She Means Business: How Young Women Founders Are Reshaping Singapore's Future
As women dominate business classrooms but remain underrepresented in leadership, young female founders are carving out their own space in Singapore's business ecosystem.
By Lo Qian Ya
At the early age of 25, Nuryanee Anisah (or Yanee) had already accomplished what many entrepreneurs dream of. After taking her Business diploma, she co-founded Commenhers, a textile recycling enterprise that has recycled thousands of kilograms of textile waste in Singapore and is working with over 100 makers.
However, despite Yanee’s expertise, she still feels overshadowed in corporate settings such as networking events and finds it difficult to prove her worth as a young woman entrepreneur.
“Especially wanting to make myself stand out, I have to say that, "Oh, my company has achieved this kind of revenue. I've worked with this amount of people." Just to get the conversation starting, and for people to listen to me.” Yanee said.
Surprisingly, according to the Singapore Department of Statistics, there has always been a significant difference in the number of female and male graduates in Business & Administration, but not in the way you might expect. With 2,930 females and 1,777 males graduating in 2023, females are the vast majority of Business graduates.
This gap slowly permeated the industry. Kickstarting more businesses than ever, the number of women-owned companies had an exponential growth from 16,300 in 2010 36,000 in 2022. How is it that women remain underrepresented in boardrooms?
Vanessa Ong, 48, co-founder of Mumpreneurs Go Places, a community that allows mothers to build their businesses while juggling family commitments, has been in the industry for decades. Working with women entrepreneurs, Vanessa shares the experiences of other women feeling intimidated in a community with men.
“Men talk about politics, economics, trading, money, investment,” she mentioned, adding that mothers in entrepreneurship believe, “it is something that they cannot relate to. It’s too big of a topic. ”
However, Vanessa finds that being able to look beyond hitting KPIs and into a more sensitive perspective is precisely what enabled female founders like Yanee to identify gaps in the market.
Commenhers is a social enterprise that doesn’t put profit as its sole purpose. Yanee identified a problem that others ignored. The ever-increasing textile waste in Singapore landfills, and the need for income among marginalised women. She created a community that was built on sustainability and kindness,
“I feel community is really important because it goes beyond the profit. It goes to the core of your heart that we're actually here for a purpose.” Yanee said.
Her success redefines the business ecosystem in Singapore. It shows that being sensitive isn’t just a trait, but an asset that drives innovation.
Vanessa helps reiterate the importance of having a community among women. “It’s a very safe place, and it's very powerful when you actually get to learn from one another.” Community over competition is what allows women-owned businesses to scale sustainably.
Yanee’s ambition embodies the wisdom that Vanessa shared with the next generation of women leaders: “Do it when you're young. Just do it.” The question now isn’t how women can fit into the existing business ecosystem, but how the ecosystem reshapes itself to fit them.