Jesse Draper's Halogen Ventures Announces Over 100 Female-Founded Investments

100% Female-Founded Portfolio Valued at Over $15 Billion, with Six Unicorns, Proves Investing in Women Is One of the Smartest Bets in Venture Capital

LOS ANGELES, March 17, 2026 /PRNewswire/ -- Halogen Ventures, Jesse Draper's venture capital fund focused on early-stage startups with a woman on the founding team, today announced it has made over 100 investments in female-founded companies since launching in 2015. The milestone marks one of the largest venture portfolios in the United States dedicated to backing female founders.

Halogen has built a portfolio that is 100% female-founded and 85% female CEO-led, with a combined market value exceeding $15 billion across sectors including consumer technology, healthcare, fintech, AI, and the Future of Family. The firm's portfolio now includes six unicorn companies, each valued at over $1 billion, highlighting the growing financial impact of Halogen's investments.

"When I started Halogen, I heard the same thing over and over 'there aren't enough women starting companies,' 'it's not a big enough market.' People were skeptical, to put it mildly. For years investing in women was dismissed as a charity play rather than recognized as a massive, untapped market," said Jesse Draper, Founding Partner of Halogen Ventures. "We saw the opportunity over a decade ago when almost no one else did. Over one hundred investments and six unicorns later, and counting, the results speak for themselves."

Halogen's portfolio includes companies such as Everlywell, the at-home health testing company valued at $3.5 billion; Babylist, the leading universal baby registry platform with more than $1 billion in annual GMV; HopSkipDrive, which has provided more than one million safe rides for students; Flex, the leading sustainable period care brand; Upwards, the largest national childcare solutions platform with 66,000+ in home affordable childcare options for families; and was one of the first investors in Metropolis, the AI-powered mobility and parking company that raised $1.6 billion in 2025.

In addition to identifying high-growth startups, Halogen has helped define emerging venture categories such as The Future of Family, a market with an estimated $7.5 trillion global opportunity spanning childcare, education, healthcare, and workplace flexibility. The childcare sector alone represents a $520 billion global industry, yet innovation in the space has historically been underfunded.

Halogen's commitment to investing in world-changing technology founded by women extends beyond traditional startup hubs. Halogen is the first out-of-state venture capital firm to receive strategic investment from the state of Alabama to invest in female founders as part of a broader initiative to drive economic growth and ecosystem transformation. Over the past year, Halogen has made nine investments in Alabama-based startups including AI, healthcare, fintech, robotics, workforce technology, childcare, and clean energy, with more to come.

This milestone comes at a pivotal moment for women in technology. Female-founded companies in the U.S. collectively raised a record $73.6 billion in 2025, accounting for 27.7% of total annual U.S. deal value. However, much of that funding flowed into a small number of AI companies, and startups founded solely by women continued to capture just over 1% of total venture capital dollars, underscoring a persistent funding gap. That number has barely budged in a decade. Halogen's portfolio is part of a growing body of evidence that when capital does reach women, the returns follow.

"The most powerful thing we can do to strengthen the economy is to get more capital into the hands of women," Draper said. "We are seeing extraordinary founders building solutions for families, healthcare, childcare, the future of work, transportation, infrastructure, beauty & wellness, consumer products and so much more. These companies are not only solving major societal challenges, they are building the next generation of trillion-dollar businesses. If you don't like the way the world looks right now, invest in women."

About Halogen Ventures
Halogen Ventures is an early-stage venture capital fund focused on consumer technology and B2B companies with a female founder. The firm brings deep expertise in understanding consumer and B2B trends and identifying entrepreneurs who will innovate and solve problems at scale. General Partner Jesse Draper is a fourth-generation venture capitalist and advocate for investing in women, named one of Marie Claire's "Most Networked Women in America." Halogen has invested in over 100 early-stage companies, including six unicorns, with a combined portfolio valuation exceeding $15 billion. For more information, please visit www.halogenvc.com.

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Halogen Ventures
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SOURCE Halogen Ventures