Women entrepreneurs in the water sector: the road less traveled, or not any more?
Did you know that less than one in five water workers are women? In 2019, research by the World Bank’s Water Global Practice found that women were also underrepresented in technical and managerial positions. Now if we look outside the water sector, at female entrepreneurship data, we find despairing figures when it comes to the various countries. In the UK, for example, only 1 in 3 entrepreneurs is female (Rose Review of Female Entrepreneurship, HM Treasury 2019). However, in the United States, research found that between 2017 and 2018 women started an average of 1,821 new businesses per day, with women making up 40% of new entrepreneurs, according to Forbes. Although the gender gap between female and male entrepreneurs is closing, there is still room for improvement and especially in the water world. The World Bank report highlighted that the gender gap in water-related employment needs to be closed if the world is to reach its commitments on water and sanitation for all.
International Women's Day is celebrated every year on March 8 to raise awareness about women's equality, accelerate gender parity
To celebrate this year’s International Women’s Day, the Smart Water Magazine team spoke with various women who have founded their own water company to learn a bit more about why they started their own company and their experience as women business owners in a male-dominated sector.
Orianna Bretschger. Aquacycl
Recognized by the San Diego Business Journal Top 50 Women of Influence in Engineering 2022, Orianna Bretschger is the CEO of Aquacycl, a California-based company she and partners founded in 2016 with a goal of creating distributed wastewater treatment to address water scarcity and lack of infrastructure in low-income countries. Aquacycl now provides the only modular, plug-and-play system for cost-effectively treating complex industrial wastewaters.
Could you tell us briefly about your career path and how you ended up founding your own company?
I am an accidental entrepreneur.
I began my career in aerospace and government consulting and pivoted my career path by returning to school and pursuing a PhD. As I began this new chapter, I had anticipated a career as an academic professor, continuing my research and mentoring students. After finishing my degree, I began managing a research group at a not-for-profit institution – continuing the exploration of how microbial communities can generate direct electricity while treating wastewater.
When the grant was completed, the decision was made to establish a company with the mission of sanitation and water for all
After an additional eight years of research and development, and with support from our largest grant funder - The Roddenberry Foundation - my group had developed and field-tested a prototype system for efficiently treating manure and sewage, while generating electricity at the same time. When the grant was completed, the decision was made to establish a company with the mission of sanitation and water for all.
Five years later, Aquacycl is now providing wastewater treatment as a service to industrial customers to help them reach their sustainability goals, maintain regulatory compliance, and save facilities 20%-60% on their monthly sewer bills.
The Aquacycl team continues to optimize our technology and service offerings to provide value across multiple segments of the wastewater market. We remain true to our mission of sanitation and water for all by delivering cost-effective, reliable solutions for wastewater treatment that support healthy watersheds and communities world-wide.
What is the rationale to start your own company versus working for a company you admire?
I was offered the unique opportunity to transition a technology that started in a laboratory into a commercial product that is now solving customer problems. I was fortunate to have investors, partners, and mentors that championed our mission and supported the company while I learned how to develop a business (not just a product). The opportunity to start Aquacycl was a gift…a big risk as well…but ultimately it was a chance to make a meaningful impact toward environmental and human health. I could not refuse.
Women are still underrepresented in the water sector. What is your experience as a woman and business founder in this sector?
Women are underrepresented; however, because of that, we are a group of empowered women working to empower more women.
"Women need to understand at an early age that the water industry has a multitude of fun and rewarding jobs that are open for them to pursue"
I love meeting and learning from my female peers in the water industry and female founders/CEOs outside of the water sector. We work together whenever possible, encourage each other, promote each other, and importantly - we hire more women into senior positions whenever possible.
As a business owner, what measures do you think would be effective to bridge the gender gap in the water sector?
There are several factors to consider when addressing how to reach gender parity in the water industry. One aspect is teaching young women about water-related jobs early in their education. The National Science Foundation has reported that engaging young women in middle-school, is critical to maintaining their interest and pursuit of STEM careers. Women need to understand at an early age that the water industry has a multitude of fun and rewarding jobs that are open for them to pursue. Several organizations have youth-outreach programs, but we can still do more to specifically reach young women through intern programs, job shadowing opportunities, and working with educators to incorporate water-related STEM activities in middle- and high-school classrooms. Aquacycl does regular classroom lectures and facility tours for students and educators across many different age groups. These outreach opportunities have brought us amazing female interns, and several have become full-time team members.
Emily Hicks. FREDsense Technologies
Recognized as a young innovator and business leader by Corporate Knight's top 30 under 30 and Bay Street Bull top 30 under 30, Emily Hicks is the President and Co-Founder at FREDsense Technologies, a Canadian early-stage biotechnology company working on creating novel biosensors for contaminants in wastewater.
