Are sisters doing it for each other? Female founders and female venture partners

A fascinating piece of research by Techcrunch about the representation (or rather, in many cases, under-representation) of female partners in venture firms and whether firms with a higher % of female partners are more likely to invest in businesses with female founders. 

Their number-crunching suggests that this might indeed be so, although why that is the case is less clear.   There is some evidence that venture firms generally are more likely to favour male founders - research by Harvard, MIT and Pennsylvania universities found that even when pitches were identical, investors were more likely to provide capital to male founders.  

There's also the question of how male and female founders present themselves:  with evidence suggesting that men are much more likely than women to apply for a job if they meet only 50% of the criteria, it may be that some female founders are less confident in seeking funding.  

Whatever the reason, the long-term outlook for female founders seems to be more positive, with a growth in venture firms founded by women and/or looking specifically to invest in female entrepreneurs.