Women entrepreneurs play a vital role in driving innovation, creating jobs and driving economic growth in the UK. According to the Rose Review of Female Entrepreneurship, ensuring equal access to opportunities for women could add up to £250 billion of new value to the UK economy. Hearing the stories of successful women entrepreneurs can provide invaluable insight, inspiration and guidance to aspiring business owners. Sharing their stories, challenges and triumphs can pave the way for the next generation of female entrepreneurs.
In this blog, we hear from three incredible women—Nicole Egan, Chief Strategy and AI Officer at Darktrace, Vicky Brock, CEO of Vistal Works, and Chandini Jain, CEO of Auquan—who share their life experiences as successful leaders in technology.
Nicole Egan, Co-Founder and Chief Strategy and AI Officer at Darktrace, shares her insights and experiences as a successful female entrepreneur. With a broad career spanning 30 years in technology, Egan has worked at large technology companies including Oracle and HP, as well as early-stage startups and venture capital firms. Darktrace is a global leader in cybersecurity AI and was named one of TIME Magazine’s ‘Most Influential Companies’ in 2021.
Here’s what inspired him to start his own business: “If you love innovation and thrive in dynamic, changing environments, you need to know when your career path or the industry you’re in no longer meets those criteria. It’s important to know when to pivot and be willing to take the leap.”
When asked how to deal with fear and doubt, Egan encourages others to learn from their fears and doubts. “Embrace your fears and doubts. It’s healthy and natural to have fears and doubts,” she says. “It’s a formative and important experience for entrepreneurs and leaders to overcome fears and doubts and come out stronger. Investors want to give people who have failed along the way a chance and come out stronger with better ideas.”
She also talks about her secrets to success.
“There are three: tenacity, lifelong learning, and strategic thinking,” says Lee. “Tenacity is the unwavering persistence that allows you to face adversity, weather storms, and remain steadfast in your mission. Lifelong learning comes from a natural drive to explore, learn, and grow. Strategic thinking (not to be confused with strategic planning) is about developing a holistic sense of what’s happening in your world, your industry, and your marketplace, and how it will impact your customers. This allows you to identify future trends, become a thought leader, and create new opportunities and future revenue streams.”
This is exciting for Darktrace and the role it can and will play in shaping the future of cybersecurity in an AI-driven world. She believes the industry is at a very exciting point with AI, and that new and emerging technologies are forcing organizations to evolve and change the way they think about cybersecurity.
Vicky Brock is a serial entrepreneur and CEO and co-founder of Vistalworks, a technology company developing AI tools to detect harmful online content and illegal goods. Brock has received numerous awards for innovation and leadership, and her company was named one of the UK Government’s ‘Most Innovative Cyber SMEs’ in 2023.
Brock recommends that when starting a business, it’s best to start with a clear vision of why the business exists and what problem you want to solve.
“You have to find out if other people care and have the same problem, if they have different pain points,” Brock explains. “For an idea to work as a business, you need a market bigger than you and your friends, and people like you may not be your first or most valuable market segment. So figuring out if other people care and are willing to pay to make their problem less severe is a step you can never skip.”
When asked how to be a good leader, Brock aims to be truthful, honest, focused, and supportive of her team. She is also brave and tries to take the first step into the unknown and throw the first punch on behalf of her team. “I want my team members to know that I always have their back,” she says. “Their trust and support makes me a better leader.”
Brock’s success is a testament to her resilience, optimism, and determination. She believes that the only thing you can control is how you react to something, and that choosing to endure or adapt to what you cannot change is the driving force behind resilience. “As an optimist,” she says, “statistically, you believe that you will succeed in the end!”
Vistalworks is now on Microsoft’s Azure Marketplace, providing a unique data service that protects end users and online platforms from harmful products and content. The company is seeking investment to scale its social impact globally, with the goal of removing 10 million criminal listings and interactions from the open web by 2030.
Chandini Jain is a former trader and engineer who founded Auquan, an AI company that helps financial services professionals extract intelligence from unstructured data. After spending a decade in global finance, Jain founded Auquan to eliminate the inefficiencies and human errors of manual data work and to help financial professionals make strategic decisions faster and with greater insight.
Jain’s advice for aspiring entrepreneurs is to recruit a great team, solve pressing problems, and execute exceptionally well. She also emphasizes the importance of pacing yourself and staying healthy over the long term. “Identify what you’re really good at, and recruit people who are great at what you’re not,” Jain suggests. “That said, recruiting great people is one of those skills that you have to be great at no matter what. Building a world-class team can’t be delegated or outsourced.”
When asked to give advice to someone starting a business, she believed that the key to success was execution.
“The most successful startups are often those that solve pressing and important problems in a way that is much better than the other options currently available to customers in the market,” she explains. “Execution is what separates successful startups from failed ones. Having a great idea is great, but a mediocre idea executed exceptionally well is better than a great idea executed poorly.”
Jain’s mother was a surgeon and a leader in her field, and inspired her to pursue her goals with confidence and equality. She believes that a good leader must delegate, unblock, and support her team. “My mother was a great inspiration to me. She was a surgeon and headed the state surgical department in India. She was a very talented and driven person!”
What’s next for Auquan? In 2023, Auquan launched an AI-based intelligence engine product for financial services, and 2024 will be a breakthrough year for them. Jain is expanding the company’s presence in the US and ensuring their amazing team has everything they need to make Auquan’s customers as successful as possible with their products.
The stories of Nicole Eagan, Vicky Brock, and Chandini Jain are a testament to the power of determination, resilience, and hard work. These women overcame challenges and barriers to achieve success in their respective fields, and their experiences are an inspiration to all women who want to become entrepreneurs. Embrace your fears, be persistent, and never stop learning. With the right mindset and support, anything is possible.
If you are a startup and want to work with Microsoft for Startups, visit the Founders Hub. The Microsoft for Startups Founders Hub helps startups radically accelerate innovation by providing access to industry-leading AI services, expert guidance, and the essential skills needed to build future-ready startups.