Welcome to Enterprising Women

We have a vision for Enterprising Women. We want to provide women business owners with a friendly meeting place, a public forum, and a national stage for the critical issues confronting our businesses and our daily lives. We want to share the unique perspective and experiences of women entrepreneurs. We hope that after you've read this issue, you will agree that we're on the right track.

We want Enterprising Women to be the magazine for you, the woman business owner. We think you've been waiting long enough for a magazine designed for women who dare to think big, make the leap, and follow their dreams.

Just a few short years ago, women business owners were virtually invisible and toiled in relative obscurity. Today, our numbers (nine million strong and counting) speak of an emerging, powerful constituency with increasing economic and political muscle.

As drivers of the new economy, women-owned businesses create nearly one out of four jobs for U.S. workers- more than all the Fortune 500 combined. We are also creating, building and leading some of the most dynamic enterprises in America. Along the way, often at great risk and against the odds, we have shattered glass ceilings and entrenched stereotypes, and are redefining the meaning of leadership and success.

Take a close look at Editorial Director Jeanie Barnett's cover story on our Top 10 Women in Technology. Women like Cate Muther and Lavonne Luquis (pictured on our cover) have made our list not only because they are leading successful enterprises, but because they are mentoring other women who have their own dreams of entrepreneurship to realize.

Our mission is to reflect and amplify the voices of entrepreneurial women. To share your stories of risk and success. To chronicle your growing political, economic, and social influence and power. To celebrate your triumphs. To provide solutions to your problems. To identify and promote a new generation of leaders, along with role models and mentors for tomorrow's leaders.

We hope you like what you see and that Enterprising Women can inspire you to take your business to the next level. I welcome your comments and would love to hear from you. You'll find me at ewomenmagazine@aol.com Monica S. Smiley

10 Top Women in Technology
by Jeanie M. Barnett

In compiling our list of the Top 10 Women in Technology, I was struck by two thoughts. One, that the years after a woman turns 40 can be the most productive, rewarding and exciting of her life; and two, that the mainstream media still tend to overlook the fact that women are running some of the most innovative technology-oriented businesses in America.

It wasn't hard to find women who fit our criteria. Because we are a magazine devoted to women business owners, our list is comprised of entrepreneurs who started or co-founded their business; have a majority ownership and/or control of the business; have a proven track record in their fields; and are involved in the community and actively support other women business owners.

Of course, for this particular list, their businesses must have something to do with computers and the digital economy.

More difficult was keeping the list to just 10. So many women today are proving that the technology field, like entrepreneurship in general, is a great equalizer where they can exercise to their fullest potential their talents and strengths. Pioneers like Sandra Kurtzig, whose ASK Computer Systems, which she started in her home in 1972, became the largest Silicon Valley company ever started by a woman; Autodesk's Carole Bartz, one of the first women software CEOs; and Anne Winblad, whose high-tech venture capital firm Hummer Winblad boasts some of the highest returns in the industry, have done much to change the face of the technology industry and prove that you don't have to be male in order to make it to the big time.

We salute those pioneers, and present 10 more to you in the following pages. Some you may already know about, others you may be meeting for the first time. All are exceptional role models you'll not only be inspired by, but with whom you'll undoubtedly have a lot in common.

On A Roll
Geraldine Laybourne
52/ founder, president and CEO / oxygen media / new york

Talk about your grrrl power. Geraldine Laybourne's Oxygen Media, the much-hyped new cable TV channel and its sister web site cater exclusively to women, has some very big names ­and some very big bucks- bankrolling the notion that women consumers are the economic powerhouse of the new millennium.

A veteran TV executive who created and built the Nickelodeon channel for kids, Laybourne did a brief turn as president of the Disney-ABC cable networks before launching Oxygen Media in 1998 with a who's-who roster of partners: Oprah Winfrey, the TV talk-show mogul; and Marcy Carsey, Tom Werner and Caryn Mandabach, whose TV production company was behind such hits as The Cosby Show and Roseanne.

The fivesome has managed to attract some $400 million in investment capital from equally heavy hitters including Microsoft co-founder Paul Allen, America Online and the luxury goods conglomerate LVMH, which peddles indulgences like Hennessy Cognac and Louis Vuitton luggage. ABC is also in the mix to develop shows for Oxygen's 24-hour, all-original-programming cable channel, which debuted on February 2nd to an initial 10 million viewers in selected markets.

Dubbed the "Queen of Convergence" by The Industry Standard, the weekly Internet news magazine, Laybourne is determined to create a new-media empire in which television and the Internet will merge into a single, integrated whole.

Laybourne admits it's still anybody's guess what exactly this future medium will look like.

