Setareh Heshmat's Vision for Empowering Female Entrepreneurs Through Climate-Focused Funds

There is a gap in the market that most investors have been content to ignore. Setareh Heshmat has made it her life's work to close it.

At 32, the Singapore-based ESG investment director has built a career at the crossroads of sustainable finance and venture capital. But beneath the impressive credentials and the polished professional trajectory lies a vision that is deeply personal — a future where female entrepreneurs across Southeast Asia have access to the capital, mentorship, and structural support they need to build businesses that matter. And where the investment funds backing them are as committed to the planet as they are to profit.

The Gap Nobody Wants to Talk About

The data is stark, even if it rarely makes headlines. Women-led businesses in Southeast Asia receive a disproportionately small share of venture capital funding. Despite research consistently showing that companies with female founders and leadership teams outperform their peers on multiple metrics — including return on investment, employee satisfaction, and long-term resilience — the flow of capital remains stubbornly skewed.

Setareh has seen this firsthand. Through her work as a Director of ESG Investments and her years of mentoring women entrepreneurs, she has encountered brilliant, ambitious, highly capable founders who struggled to get meetings, let alone term sheets, simply because they did not fit the archetype that traditional venture capital has historically rewarded.

"The pipeline is not the problem," she has said in professional discussions. "The pipeline is full. The problem is the filter."

Her proposed solution is not incremental. It is structural: a dedicated sustainable investment fund, built from the ground up, designed to back female entrepreneurs across Southeast Asia with both capital and long-term strategic support.

Why Climate and Gender Belong in the Same Conversation

To some, combining climate-focused investing with gender equity might seem like an unusual pairing. To Setareh, the connection is obvious.

Research from institutions including the United Nations and the World Bank has consistently demonstrated that women are disproportionately affected by climate change — particularly in developing and emerging economies. At the same time, women-led organizations and communities have repeatedly shown greater commitment to environmental stewardship and sustainable resource management.

In Southeast Asia, where climate vulnerability is acute and the entrepreneurial ecosystem is rapidly maturing, this intersection creates a powerful investment thesis. Female founders building climate solutions in this region are not just addressing market gaps — they are addressing the problems that matter most to the communities they come from.

Setareh's fund vision is built on this thesis. By directing capital toward women-led climate and sustainability startups, she believes it is possible to generate compelling financial returns while simultaneously accelerating two of the most urgent priorities of our time: gender equity and environmental action.

Mentorship as a Bridge to Funding

Long before the fund becomes a reality, Setareh is already putting her philosophy into practice through mentorship.

She regularly works with early-stage female founders, offering guidance on everything from financial modeling and investor readiness to strategic positioning and team building. For many of the women she mentors, these conversations represent access to a kind of knowledge that is typically reserved for those who already have the right network — the insider perspective of someone who has sat on both sides of the table.

It is deliberate, and it is personal. Setareh understands that capital alone does not close the gap. Knowledge does. Confidence does. A network of people who believe in you and open doors does.

"Mentorship is pre-investment," she has explained to colleagues. "You are building someone's capacity to succeed before the check is ever written."

This approach reflects a broader philosophy that runs through everything she does — the belief that sustainable impact is not just about where money goes, but about the ecosystem of support that surrounds it.

The INSEAD Edge: Thinking in Systems

Setareh's ability to hold climate, gender, and finance in a single coherent framework owes much to her academic formation. Her Master's in Finance and Sustainability from INSEAD Singapore trained her to think in systems — to trace the connections between capital flows, policy environments, social structures, and environmental outcomes.

Where many investors see separate problems requiring separate solutions, she sees a single, interconnected challenge requiring an integrated response. This systems-level thinking is rare in venture capital, and it is one of the qualities that makes her fund vision distinctively ambitious.

She has reinforced this with hard analytical skills — her CFA designation, her MIT data analytics training, and her years of experience building impact measurement frameworks. The result is a thinker who is equally comfortable discussing carbon accounting and cap tables, biodiversity risk and burn rates.

Southeast Asia: The Right Region at the Right Time

The timing of Setareh's vision is as important as its content.

Southeast Asia is undergoing a transformation that is without precedent in its speed and scale. Digital penetration is rising rapidly. A young, educated, entrepreneurially minded population is building companies at an accelerating rate. Governments across the region are making ambitious commitments to green growth and sustainable development. And international capital is increasingly looking to the region as a source of both opportunity and innovation.

For a fund focused on female-led climate startups, this is an extraordinary moment. The founders are there. The problems are there. The growing investor appetite is there. What has been missing is a fund with the specific mandate, expertise, and network to bring them together.

Setareh intends to be that fund.

Her base in Singapore — Asia's most connected financial hub — gives her the infrastructure and credibility to raise capital from both regional and international limited partners. Her existing network of founders, co-investors, and institutional relationships gives her the deal flow. And her years of experience in ESG investing give her the track record to back it up.

Building the Future, One Investment at a Time

Setareh is measured about timelines. She is not the kind of person who announces a vision before the foundations are in place. But those who know her describe a woman who is methodically and patiently building toward something significant — deepening relationships with potential LPs, refining her investment thesis, expanding her network of female founders across the region.

In the meantime, her day job continues to be its own form of proof of concept. Every climate-focused startup she backs, every impact metric she tracks, every female founder she mentors brings her closer to the model she intends to scale.

She balances this professional intensity with practices that keep her grounded — pilates, yoga, marathon running, and a deep love of books on philosophy and behavioral economics. For someone who thinks as systemically as Setareh, the discipline of long-distance running offers its own kind of wisdom: that meaningful progress is not about speed, but about consistency, endurance, and knowing where you are going.

A Fund the World Needs

The sustainable investment fund that Setareh Heshmat is working toward does not yet have a name. But it has a clear purpose: to direct capital where it is most needed and least present, to back the founders who are solving the problems that matter most, and to demonstrate that gender equity and climate action are not additions to a strong investment strategy — they are the foundation of one.

Southeast Asia is waiting. The founders are ready. And Setareh Heshmat is building the vehicle to reach them.

Setareh Heshmat is the Director of ESG Investments at a Singapore-based venture capital firm. She is a CFA charterholder, a sustainability advocate, and a mentor to women entrepreneurs across Southeast Asia.