominated over the last few decades. That's the 0:04:20.720 --> 0:04:23.880 opposite of what's happened in other areas like lawn medicine, 0:04:23.960 --> 0:04:27.719 which have attracted more and more women. You lived this, 0:04:28.480 --> 0:04:31.560 what went wrong? Like? How did that happen? It looks 0:04:31.600 --> 0:04:35.200 like when the gaming industry turned, when the prob the 0:04:35.279 --> 0:04:39.080 games became more male games, more shoot him up. If 0:04:39.120 --> 0:04:41.560 you think about the earlier games that I played, pac Man, 0:04:41.600 --> 0:04:44.880 the adventure games, the Atari games, Breakout, they were pretty 0:04:44.880 --> 0:04:47.760 gender neutral. But when you got in these very combative 0:04:47.800 --> 0:04:51.320 games that were very male centered, it's and more and 0:04:51.360 --> 0:04:54.080 more men got into the industry, then it's two women. 0:04:54.120 --> 0:04:58.400 It's just started to feel unwelcoming. Family and your reporting 0:04:58.440 --> 0:05:01.040 for bro Topia, you found so causes of your own. 0:05:01.600 --> 0:05:04.240 In the sixties and seventies, as the computer industry was 0:05:04.279 --> 0:05:08.160 exploding in size, tech companies were desperate for new talent, 0:05:08.440 --> 0:05:11.840 so they started doing aptitude tests and personality tests to 0:05:11.880 --> 0:05:17.039 identify good programmers, and a software company called STC hired 0:05:17.080 --> 0:05:20.720 two psychologists to identify people who would be good at 0:05:20.720 --> 0:05:25.559 this job, and they decided that good programmers quote don't 0:05:25.640 --> 0:05:29.720 like people. Well, if you look for people who don't 0:05:29.720 --> 0:05:32.840 like people, the research tells us, you'll hire far more 0:05:32.839 --> 0:05:35.040 men than women. And it's more money came into the 0:05:35.040 --> 0:05:39.800 tech industry. Working in tech became a higher profile job. Absolutely, 0:05:39.800 --> 0:05:44.520 the jobs became more professional, higher status, so men wanted 0:05:44.520 --> 0:05:52.839 those jobs and women essentially got pushed and profiled out. 0:05:53.240 --> 0:05:57.080 Melinda married Microsoft co founder and then CEO Bill Gates. 0:05:57.640 --> 0:06:01.360 She left Microsoft in to focus on her family when 0:06:01.360 --> 0:06:04.640 their first child was born in two thousand, she co 0:06:04.800 --> 0:06:08.839 founded the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation. For many years, 0:06:09.000 --> 0:06:11.960 Melinda's work with the foundation took her to remote parts 0:06:12.000 --> 0:06:15.200 of the world, often in communities living in deep poverty. 0:06:15.560 --> 0:06:17.920 The time she spent in the field far from home, 0:06:18.080 --> 0:06:20.640 was part of what made her realize things still needed 0:06:20.640 --> 0:06:24.320 to improve for women right here in the United States. Well, 0:06:24.360 --> 0:06:27.479 I've been lucky enough now to travel for over seventeen 0:06:27.560 --> 0:06:31.040 years in philanthropy, and I traveled all over the world. 0:06:31.200 --> 0:06:33.640 I'm in the developing world a lot. I'm in Asia, 0:06:33.680 --> 0:06:38.240 I'm in Africa, and who shaped my views were the 0:06:38.279 --> 0:06:41.400 women I talked to on the ground and what I 0:06:41.480 --> 0:06:45.440 was hearing in their conversations at the local village level, 0:06:45.520 --> 0:06:48.120 sitting in the dirt on a mat was the same 0:06:48.160 --> 0:06:51.400 thing I was hearing when I would hear the news 0:06:51.440 --> 0:06:55.440 in the United States about CEO under representation on boards, 0:06:55.560 --> 0:06:58.120 right of women on boards, or women's CEO s. So 0:06:58.200 --> 0:07:01.599 in Melinda to I did, she would focus on making 0:07:01.600 --> 0:07:05.480 Silicon Valley a better place for women. In an interview 0:07:05.520 --> 0:07:08.680 with Wired magazine, she said not having more women in 0:07:08.760 --> 0:07:14.680 tech was quote not good for society. It was around 0:07:14.680 --> 0:07:16.840 this time that I too was getting interested in this 0:07:16.960 --> 0:07:20.360 question of gender in Silicon Valley. And this was at 0:07:20.360 --> 0:07:22.200 a time when not a lot of people were talking 0:07:22.280 --> 0:07:26.080 about this. Right. I made it a chore at a 0:07:26.120 --> 0:07:29.320 certain point to ask investors and ask CEOs when they 0:07:29.320 --> 0:07:31.320 came on the show, what are you doing about this? 0:07:31.640 --> 0:07:33.200 What are you doing to fund women? What are you 0:07:33.240 --> 0:07:36.080 doing to hire women? And I wasn't liking the answers 0:07:36.200 --> 0:07:38.320 that I was getting, but I knew that this was 0:07:38.360 --> 0:07:43.080 a problem. Of course, a year later came the Reckoning 0:07:43.560 --> 0:07:47.360 first former Uber engineer Susan Fowler wrote a blog post 0:07:47.400 --> 0:07:50.840 that exposed a toxic culture of sexism and sexual harassment 0:07:50.840 --> 0:07:54.440 at the company. Uber promises an urgent investigation into sexual 0:07:54.480 --> 0:07:57.560 harassment claims made in a former employees blog post. She 0:07:57.640 --> 0:08:00.560 claims upper management tried to sweep her comple lanked under 0:08:00.600 --> 0:08:04.000 the rug, calling her supervisor a high performer. And then 0:08:04.200 --> 0:08:07.440 female startup founders came forward with their stories about how 0:08:07.480 --> 0:08:10.960 they got harassed by a number of male venture capital investors. 0:08:11.960 --> 0:08:14.680 Venture capitalists are the investors who give money to startups, 0:08:14.760 --> 0:08:17.840 which means they're the ones deciding which companies get more 0:08:17.880 --> 0:08:22.040 funding to expand more chances to succeed. Because of that, 0:08:22.120 --> 0:08:26.680 these investors are incredibly powerful people in Silicon Valley, this 0:08:26.760 --> 0:08:31.000 group consists mostly of men. Only eight percent of investors 0:08:31.000 --> 0:08:34.640 are women. After the torrent of news stories, many of 0:08:34.679 --> 0:08:37.520 the men accused of misconduct got fired or stepped down 0:08:37.559 --> 0:08:41.400 from their jobs. But stories of harassment are only one 0:08:41.480 --> 0:08:44.640 symptom of a much bigger problem, which is the severe 0:08:44.800 --> 0:08:47.520 gender imbalance in tech. So how do you fix that? 0:08:48.559 --> 0:08:52.000 Melinda Gates search for a solution that's coming up after 0:08:52.040 --> 0:09:02.840 this So twenty seventeen minute Clear that the tech industry 0:09:02.880 --> 0:09:06.720 needs to get better at creating opportunities for women. But 0:09:06.760 --> 0:09:09.360 this is a problem the industry has been aware of 0:09:09.400 --> 0:09:12.360 for some time, and solutions have been hard to find. 0:09:13.040 --> 0:09:15.360 That's when I started looking into one corner of the 0:09:15.400 --> 0:09:19.760 investing world that we don't hear from very often. There's 0:09:19.760 --> 0:09:22.920 a group of people called limited partners, and it's their 0:09:23.000 --> 0:09:26.920 money that venture capitalists are investing. As I did more 0:09:26.920 --> 0:09:29.760 reporting for my book, I realized there are a lot 0:09:29.800 --> 0:09:32.680 of really powerful women in this community of behind the 0:09:32.720 --> 0:09:36.440 scenes investors, Women like Lauren A. Messer, who is chief 0:09:36.480 --> 0:09:39.959 