"The whole premise of Oxygen is this grassroots movement that's trying to connect with the democratic landscape that the Web has provided, and to translate that into a TV network," she explained in a recent Industry Standard article. "On Day One, it's going to be something, but a month later it's going to be something else. Two months later, it's going to be something else. That's the only way to be if you're trying to figure this out."

At this very minute, convergence is still more of a concept than an actual "something." Oxygen's cable shows display banners across the bottom of the screen that point viewers to pertinent content on the Oxygen web site, which in turn includes highlights of Oxygen's TV shows. Still on the drawing board are plans to develop TV content from the web site's various message boards, chat rooms and surveys.

As for Oxygen's programming itself, much is fresh and sassy, and targeted to "today's woman," who comes in all shapes and sizes, colors and ages. Some favorites: "ka-Ching," which looks at money and investing; "X-Chromosome," which features short works by women animators; and a talk show called "Exhale," hosted by Candace Bergan in a non-fiction reprisal of her Murphy Brown TV persona, which extends beyond the usual parade of celebrities to celebrate women in politics and the arts. The web site, which is actually an agglomeration of several different sites Oxygen acquired from AOL last year, hosts an expansive range of female-oriented content (check out womenshands, a retail site featuring the work of women artisans around the globe) that may lack depth, but not necessarily intelligence.

Can Oxygen Media live up to its hype and fulfill its promise to be all things to all women? Moreover, can it compete with well-financed online rivals like iVillage and Women.com, along with cable's Lifetime Channel, which currently holds the lock on women's programming?

Laybourne is supremely confident that Oxygen will prevail. Within five years, she predicts her "converged network" will have 50 million subscribers and lead the pack in providing smart, quality programming for the 21st century woman.

For now, though, says Laybourne, "it's a work in progress."

Different Drummer
catherine muther /52 / founder of three guineas fund / women's technology cluster / san francisco

It's said that northern California's Silicon Valley now creates about 64 millionaires a day in the digital economy. So what do all those newly minted moguls do after cashing in their stock options and taking an early retirement? Constructing monster houses and driving monster SUVs aside, the regions nouveaux riches are also building a philanthropic community that takes an entrepreneurial approach to giving: investing in projects that produce measurable results.

Cate Muther stands out among this new breed of "venture philanthropists." Six years ago, Muther, then age 46, left her senior executive position as vice president of marketing for Cisco Systems, the computer network giant whose sales increased from $25 million when she joined the company in 1989 to more than $1 billion by 1994. Retiring a multi-millionaire from the stock options she had in the company, Muther then put into action a goal she'd had since her early days at Cisco: to create a foundation that supports economic and educational opportunities for women. Muther endowed her foundation with an initial $2 million and named it The Three Guineas Fund, after the title of an essay by Virginia Woolf about charitable giving and social change.

Since then, the Three Guineas Fund has funded several projects including Sweet Things, an entrepreneur program for girls and their mothers; Quietly Torn, a journal of young Mien women; and Sportsbridge, an athlete mentor program for middle school girls. The Foundation also supports the Center for Women Leaders at Cambridge University, where Muther received a degree in anthropology before attending Stanford University for her MBA.

Last year, Muther launched the fund's biggest and most impressive project to date: a business "incubator" in San Francisco that provides inexpensive office space and support services to women-led internet start ups.

After two years of planning, signing on other donors and an exhaustive search for a space large enough to house up to 20 businesses, the Women's Technology Cluster (WTC) opened its doors in January 1999.

The WTC is modeled on several successful incubators that have sprouted up around the country in recent years which bring together fledgling entrepreneurs in similar industries and provide them with shared resources and management support as they get their businesses off the ground.

To date, 10 companies, winnowed from 300 applicants so far, occupy the WTC's 30'000-square-foot office space. Tenants share office equipment, including a computer network with high speed Internet access, and are treated to regular lunchtime seminars and workshops conducted by business, technology and legal experts.

Three of the WTC's tenants have already "graduated" and moved to their own facilities, including Latino.com.

Muther's main goal for the WTC is to close the financing gap for women entrepreneurs and put their companies on the radar screens of institutional and private investors. "Access to capital is the last barrier to women's full participation in the economy," she notes. Her scheme is apparently working, if you count the nearly $18 million that's been invested in the incubator's tenants in its first year of operation. Muther is confident that figure will double by June 2000.

Another equally important objective of the cluster is to create a "giving back" culture. Every tenant pledges two percent of its equity to the WTC's Venture Philanthropy Fund. Says Muther; "we're trying to give women an opportunity to participate in the wealth-creating process of the technology boom. At the same time, we want to educate entrepreneurs about reinvesting wealth in their community."