Could you tell us briefly about your career path and how you ended up founding your own company?
I honestly never expected that I would found a company. I had always planned on going to medical school to become a surgeon, and entrepreneurship to me, was something similar to opening a Tim Horton’s franchise. During my undergraduate program however, I got involved in the University of Calgary’s International Genetically Engineered Machines (iGEM) competition. The competition challenges student groups from around the world to engineer biology to do something novel. Back in 2011-2012, I was leading a team where we were focused on genetically engineering bacteria to be able to detect contaminants in oil sands tailings ponds, and in response produce electrochemical signals. This was where the idea for FREDsense was born.
We did extremely well in the competition, winning a bunch of awards, and realized the idea may actually have legs
We did extremely well in the competition, winning a bunch of awards, and realized the idea may actually have legs. The more we looked into it, the more we discovered that understanding water chemistry was a huge problem across many industries, and in many cases, people had to wait days to weeks to get data, making it difficult to make decisions. We realized that our solution could allow us to measure a broad range of contaminants, in a portable kit, in just a couple hours. I really fell in love with this idea of engineering biology to solve a really big problem like this. And so we decided to found FREDsense, to use synthetic biology to create portable tools for measuring different water chemistry parameters. The early days were a crazy roller coaster. We got the company off the ground by winning every pitch competition that we could find that had a cash prize that would be more than the cost of getting there. We rented a tiny 140 sqft closet lab space, and bought lab equipment from Amazon, eBay, Government surplus, etc. We found some small grants to help hire the first couple of employees, and we bootstrapped really hard. It was a crazy time, but slowly we were able to get things started. We then received some funding from Singularity University to really get things going.
What is the rationale to start your own company versus working for a company you admire?
I became really passionate about the problem we were solving (water monitoring) as well as using synthetic biology to solve it. It seemed like such an elegant solution to such a huge problem. I never planned on starting a company and definitely never saw myself as an entrepreneur, but I quickly realized that nobody else was going to make this happen if I didn’t. I was also young, fairly naïve, and figured this was the right time in my life to take a big risk on something, when I didn’t have kids, a mortgage and other responsibilities.
"Even though the gender gap definitely still exists, it’s great to see so many technology startup companies entering the space with strong female leadership"
I also figured this would be a tremendous learning experience that I really wouldn’t get anywhere else. And that has been absolutely true. While the path hasn’t been easy, I have learned so much these last couple years and I am so grateful for that.
Women are still underrepresented in the water sector. What is your experience as a woman and business founder in this sector?
I have definitely had an interesting experience. Although I have experienced my fair share of sexism, I have also found that being a woman in a male-dominated space can sometimes be an advantage. I bring a unique perspective to the table and find that sometimes being a bit different can help you to stand out, which is never a bad thing when you’re a startup!
As a business owner, what measures do you think would be effective to bridge the gender gap in the water sector?
This is a super tough question, and I think that if there were easy answers, I hope that we would have implemented them already. I personally am extremely encouraged by how many female entrepreneurs I see entering the space. Even though the gender gap definitely still exists, it’s great to see so many technology startup companies entering the space with strong female leadership. From Swirltex, Cloud to Steet, StormSensor, 120Water, there are so many tremendous examples of female-led companies making a huge impact. I do hope that this helps to increase representation and provide amazing role models for women just starting their career.
Karen Sorber. Micronic Technologies
Karen Sorber is the CEO and co-founder of Micronic Technologies, a US company that has patented and piloted a small-scale clean water system that purifies industrial wastewater from any source, based on patented tornadic-enhanced purification technology. Micronic is the recipient of several awards, including the Greater Washington's 2021 Clean Tech Innovator of the Year.
"Showcasing woman led companies in periodicals, such as Smart Water, also goes a long way toward increased awareness"
Could you tell us briefly about your career path and how you ended up founding your own company?
I held a number of executive positions in federal contracting and commercial consulting culminating as Study Director with the Congressional Commission on Wartime Contracting. Toward the end of my ‘First Act’, I visited Peru on a humanitarian visit.
After witnessing firsthand children deprived of clean water and its impact on their health, I became committed that one day I would help Peruvians and other water-deprived peoples around the globe. The next year, whether by chance, karma, or design; I married Kelly Rock, who at that time held 21 patents in automotive, medical, and water technologies. After expressing my commitment based on my Peruvian experience, Kelly shared his idea about how to clean water and his desire to help people and the environment. Micronic Technologies was born.
What is the rationale to start your own company versus working for a company you admire?