investment officer of the Metropolitan Museum of Arts three point 0:09:40.000 --> 0:09:44.440 one billion dollar investment portfolio. The io p A that's 0:09:44.480 --> 0:09:48.520 the International Limited Partners Association told us that roughly one 0:09:48.559 --> 0:09:51.679 third of their members are women. So I wanted to 0:09:51.760 --> 0:09:55.600 understand if these female LPs, these people who invest in 0:09:55.600 --> 0:09:59.440 the investors, were concerned about diversity in Silicon Valley. I 0:09:59.520 --> 0:10:03.160 checked in with Joel Caden, who spent eighteen years in 0:10:03.160 --> 0:10:07.800 investment banking before co founding her own investment company, Accolade Partners. 0:10:07.840 --> 0:10:10.600 Your contribution to the book, I really appreciate it. Oh, well, 0:10:10.640 --> 0:10:14.640 I'm excited for you. Joelts for manages about eight hundred 0:10:14.679 --> 0:10:18.000 million dollars and the majority of her investments are in 0:10:18.040 --> 0:10:22.520 the tech industry. I thought that perhaps these powerful investors 0:10:22.559 --> 0:10:25.360 like Joel could use their vast financial might to put 0:10:25.360 --> 0:10:28.920 pressure on tech investors to change. Maybe they could refuse 0:10:29.000 --> 0:10:32.280 to invest with firms that don't have any female investing partners, 0:10:32.880 --> 0:10:36.640 or maybe allegations of sexual harassment and the existence of 0:10:36.720 --> 0:10:40.880 nondisclosure agreements, which have helped keep accusations covered up, would 0:10:40.920 --> 0:10:44.960 become a bigger part of their due diligence process. What's 0:10:44.960 --> 0:10:47.120 more important whether there's a woman on board or what 0:10:47.200 --> 0:10:50.640 the returns are. Um, I don't think they should be 0:10:50.760 --> 0:10:55.920 mutually exclusive. So I'm I'm rooting for women to get 0:10:55.960 --> 0:10:59.599 to that metric that everybody knows. Look, our business is 0:10:59.640 --> 0:11:01.640 about making money. That's what we get paid to do. 0:11:01.880 --> 0:11:03.840 So at the end of the day, my job is 0:11:03.880 --> 0:11:06.360 to make as much money as possible for the wonderful 0:11:06.400 --> 0:11:10.160 institutions that have, you know, hired us to invest. So 0:11:10.760 --> 0:11:13.440 that's what gets us up in the morning. Silicon Valley 0:11:13.440 --> 0:11:16.000 knows it has a gender imbalanced and Joel told me 0:11:16.080 --> 0:11:19.560 she's having conversations with top venture capitalists encouraging them to 0:11:19.600 --> 0:11:22.360 look for more women they can hire. She said, it 0:11:22.400 --> 0:11:25.040 will happen. It just requires a lot of hard work, 0:11:25.120 --> 0:11:27.440 and it will take some time because as much as 0:11:27.480 --> 0:11:30.280 these investors would like to see change, they're worried about 0:11:30.280 --> 0:11:34.200 making changes that could jeopardize returns. But behind the scenes, 0:11:34.320 --> 0:11:37.840 Melinda was thinking about doing more. She was in talks 0:11:37.880 --> 0:11:44.960 with the venture capital firm run by two women. When 0:11:45.040 --> 0:11:47.720 Melinda announced she wanted to focus on helping more women 0:11:47.760 --> 0:11:50.760 get into the tech industry. She had created a private 0:11:50.800 --> 0:11:54.200 office called Pivotal Ventures. This will be different from the 0:11:54.240 --> 0:11:57.920 Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, which is a philanthropic project. 0:11:58.360 --> 0:12:02.360 With Pivotal Ventures, Melinda would be making actual investments with 0:12:02.480 --> 0:12:04.560 the goal of making money. I mean, the first goal 0:12:04.600 --> 0:12:06.440 is to make money. I'm not putting my money out 0:12:06.440 --> 0:12:09.120 as a social impact. I'm putting it out to make money. 