Retrospective: 5 years of Project Female Founder
- Live True
- 2 days ago
- 7 min read
What investor readiness programmes don't usually say
5 years. 121 founders. 132 mentor touchpoints. And the thing I'm most proud of isn't in any of those numbers.
I build and curate a container. That is my job in Project Female Founder (PFF), UBS's global investor readiness programme for female founders. This is my 4th year as APAC Project Lead. (In the 1st year, I was a speaker who nominated half of the SEA cohort.)
The outer game — financial modelling, funding landscape, pitch deck, investor navigation — is well covered by Delilah Panio of Fortuna Funding LLC, my partner-in-crime. Those modules remain at the core, augmented by market developments each year.
What I have incorporated, with every year, is something most investor readiness programmes leave out entirely.
Most investor readiness programmes teach founders how to pitch. Fewer teach them how to stay whole while doing it.
In every Module 5 — "You… Are You Ready?" — I name something:
Fundraising trauma is real.
Not just the dramatic moments: the predatory term sheet, the follow-on that doesn't arrive, the investor who moves to remove a founder from their own company.
Also the less dramatic ones: coming out of a meeting feeling small. Altering who you are to tick boxes before you've even walked in. Walking away from a valuation conversation feeling like a number is all they saw.
It's not what happens to you. It's what happens inside you.
I named it in a room full of investors and founders. And it echoed back. 2 mentors — ex-founders, now investors — said:
Me, too.
The test is in how one behaves when on the other side of the table. That can be a discomforting look at oneself in the mirror. Every year, when I speak about fundraising mindset in mixed rooms of founders and investors, I pull these punches less (hopefully with increasing grace) — because it has to be said.
Founders or investors: we are all humans, first.
Acknowledging trauma = acknowledging the whole person.
This year, we made the most concerted effort yet to invite founders to centre their wholeness through the fundraising process — with Mindful Moments in every module nudging attention to the oft-overlooked or repressed aspects of the experience: the inner game.
One mentor put it plainly after pitch practice:
Surfacing the trauma and the fears, making them not taboo — that is so powerful. Masking is another kind of labour.
Yes. It is.
What I noticed across the guest speakers this season — Agnes (Neufast), Peiru (KeyReply), Lucy Liu (Airwallex) — is something that rarely gets written about. They were grounded. Anchored in business fundamentals. Not performative about fundraising.
We don't make fundraising a milestone. We need the money, we get the money, we build the business.
The headlines, the logos, the valuation number — those are the stories that travel.
What no one writes about: the founder who kept her head down and built the thing anyway. Who treated the money as a means, not a measure of worth.
These are the role models I want founders in the room to see. Not a polished fundraising story. A real one.
Because founders are the heroes of the ecosystem, and this is the real hero's journey.
What's special to me about this year
This year, something else shifted. We’ve had a handful of MVP mentors over the years who not only mentor across multiple years, but return for multiple sessions in one season. This year, a stunning 50% of our mentors and speakers this season returned for more than 1 session in our 8-week programme. (See full credits below)
I have witnessed the room change because of it. The vibe reorients from information (advice) to relationship. A founder who has heard a mentor's perspective on an earlier panel begins their breakout conversation at a different level. Meeting someone twice across the arc breeds familiarity of a connected kind. Even I experience a deeper warmth, welcoming some faces for 2, 3, 4 sessions in a row.
The psychological safety — in a programme that is 100% remote and virtual — changes what is possible in a breakout room. The conversations go somewhere different.
It's inspiring to witness both mentors and founders in their zones of genius and the ecosystem doing its work:
Founders: the pitching, the conviction, the real depth and openness to engage even when it's 3am for them.
Mentors: the investor lens, the specific introductions, the expertise that lands because it is earned.
The essential, oft-invisible, third pillar of client advisors like Akshay Menon, Jessy W., Carman Leung, David Schindler, Jac Lin, Emma Li, Rosalind Li who nominated multiple founders and mentors this year, and Antony Pau, Cecil Yeo, Hui Leong Tng, Jason Wong serving as pitch session moderators and hosts. They bring one of UBS' special powers into the mix.
My job is to build and curate the container that makes it possible.
Love notes to close
To the UBS team, at all levels:
Emma Wheeler, who co-created the vision of this ecosystem and invited me to partner in building it out, saw what is now playing out. I'm grateful to be entrusted with the platform and the space to infuse it with a whole-person approach. It's affirming to see that elevating the quality of connections.
Vishakha Rajput and Aneta Orlowska — your energy and superpowers also built this out globally over the years.
Florence Fong, Marissa Ow, Grace Yeo, Esther Chan — your day-by-day collaboration brings the operational architecture that makes everything else possible, and the all-important interface with the client advisors to anchor the programme. Always a pleasure to close another season.
To my PFF "work-wife" Delilah Panio
who, with Emma, cooked this up and invited me to the dinner party (😉 inside joke!) in 2022 that's still going. Oft-complimented on her crisp delivery, but it's her massive heart that fuels her presence. She is such a sponsor for others, and me too. It has been a genuine pleasure to retool and elevate our offerings together each year — she has now heard me talk about money mindset > 10x and never seems to tire of it! Here's to continually making magic together.
To every founder in this cohort:
You built something in these 8 weeks that goes beyond a deck and a model. A relationship with yourself as a fundraiser.
It's a gift to spend time with some of you during our sessions and hear updates in between. I hope this continues and I truly want to see all of you win at what you do next.