Always a natural self-starter, I preferred beginning new ventures; in school, business, and socially. My life is replete with this history, partaking or leading in the development of new projects or organizations along my federal and commercial career. Like many opportunities, pursuing a new technology business did not scare me if I had the passion, which of course, I did. Using my connections and knowledge of state and federal grant-making entities I was able to secure $4M in non-dilutive funding. My friends, family, and other investors matched this $4M in seed capital.
Like many opportunities, pursuing a new technology business did not scare me if I had the passion, which of course, I did
Now, after $8M in investment and grant funding, our patented wastewater concentration technology, the Tornadic One-Pass™ (TOP™) mechanically concentrates highly contaminated wastewater without the high cost and logistics supply chain of current evaporators. The TOP™ system injects contaminated water through the patented “pod” with sufficient force and velocity to create a miniature tornado and the conditions for near-instantaneous evaporation to remove contaminants and recapture of clean water through condensation.
Women are still underrepresented in the water sector. What is your experience as a woman and business founder in this sector?
In a word, difficult. Last year, just 2% of venture backed companies had female CEOs. I have found this underrepresentation to carry over into the water sector and other STEM fields. That said, I am not one to let obstacles stand in my way. I’m proud of the fact that we are female co-founded and led with a 60% female board. The technology speaks for itself as our Tornadic One-Pass™ has proven its ability to clean wastewater more effectively and less costly than alternatives. Today the company has 11 patents and a partnership with the EPA where our first engineered unit is available at the EPA test facility in Cincinnati Ohio. Just last quarter, Micronic and the EPA co-authored a peer reviewed scientific study that was published in the peer reviewed journal, Desalination. At this point I enjoy excellent male and female relationships with potential customers, partners, board members, and advisors.
As a business owner, what measures do you think would be effective to bridge the gender gap in the water sector?
Speak up! As I develop relationships in the sector, I engage in communication about this specific issue, gaining more and more acknowledgment of the general desire to fix it. Most just don’t know how. I suggest woman speakers be sought out for events and panels on this subject at conferences to raise the awareness and that more women be recruited into engineering programs. Lastly, showcasing woman led companies in periodicals, such as Smart Water, also goes a long way toward increased awareness.
Carmen Larragay. Cartometrics
Carmen Larragay is one of the founders of Cartometrics, a company based in Spain aiming to make geospatial technology more accessible. They have developed Watcher, a tool that uses satellite data analysis and machine learning models to detect fraud in water consumption aimed at water utilities.
Could you tell us briefly about your career path and how you ended up founding your own company?
Although I didn’t finish my degree, I studied engineering. I studied my degree in Malaga, so I was lucky enough to be part of a university that makes a great effort to help students get to know the world of entrepreneurship. And that's how I got to know it, at one of the events they organised.
One of the products we are developing is Watcher, which aims to detect plots of land suspected of committing water fraud
During the weekend that the event lasted, I discovered my vocation: to create companies that can change the world we live in for the better. At that moment, together with one of my current partners and other colleagues, I founded our first company, Terrakit, focused on bringing the experience of having a vegetable garden to people living in big cities.
I am currently part of Cartometrics, a company dedicated to the development of web applications powered by geospatial data. One of the products we are developing is Watcher, which aims to detect plots of land suspected of committing water fraud using satellite imagery and data science.
What is the rationale to start your own company versus working for a company you admire?
I would say that there are two main but related reasons:
On the one hand, I feel freer. We have flexibility both in terms of time and location and our salary is a reflection of our decisions, there is no imposed figure.
“I believe that a large part of our efforts should be directed towards improving education, as it is the basis of our society”
On the other hand, I am passionate about creating products from scratch that have a purpose, seeing them evolve over time and thus creating a company to admire.
Women are still underrepresented in the water sector. What is your experience as a woman and business founder in this sector?
In my case, I have not been working in the water sector for very long, but I have been working in the technology sector, where the problem is similar.
Of all the professionals we have worked with so far in the water sector, we have only worked with one woman, and of course this is a problem that we need to work on to increase participation in future generations.
As a business owner, what measures do you think would be effective to bridge the gender gap in the water sector?
I believe that a large part of our efforts should be directed towards improving education, as it is the basis of our society. In my opinion, it is necessary to work on eliminating the biases that some professional careers are sometimes influenced by because they are considered "men's" by showing cases of successful women in masculinised sectors so that they can serve as references.
This and many other measures are already being carried out. This is obvious when you look at the presence of women in technical careers, it is much greater than it was just four years ago.
I am confident that with a little more time and initiatives like this one, logic will prevail and the professional differences between us will no longer be a matter of gender.