Meet the Chinese investor who says female bosses are bad for business
‘It’s not prejudice,’ says venture capitalist Luo Mingxiong, but ‘what else do women do better than men except giving birth’
After days in the spotlight for saying female CEOs are bad for business, Luo Mingxiong, a Chinese investor in Beijing, does not regret what he said.
“If I could have had a chance to say it again, I would still list this as my investment principle,” said Luo. He was referring to his statement at a public presentation in Beijing this month that “we usually don’t invest in female chief executive officers”.
Luo, the founder of Beijing venture capital firm Jingbei Investment, sparked a public outcry in China as he listed female CEOs in his 10 no-investment principles, suggesting that in the corporate world, they are as negative an attribute as dishonesty or an inability to learn.
“It’s not because of any kind of prejudice,” Luo told his audience. “But just think about it carefully. What else did women do better than men except giving birth?”
And it is not just female CEOs he considers undesirable; Luo also said companies filled with female board members are another red flag. “If the company CEO is a man, but a lot of the chairmen are women, we typically won’t invest in [them] either,” he said. “Why? Because it shows that the entrepreneur can’t recruit equally excellent and ambitious male executives.”