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A master's thesis from Aalborg University
Book cover


CAPILUNA: Empowering Female Founders Through Intelligent Investor Matching and Discovery

Translated title

CAPILUNA: Understøtter kvindelige iværksættere gennem smart investor-matching og eksponering

Author

Term

4. Term

Publication year

2025

Submitted on

Pages

14

Abstract

Kvindelige iværksættere møder systemiske barrierer, som skaber en investeringskløft, selv om der er tegn på, at deres virksomheder kan være bedre investeringer med højere afkast end mænds. En central udfordring er at finde investorer, der reelt er åbne for at finansiere virksomheder startet af kvinder. Som svar på denne udfordring udviklede jeg Capiluna, en digital platform, der skal styrke kvindelige iværksættere ved at forbedre identifikation og matchning af investorer. Gennem research og interviews med kvindelige iværksættere identificerede jeg investoropdagelse som en hovedbarriere og brugte Design Thinking-processen (en iterativ, brugercentreret udviklingsmetode) til at skabe en løsning. Capiluna kombinerer en database med over 2.500 investorer med dokumenteret historik for finansiering af kvindelige iværksættere med en matchningsalgoritme, der vurderer kompatibilitet ud fra branche, geografi, finansieringsfase og typisk investeringsbeløb. Platformen styrker iværksættere ved at give viden om relevante investorer, hvilket skaber varig handlekraft, der rækker ud over selve systemet. Projektet bidrager til empowerment i HCI (menneske–computer-interaktion) i en forretningskontekst ved at undersøge, hvordan teknologi kan adressere systemiske finansieringsbarrierer for underrepræsenterede iværksættere.

Women founders face systemic barriers that create an investment gap, even though evidence shows their companies can be strong investments with higher returns than men’s. A key challenge is finding investors who are genuinely open to funding women-founded businesses. In response, I developed Capiluna, a digital platform that empowers women founders by improving investor identification and matching. Through research and interviews with women founders, I identified investor discovery as a primary barrier and used the Design Thinking process—an iterative, user-centered approach—to develop a solution. Capiluna combines a database of 2,500+ investors with verified records of funding women founders with a matching algorithm that assesses founder–investor fit by industry, location, funding stage, and typical investment amount (check size). The platform empowers founders by providing clear information about relevant investors, building lasting capability beyond the tool itself. This work contributes to empowerment research in HCI (human–computer interaction) in a business context by exploring how technology can address systemic funding barriers for underrepresented founders.

[This summary has been rewritten with the help of AI based on the project's original abstract]