Successful businesses you (probably) didn’t know were founded by women

As part of our celebration of International Women’s Day 2024, we have been looking into some of the most successful global businesses that have been founded, or co-founded, by women. 

We’ve listed our top five picks below.

Canva – Melanie Perkins

Commonly referred to as the design platform for non-designers, Canva was co-founded in 2013 by Melanie Perkins with its mission to “empower everyone in the world to design anything and publish anywhere”.

Fast-forward 11 years, Canva has become one of the world’s fastest-growing online design tools, boasting 130 million monthly active users and over 15 billion designs created across 190 countries since its inception.

Cisco – Sandy Lerner

Founded in 1984, Sandy Lerner started Cisco with her husband Leonard Bosack after they had developed the concept of connecting computer networks using a local area network (LAN). In their 40 year history, Cisco has continued to grow and at one point surpassed Microsoft as the world’s most valuable company.

Today, Cisco is still one of the largest technology companies in the world and employs in excess of 84,000 people.

Eventbrite – Julia Hartz

Co-founded by Julia Hartz and her husband, Kevin, the event management and ticketing website, Eventbrite was created in 2006 to make it easier for all to create, share and attend events across the world.

In 2022, Eventbrite’s key statistics were over five million events across nearly 180 countries managed through their system, with a total of 284 million tickets sold.

Grab – Tan Hooi Ling

Arguably South-East Asia’s most valuable startup, Grab was founded by Tan Hooi Ling in 2012 and boasts stats such as 187 million users, across 330 cities in nine countries. Although originally founded as a taxi-booking app, Grab diversified and now offers additional services to its users including food delivery, online banking and insurance services.

TaskRabbit – Leah Busque

Connecting people with skilled labourers and taskers to help with errands and odd-jobs you may not have time to do, TaskRabbit was founded by Leah Busque in 2008. From furniture assembly to TV mounting, moving services and even waiting in line, TaskRabbit’s marketplace currently serves users in nine countries across North America and Europe.