Hard-pressed to name more than a few examples (full credits below):
Uma Louise Roa, who came to Singapore and met with 3 mentors from the programme;
Sasha Lee Seals whose infectious energy from Japan magnetises mentors to reach out across the seas;
Rosina Mazumder pitching her $20M business at 3am her time with winsome engagement and no trace of ego.
That is not about polish. That is about the person - and you are all amazing.
To our fantastic mentors who got rave reviews:
You gave your Tuesday mornings, expertise, lived experience from sometimes both sides of the table and your undivided attention to the founders in front of you.
For every acknowledgment I've received from founders, I'm sure there are many more interactions and support beyond the requested scope of the program that go undocumented. Those will travel further than you know. My deep thanks for your generosity and contributions.
Something between relief and loss settles in at the end of a season like this. I won't be having withdrawal symptoms alone. Mamta Swaroop said it better than I could:
7.30am calls will be missed. Each session was enlightening and very well organised. The programme not only helped me better appreciate the fundraising journey, but transformed me into someone ready to take the leap and embrace it.
To all my new friends gained — and existing friends renewed — through this season of Project Female Founder: I thank you for sharing your knowledge and presence. We are all part of this global PFF community, now 5 years old and numbering in the hundreds, shaped by every person who has shown up for it.
What will the next 5 years look like? Many possibilities to contemplate.
What I do know: if I continue to shape it, I will remain committed to making space in our curated container for all of the above.
Full credits:
Speakers/ Mentors (modules and pitch sessions)
Agnes Wun, CEng MIEEE, MBA, MSc, DIC, B.Eng (EE), CPA (Aust.), FRM (Neufast), Amit Gupta (Varni Capital), Andrea Ma (Swire Pacific), Ashish Taneja (growX ventures), Avik Ashar (Artha Venture Fund), Bree Kirkham (HWLE Lawyers), Brinley Meagher (HWLE Lawyers), Caterina Meloni (Connecting Founders), David Pardo 🌳🌏 (Sif.vc), Deeksha Ahuja (Encubay), Eddy Ng (Genesis Alternative Ventures), Fernanda Carapinha (Founderverse), Gautham Devlekar (TiE), Gayatri Suri (UBS Optimus Foundation), Haoming Lee (Louken Group), Harjit Singh Bhatia (Asia Growth Capital Advisors), Helen, Young Mee Kim, Ph.D. (DIVA Global), Hester Spiegel-vdSteenhoven (Epic Angels), Hian Goh (Openspace Capital), Hooi Yen Chin (Polaris International), Jennifer Cheng Lo (NewChic Capital Family Office), Jireh Li (INCE Capital), Joshia Kwa (Integra Partners), Kaajal Shivdasani (The Nanson), Lucy Yueting Liu (Airwallex), Maansi Vohra (Monk's Hill Ventures), Michael Wieser (Helvetia Venture Fund), Murli Ravi (Tin Men Capital), Peiru Teo (KeyReply), Rishab Malik (Jungle Ventures), Sadaf Sultan (Finprojections), Shi Pei Tay (iGlobe Partners), Siddharth Pisharody (Argor Capital Management), Silvia Thom (Argor Capital Management), Swetha Vijay (LinkGlobal Capital), Vorapol (Brook) Supanusonti (Asia Partners), Winnie Leung (Transcend Capital Partners), Yuhan Xie, CFA (Burda Principal Investments), Xueying WANG (Ph.D., M.B.A.) (NUS Graduate Research Innovation Programme (GRIP)).
2026 APAC founders:
Spanning healthtech, fintech, sustainability, agritech, consumer, deep tech.
From Bangladesh, China, Hong Kong, India, Japan, Malaysia, Pakistan, Singapore, Thailand, Taiwan, US, — some choose to be there at 7.30am.
Aditi Mittal, Aimen Ameer Malik, Annabelle Lin, Anushka Purohit, Burtujin Dashnyam, Chaitsi Ahuja, Charmaine Lo, Charmaine Low, Chen Zhu, Christine Yoong, Christine Sarima, Deb Chien, Deepthi Bobba, Donna Chan, Elaine Sun, Fagun Garg, Gauri Gokhale, Gina Sanchez, Goh Su Fen, Jiao Cheng, Joanna Chan, Dr. Kitty Y. M. Yeung, Krishnavenee Krishnan, Kshitiza Shukla, Maloo Natarajan, Mamta Swaroop, Mitra Tajrobehkar, PhD, Monika Shukla, Neha Makdey, Pamela Tan, Paramee Intarachumnum, Prachi Saini Garg, Priya Darshani, Quinn L., Raina Kumra, Ria Rustagi, Rishita Changede, Rosina Mazumder, Sanya Abbey, Sasha Lee Seals, Shangguan Ziqi, Shi Tang, Shobha Chanchlani, Shrestha Ganguly, Smriti Chaudhry, Stephanie Lam, Sudeshna Mukhopadhyay, Surbhi Bhatia, Tina Law 📎, Uma Louise Roa, Vidhi Gaur, Vivian Chen, Yizhi Wang, Yuru Tang.
Project Female Founder is a virtual investor readiness program for female founders hosted by UBS, in partnership with Fortuna Funding LLC and Live True Pte. Ltd.. This year’s cohort includes over 130 founders from around the world raising pre-seed/seed/Series A capital.
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