| dc.description.abstract | The venture capital industry has grown rapidly over the last decades and is seen as an important part of the financial market that provides capital to start-ups. As in most other countries, the venture capital industry in Norway is highly gender imbalanced, both among the decision makers in the funds and the allocation of the capital to the entrepreneurs. Through an exploratory research strategy, this study investigates how investors’ gender perception influence investment decisions in venture capital, and if the decision-making process is affected by homophily and role congruity. This was done through semi-structured interviews with ten decision makers in some of the biggest venture capital funds in Norway, whereas five were female and five were men. To our knowledge there has not been done similar studies to this extent in Norway, hence, this thesis is an attempt to close a gap in the existing literature.
Our findings provide evidence that the venture capital industry in Norway is influenced by homophily and role congruity. This study shows that it is challenging for entrepreneurs to gain access to venture capital if they are not already a part of the investors’ network. Due to tendencies of homophily, the networks of the investors can be quite homogenous. This, in combination with the fact that the entrepreneurial ecosystem in Norway today has an overweight of men, both among the investors and the entrepreneurs, results in a recycling effect that contributes to maintain the gender imbalance in the industry. Moreover, it appears that the VCs seem to favour masculine characteristics when assessing entrepreneurs, showing that there could be an incongruence between female characteristics and the perceived attributes of an entrepreneur also in Norway. | |