Additional support for the WTC is provided by the City and County of San Francisco, which contributed $250,000 in funding and rent support; various private foundations; and corporations like Pacific Gas & Electric, Pacific Bell, and Grant Thornton, LLP. Muther's old employer Cisco Systems chipped in with the computer network. The Three Guineas Fund also makes continuing grants to the WTC.

Most recently, Muther's fund was a sponsor of Springboard 2000, the first venture fair for women technology entrepreneurs held this past January at Oracle's Silicon Valley headquarters where 27 women presented their companies to venture capitalists and angel investors. Among the presenters were three WTC tenants, who have secured millions of dollars in venture capital since the event, Muther reports.

Her next goal is to create an incubator for start-up foundations. "The rate of new philanthropic foundations starting up in the Silicone Valley is the highest in the country. Applying an incubator model to these foundations can help them share resources and networks, accelerate their learning and become more strategic."

Muther grew up in Massachusetts in a family where the New England work ethic was almost a religion. Her Yankee sensibility still prevails: she neither lives in a monster house nor drives an SUV. Giving back is her true passion. "The foundation has released an enormous burst of creativity in me. This is how I can make a difference."

"Wealth is created in this country by building companies," she adds. "I don't have a crystal ball on this, but I think as women create more wealth, we'll see more and more giving back."

Leader of the Pack
lavonne luquis / 40 / co-founder and president / latino.com / San Francisco

Lavonne Luquis holds the distinction of being the first entrepreneur to target the Latino community on the web. Six years ago, the former newspaper editor, fed up with searching the web in vain for news about her homeland of Puerto Rico and other stories on Hispanic culture, decided to start a web site that focused exclusively on serving the Latino community. When people told her she was crazy, conventional wisdom being that minorities and women weren't using the Internet, Luquis became only more determined to prove them wrong.

Boy, did she ever. Since then, her vision has launched a slew of big-name, well-financed competitors that are scrambling to capture one of the fastest growing audiences online that Luquis helped define.

How does she continue to compete with the rivals she's spawned? "We differentiate ourselves through the quality of our content," says Luquis, whose site features original stories on current events, politics, entertainment and the arts written by an in-house staff of reporters.

The Internet is ideally suited for reaching people with specific interests, says Luquis. "The web is all about serving niches. Our niche is Latinos in the United States." We try to reflect their experiences, their challenges and successes. People are looking for a roadmap in the stories they read. And they want to read about other people who are like themselves."

To survive, though, Latino.com will have to continue growing- which it's been doing at a healthy clip. One of the first residents to move into the Women's Technology Cluster in San Francisco when it opened last year, Latino.com was also the first to "graduate" from the incubator at the beginning of the year after its staff swelled from five to 35 employees. The company now occupies new office space in downtown San Francisco, and recently opened a second office in New York City to handle the business side of its operations.

Having raised $4 million in angel investments last summer, Luquis reports she is near to closing on a second round of financing that may bring up to $30 million in institutional venture capital to help build Latino.com's market presence and staff.

Luquis thinks the term "digital divide" is overused in referring to minorities' lack of access to technology. "The divide is really one of poverty and education, issues that cut across all segments of our society," she notes.

"The only way to bridge the divide is to provide more education and training to everybody."

Education has always been a priority for Luquis, who was born in Los Angeles and attended 12 elementary schools by the time she was 10 years old as her father moved his wife and daughter back and forth between the U.S. and his native Puerto Rico in pursuit of better jobs. Finally settling down on the island, he started an auto repair shop, which Luquis helped manage during high school. By the age of 20, Luquis had married and had a daughter. The marriage didn't last, and motherhood did nothing to bridle her adventuresome spirit: when her daughter was three, Luquis took her to Florence, Italy where she studied history and languages for six months, then returned to Puerto Rico and intermittently worked while going to school. She finished up her degree in journalism at the University of Colorado at Boulder in 1988, then spent seven years as a reporter for the San Juan Star and another year as city editor of the Olympia Times in Olympia, Washington. A year later, just after she and a partner started the web site, Luquis moved to San Francisco.

Most of Latino.com's employees are Hispanic. "The people who work with us are very passionate about what we do. They have an emotional connection with our audience," she says.

By fall, Luquis plans to take her company public. "I didn't know what an IPO was when I started," she says, admitting that the learning curve has been steep. "You figure things out as you go along and try to make the right choices. Because this industry is still very much virgin territory, there aren't a lot of case studies out there to learn from."

It's amazing, though, how swiftly the Internet has insinuated itself in people's lives," she adds, recalling a conversation she overheard while having breakfast during a recent trip to Miami. "The people at the next table were talking about their email. Five years ago, people were saying ŒInter-what?' Now, they talk about it like the weather."