0:12:09.360 --> 0:12:13.079 But Melinda also believed that smart investments can help drive change. 0:12:13.400 --> 0:12:16.120 And I kept thinking there would be a woman to 0:12:16.240 --> 0:12:18.360 speak out or women who would speak out more. And 0:12:18.400 --> 0:12:21.920 there are women speaking out, But I hadn't honestly put 0:12:21.960 --> 0:12:25.120 together my background of realizing well, I was in that space. 0:12:25.160 --> 0:12:28.440 I've always cared about computer and tech um. But wow, 0:12:28.480 --> 0:12:31.880 maybe I should use my voice behind this. So when 0:12:31.880 --> 0:12:35.480 did you first believe that limited partners or the investors 0:12:35.520 --> 0:12:39.280 that fund venture capital firms have a role to play here. Well, 0:12:39.320 --> 0:12:41.719 I started to look at what the barriers were in 0:12:41.760 --> 0:12:44.120 the tech industry for women and people of color. We 0:12:44.200 --> 0:12:47.520 don't have enough women with patents, we don't have enough 0:12:47.520 --> 0:12:50.760 women founder c e O s who are getting funding. 0:12:51.200 --> 0:12:54.360 So basically, less than two percent of VC funds go 0:12:54.520 --> 0:12:58.240 to women, less than one percent go to women of color. 0:12:58.559 --> 0:13:01.480 And so in this innovation Asian space, I said to myself, 0:13:01.520 --> 0:13:05.840 what's the best way to use capital to move things 0:13:05.880 --> 0:13:08.200 for women? And that's when I started to say, Okay, 0:13:08.240 --> 0:13:10.000 I actually need to move some money into the venture 0:13:10.000 --> 0:13:13.000 capital space. That's what led Melinda to the venture capital 0:13:13.040 --> 0:13:18.120 firm Aspect Ventures, co founded by Teresa Go and Jennifer Fonstad. Yes, 0:13:18.200 --> 0:13:22.080 so we met Melinda actually through a mutual friend. That's 0:13:22.160 --> 0:13:25.640 Jennifer Fonstad, a straight shooting investor whose career I've been 0:13:25.679 --> 0:13:29.000 following for many years. I met them, I think it 0:13:29.040 --> 0:13:30.760 was my first time was about two and a half 0:13:30.840 --> 0:13:34.920 years ago, and they're just they're savvy and smart investors, 0:13:35.000 --> 0:13:38.839 right Jennifer and Theresa both distinguished themselves as venture investors. 0:13:39.000 --> 0:13:41.800 Jennifer spent seventeen years at a firm called d f J, 0:13:42.400 --> 0:13:45.800 and Teresa was a partner at another top firm, Excel Ventures, 0:13:45.920 --> 0:13:50.120 for fifteen years before they left to start their own fund. Now, 0:13:50.280 --> 0:13:53.320 four years after its founding, Aspect Ventures has one of 0:13:53.320 --> 0:13:56.480 the most diverse investing teams in Silicon Valley. I think 0:13:56.520 --> 0:14:00.000 about it more along the lines of how it drives 0:14:00.040 --> 0:14:04.640 better business outcomes, better performance, and better decisions. Where we 0:14:04.679 --> 0:14:06.720 are building to approach a point where we can have 0:14:06.720 --> 0:14:11.040 critical mass. We're having twenty to thirty of an organization 0:14:11.520 --> 0:14:14.840 which has a different perspective, diversity of voice, different diversity 0:14:14.840 --> 0:14:18.160 of experience. In the male dominated world of startup investing, 0:14:18.520 --> 0:14:20.800 this is a pretty new approach. And when you have 0:14:20.920 --> 0:14:23.840 that critical mass, you build in an entirely different culture 0:14:24.360 --> 0:14:28.840 around how you incorporate those voices, and I think that's 0:14:29.680 --> 0:14:32.600 what will drive change for us over the next couple decades. 