Let’s say that two entrepreneurs, a man and a woman, co-found a startup and raise venture capital. But the business struggles, and they shut it down and go their separate ways. Eventually, each of them independently forms a new business. Do these entrepreneurs have the same chance of getting venture capital funding for a second time?

The answer is no, according to Yale SOM’s Heather Tookes, whose new research uses this scenario as a natural experiment of sorts to understand how potential gender bias shapes the world of entrepreneurial financing. It’s long been recognized that women are underrepresented in the group of startup founders who receive funding from venture capital investors. But how underrepresented, and why, are more difficult questions to answer. READ MORE