At the seventh annual ATHENA WOMEN'S ENTREPRENEURSHIP SUMMIT, held March 2 at Town & Gown on USC’s University Park Campus, women founders were celebrated, even while the challenges facing them were acknowledged.

“It has long been the case that a tiny percentage of all venture capital funding — typically less than 3% — is given to ventures solely founded by women. It is similarly the case that very few women are providing the VC funds,” said ELISSA GROSSMAN, Orfalea Director’s Chair in Entrepreneurship, professor of clinical entrepreneurship, and the director of the LLOYD GREIF CENTER FOR ENTREPRENEURIAL STUDIESs at the USC Marshall School of Business. “ATHENA WAS CREATED in part to help connect the amazing women founders, entrepreneurs, and investors who have the power to improve on these statistics and deliver powerful successes.”

Co-sponsored by the Lloyd Greif Center for Entrepreneurial Studies at the USC Marshall School of Business, and the Annenberg School for Communication and Journalism, the daylong event featured the winners of the Women’s Pitch Competition, three panels exploring topics such as finding the right partner for a startup, pivoting, and learning how to lead, as well as ample time for networking.

Jeymi Choi, senior director of founder programs for the Lloyd Greif Center for Entrepreneurial Studies, introduced the teams that had made the semifinals of the fifth annual Women’s Pitch Competition, and announced the winners.

“We created the Athena Summit because we knew that USC could play a role in helping so many talented and smart founders whose efforts were getting insufficient attention,” said Choi. “Today, we are proud to offer female founders and allies a community that meets not solely through our Summit, but also a yearlong series of Launch & Learn sessions and our Female Founders Pitch Competition whose top prize — the Helena of Troy Award — honors Helena Yli-Renko’s deep commitment to this initiative.”

The Entrepreneur’s Journey: The Power of Partnership

Co-moderated by Willow Bay, dean of the Annenberg School for Communication and Journalism and her student Pilar Lee, the first panel of the day interviewed LAUREN SANTO DOMINGO, of Moda Operandi, which she co-founded in 2010, and an early investor in her company, TONY FLORENCE, of New Enterprise Associates.

After years working in the world of high fashion, Santo Domingo said she clearly saw a pain point.

“Runways were very exclusive, almost like tradeshows,” she said. “They were only for editors and buyers, and a regular woman could not attend. But with the rise of social media, women were seeing what was going down the runway. For me, it became obvious that we needed to connect the two.”

We took the original concept of a trunk show, and digitized it,” she said.

Fortunately she met a financial partner who saw the value of her idea right away.

“Lauren’s insights were quite unique and on point,” said Florence. “We got excited about two things: Lauren as a founder, and her idea to use the internet to get access to something that was gated. Marrying data with a commercial business was exciting for us.”