0:14:33.360 --> 0:14:37.200 This idea that new voices will help identify new opportunities 0:14:37.360 --> 0:14:41.800 is a concept Melinda also believes in. Some LPs have 0:14:41.840 --> 0:14:44.800 said to me, all we care about is returns. We 0:14:44.880 --> 0:14:47.200 care about diversity, but we really care about how much 0:14:47.240 --> 0:14:49.000 money that we make. What do you have to say 0:14:49.000 --> 0:14:51.360 to those people? I have to say, you're investing in 0:14:51.360 --> 0:14:56.440 what you know. Women are of consumer dollars spent. Women 0:14:56.760 --> 0:15:01.200 control sevent financial decisions in the house. So you're missing 0:15:01.200 --> 0:15:03.600 an opportunity because you just don't see it. So you're 0:15:03.680 --> 0:15:06.120 leaving money on the table. You're not in the deal flow. 0:15:06.240 --> 0:15:08.800 So good luck ten years from now. I think what's 0:15:08.800 --> 0:15:12.000 really critical about what Melenda is doing is that she 0:15:12.240 --> 0:15:16.880 is She really understands and appreciates how diversity leads to 0:15:16.880 --> 0:15:22.000 better performance. In January, they announced Melinda was investing in 0:15:22.080 --> 0:15:27.240 Jennifer and Teresa's fund. It's encouraging to hear stories like this, 0:15:27.880 --> 0:15:31.840 but still, Melenda is just one investor, and Aspect Ventures 0:15:31.960 --> 0:15:35.120 is just one venture capital firm. There's a long way 0:15:35.160 --> 0:15:38.400 to go before these ideas filter out across the whole industry, 0:15:39.000 --> 0:15:41.720 and it's important to remember Jennifer and Teresa are the 0:15:41.840 --> 0:15:44.640 rare example of two women who have already been in 0:15:44.680 --> 0:15:47.480 tech for a long time. People know who they are 0:15:47.640 --> 0:15:50.560 and trust they can deliver good returns. That won't be 0:15:50.560 --> 0:15:52.640 true for every woman looking for someone to take a 0:15:52.720 --> 0:15:57.600 chance on her. How much of an impact can LPs 0:15:57.640 --> 0:16:02.240 have and should LPs have in galvanizing change, you know, 0:16:02.320 --> 0:16:05.120 because some of these funds don't necessarily have the returns 0:16:05.200 --> 0:16:07.440 yet you know that these investors would like to see. 0:16:07.560 --> 0:16:09.760 But someone has to give those people a chance. But 0:16:09.800 --> 0:16:11.960 we all care about making money, right, So how do 0:16:11.960 --> 0:16:14.200 you balance all of those concerns. I think that you 0:16:14.480 --> 0:16:16.960 I think we definitely need LPs who start to make 0:16:17.120 --> 0:16:20.000 those investments. And there's gonna be some people who are 0:16:20.040 --> 0:16:22.600 already out on the forefront of that, and I think 0:16:22.600 --> 0:16:24.560 they not only need to make investments, they need to 0:16:24.560 --> 0:16:26.760 open their networks because if you look at a woman, 0:16:26.840 --> 0:16:31.000 she often doesn't have the same network into the deal flow, right, 0:16:31.280 --> 0:16:34.800 So broader change will ultimately require more people to take 0:16:34.840 --> 0:16:37.640 some risks. Some of that pressure may come from behind 0:16:37.680 --> 0:16:40.320 the scenes investors like Melinda, but a lot of it 0:16:40.360 --> 0:16:42.760 will have to come from people within the tech industry 0:16:42.840 --> 0:16:45.520 deciding to make change as well. You know, all firms 0:16:45.520 --> 0:16:48.280 don't need to look and act the same. But you know, 0:16:48.440 --> 0:16:50.960 what is the burden on the rest of the industry 0:16:51.240 --> 0:16:55.440 to to make these changes that are you know, so necessary? 