Rewind back in time and it would have been a surprise to see anyone other than men being at the top of the business world, leading the race in almost every successful entrepreneur ranking article on the internet. However, there’s been a seismic shift in recent times, with the rise of influential women leading the charge of a new era of businesswomen leaving their mark.
They’re now household names, building businesses from the ground up as they sit by side with men that once solely occupied boardrooms. However, they all started somewhere. Whether it was taking over a family business and launching it into a new stratosphere or building a business from the ground up, women deserve to be recognized for their efforts in the business world.
To inspire the next generation of female talent, here are the 10 most successful female entrepreneurs in the world.
10. Huda Kattan
Age: 38
Net worth: $490 million
Let Huda Kattan be a perfect example of taking a risk when the day job doesn’t feel right. After leaving her finance role in Dubai behind, this beauty mogul found the perfect gap in the market when she struggled to find suitable false eyelashes as she switched to a freelance makeup role. This kickstarted the decision to create her own faux minx and synthetic eyelashes, quickly becoming the go-to product for some of the biggest names around.
To this day, Huda Beauty products sell out instantly, with her name etched in history as one of the most successful makeup moguls around. Her name alone instantly improves brand perception, which is powerful. She’s since expanded into the world of skincare and continues to be an inspiration to young women of color.
9. Kylie Jenner
Age: 24
Net worth: $700 million
Despite the controversy surrounding her legitimate billionaire status on Forbes and coming from a famous family, Kylie Jenner has done a fantastic job of becoming one of the most successful female entrepreneurs today, of any age. Jenner has proven to be business-savvy, thanks to her beauty brands Kylie Skin and Kylie Cosmetics, which are on an astronomical rise and show no signs of slowing down.
According to some sources, her brands are growing much faster than any other beauty brand around, which shows her marketing skills and business strategy are paying off in dividends.
8. Sara Blakely
Age: 50
Net worth: $750 million
Although Spanx is a household name now, it was close to never getting off the ground in the first place. Sara Blakely initially had no money to invest in her idea of Spanx, facing multiple rejections from investors who refused to acknowledge the brands. However, fellow female entrepreneur Opray Winfrey publicly endorsed the idea, which helped Blakely set up the now booming business, selling everything from leggings and undergarments to maternity clothing.
She’s shown no signs of slowing down, either. She’s one of the most powerful women in the world today and has since tried her hand at sports ownership, becoming a co-owner of the Atlanta Hawks basketball team in 2015.
7. Susan Wojcicki
Age: 53
Net worth: $815 million
You could argue Susan Wojcicki was always destined for success. After renting out garage space in what would be Google’s first-ever headquarters, she eventually joined the company in 1999 and had plenty of success there. The most notable being the acquisition of YouTube after first getting involved in the video space with the launch of Google Video.
Her trajectory was always on a rapid rise. She became the senior vice president at Google in 2010, moved to YouTube four years later and then became the CEO of the world’s most popular video platform. With YouTube more popular than ever and her net worth creeping towards the $1 billion mark, it’s safe to say Wojcicki is currently one of the world’s most successful female entrepreneurs.
6. Cher Wang
Age: 62
Net worth: $850 million
Cher Wang is one of the most successful female entrepreneurs involved in the technology space today. She’s held the title of the world’s most powerful woman on two occasions in 2012 and 2014, primarily because she’s the founder of the uber-successful billion-dollar tech organization, HTC.
HTC focuses on innovating new technology, such as smartphones. Despite multiple market slumps, Wang knows how to turn the business around with new devices created to boost sales and her net worth.
5. Tory Burch
Age: 55
Net worth: $900 million
Tory Burch is a perfect example of a dedicated person who utilized her knowledge from brands around her. In the early days, she went and gained work experiences from some of the biggest fashion brands around, ranging from Polo Ralph Lauren to Loewe. After that venture, Burch decided to go at it alone by setting up her own fashion brand in 2004.
Her brand now has 300 locations and has become a huge hit, with unique designs and womenswear range.
4. Folorunsho Alakija
Age: 70
Net worth: $1 billion
Nigeria’s Folorusho Alakija amassed her wealth after initially starting a fashion label. Her first company had big-name customers, including the likes of Ibrahim Babangida’s — former Nigerian president — wife. Today, she’s the vice chairwoman of Famfa Oil, a Nigerian oil exploration company with partners including Petrobras and Chevron. What made her so wealthy and subsequently successful is that the Nigerian government awarded Alakija’s oil company an oil prospecting license in 1993. Later, that was converted into an oil mining lease.
3. Oprah Winfrey
Age: 67
Net worth: $2.5 billion
Coming from a poor background, talk show icon Oprah Winfrey has amassed a fortune of around $2.5 billion. She’s the founder of Oprah Winfrey Leadership Academy for Girls, OWN and Harpo productions. However, she fought her way to the top, starting as a news anchor before getting her own talk show and eventually building her own well-deserved empire. Now a philanthropist, she’s truly an inspiration for the next generation and those from underprivileged backgrounds. There isn’t anything that hasn’t already been said about Oprah and her well-deserved success as a female entrepreneur.
2. Kiran Mazumdar-Shaw
Age: 68
Net worth: $3.7 billion
Kiran Mazumdar-Shaw is a female entrepreneur that had to do it the hard way. Being India’s first-ever female entrepreneur comes with its fair share of expectations. Still, the issues in the early years haven’t diverted her focus from turning her business, Biocon, into a global biopharmaceutical giant.
Mazumdar-Shaw has seen a lot of milestones involving Biocon. It’s a pioneering organization utilizing India’s own scientific talent to make world-leading breakthroughs in clinical research. A year after forming, Biocon also became the first Indian company to export enzymes to Europe and the US, but as a female, she faced plenty of scepticism and discrimination, with many not wanting to work for a woman.
Over time, that notion has changed as she’s transformed Biocon into a successful brand while amassing a fortune herself.
1. Denise Coates
Age: 53
Net worth: $6.1 billion
It’s rare to see women entering the gambling world and leaving their mark for the right reasons. British entrepreneur Denise Coates is a perfect example of someone who took her time to get her project right, rather than rushing it to see quick results. Initially training as an accountant, she sold a number of her family’s betting stores to another gambling franchise, Coral.
Seeing a gap in the market and the success online gambling had, she purchased the Bet365.com domain name and funded the business with a $20 million loan from the Royal Bank of Scotland. Using the funding, she spent a year fine-tuning it and presented the website in 2001.
Today, Coates owns around half of the private company, which makes over $65 billion in bets each year. The perseverance and noticing the gap in the market has helped Coates turn Bet365 into one of the world’s biggest online gambling sites and has cemented her place as one of the most successful female entrepreneurs of all time.
Not every entrepreneur is in a privileged position when they begin. Yes, it’s easy to scoff at many when you factor in major bank or family loans, government involvement and also famous family backgrounds that already provide a somewhat ‘unfair’ launchpad to success.
However, that doesn’t apply in all cases. The majority of the women on this list of successful female entrepreneurs have been strategically chosen based on how they built their businesses and fortunes. With many starting from the bottom, they’re the perfect inspiration for young women looking to make their impact in the business world one day.
There’s no denying a lot of hard work and energy that goes into carving out a successful career and then also a business. To start on the right path to becoming an entrepreneur, set up a profile on VanHack. Using our platform, you can get prospective employers to notice you by setting up a detailed, engaging profile and film videos so they can get to know the real you — the person behind the digital profile.
If you’re nervous about the interview stage, don’t worry. That’s why we created the VanHack Premium Academy. It’ll help you get prepared with practical interview answers, nuance education and more. Get started today.
