Keely Deininger loved her job in design at a Marks and Spencer supplier.
But she gave it up to look after her three children: “One day, I called my mother and asked her to look after the children. I took a plane to Vietnam.
Once there, she started designing clothes: “I became an accidental entrepreneur overnight.”
Her story is part of a report that suggests the UK economy could be given a £250bn boost if women’s start-ups were given the same funding as men.
The government-commissioned report estimates there are 1.1 million “missing” female-run firms and sets out eight ways of boosting the number of female entrepreneurs.
The funding for Keely Deininger’s Angel Face business came from a colleague, rather than a formal loan from a bank or venture capital fund.