0:16:55.480 --> 0:16:57.120 I mean, I I just find it hard to believe 0:16:57.200 --> 0:17:00.840 that some of these firms can't find a qualified woman, right. 0:17:00.840 --> 0:17:03.080 I think that's a bit of an excuse, to be honest, 0:17:03.240 --> 0:17:05.760 and um, so firms need to figure out, you know, 0:17:05.800 --> 0:17:09.160 are they really serious about this issue or the window dressing. 0:17:09.480 --> 0:17:11.480 And it's just like the early days when we used 0:17:11.480 --> 0:17:13.680 to start to talk about corporate boards, Oh, they need 0:17:13.720 --> 0:17:15.639 to have a woman. So you had some some boards 0:17:15.640 --> 0:17:17.040 that did it as a token, they would put a 0:17:17.040 --> 0:17:20.440 token woman on. But eventually there was public pressure that 0:17:20.480 --> 0:17:23.480 people started to realize, actually, companies are doing better when 0:17:23.480 --> 0:17:28.800 they have a more diverse board. In March, hundreds of 0:17:28.840 --> 0:17:33.080 startup founders joined the Founders for Change movement, committing to 0:17:33.160 --> 0:17:36.560 consider the diversity of a venture capital firm before taking 0:17:36.560 --> 0:17:41.159 a check. For now, Jennifer and Theresa have closed their 0:17:41.200 --> 0:17:43.119 latest round of funding and are getting to work on 0:17:43.200 --> 0:17:46.560 deploying that money. They're looking for startups to invest in, 0:17:46.800 --> 0:17:50.760 and they're especially interested in cybersecurity, digital health, and future 0:17:50.760 --> 0:17:54.560 of work companies. As for Melinda, she's looking for more 0:17:54.600 --> 0:17:58.280 investments too. She says Aspect Ventures is just the first 0:17:58.320 --> 0:18:00.920 of many bets she wants to make on women in tech. 0:18:01.800 --> 0:18:05.880 Do you think Silicon Valley can fix this, the problem 0:18:05.960 --> 0:18:08.239 of not having enough women at the table. I know 0:18:08.320 --> 0:18:10.520 Silicon Vallet can fix this. They just have to decide 0:18:10.520 --> 0:18:13.480 they want to to be honest. Venture Capitals behind the 0:18:13.680 --> 0:18:16.160 ball on this way behind and they need to catch up. 0:18:26.640 --> 0:18:29.080 And that's it for this week's Decrypted. Thanks for listening. 0:18:29.640 --> 0:18:31.280 We always want to know what you think of the show. 0:18:31.480 --> 0:18:33.959 You can write to us at Decrypted at Bloomberg dot 0:18:34.040 --> 0:18:37.240 net and I'm on Twitter at Emily Chang TV and 0:18:37.280 --> 0:18:40.199 I'm at Akita seven. And please consider leaving us a 0:18:40.280 --> 0:18:43.040 rating and a review on Apple Podcasts or any of 0:18:43.080 --> 0:18:46.360 your favorite podcasts apps. It really helps us find new listeners. 0:18:47.119 --> 0:18:49.480 My book pro Topia, Breaking Up the Boys Club of 0:18:49.480 --> 0:18:53.199 Silicon Valley is in bookstores and online now. And the 0:18:53.200 --> 0:18:56.000 full interview of Melinda Gates will air as an episode 0:18:56.160 --> 0:18:58.720 on my show Bloomberg Studio One point Out on Bloomberg 0:18:58.760 --> 0:19:02.960 Television May second at nine pm Pacific six thirty pm Eastern. 0:19:03.400 --> 0:19:06.120 It'll also be available in audio form on our own 0:19:06.160 --> 0:19:10.120 podcast called Studio one point Out. This episode was produced 0:19:10.119 --> 0:19:14.080 by Pia Getkary Magnus Hendrickson, and Liz Smith. A special 0:19:14.080 --> 0:19:17.440 thanks to Candy Chang, Executive producer, of Studio one Point Oh, 0:19:17.600 --> 0:19:20.720 Kevin Hines, who edits the show, and our managing editor, 0:19:20.800 --> 0:19:25.200 Danielle Culperson. Francesca Leavie is head of Bloomberg Podcasts. We'll 0:19:25.240 --> 0:19:35.560 see you next week.