2022 WEConnect International Annual Report

Building brighter futures through the power of connections

About Us

WEConnect International is a global nonprofit that educates and connects WomenOwned Businesses to Member Buyers around the world.

Our Mission

WEConnect International helps drive money into the hands of women business owners by enabling them to compete in the global marketplace.

Our Vision

A world in which women have the same opportunities as men to design and implement business solutions that create wealth and the sustainable prosperity of their communities.

Letter from our Leadership

Dear WEConnect International Community:

On our 13th anniversary, we are thrilled to present our 2022 Annual Report on our growing network across 135 countries, representing 16,000 Women-Owned Businesses, and 172 Member Buyers with more than $3 trillion in annual purchasing power.

We invite you to learn more about our work and our leadership role in educating businesses, governments, multilateral institutions, and other NGOs on how inclusive global trade can advance economic prosperity and job creation.

In the report you will see that the impact of our work is both profound and measurable. Profound in the sense that in another year that saw barriers to in-person gatherings, our community

came together, adapted, innovated, and forged new business connections while emerging from a global pandemic. And measurable because of the life-changing impact our work has on women business owners, their companies, and their families, as well as the solutions we bring to our Member Buyers seeking to build more inclusive global value chains in an ever-changing global landscape.

In fact, our impact extends beyond the women business owners and Member Buyers to actualizing inclusive trade that is both prosperous and sustainable, while also helping to build entrepreneurial ecosystems that create quality jobs around the globe.

Our impact on creating economic opportunity for Women-Owned Businesses would be impossible without the advice and support we receive from our Member Buyers, global strategic partners, funders, and of course our global team of passionate subject matter experts. Our pledge is to build on the successes of 2022 by accelerating the way we facilitate powerful business connections, market access opportunities, inclusive and sustainable trade, and economic investment for women business owners to ensure they have an equal opportunity to deliver their muchneeded solutions to the world.

and systems will continue to grow. To quote Peter Drucker, the father of management thinking, “Every important idea for social change in the last 100 years has been initiated and led by nonprofits.”

As WEConnect International continues to contribute to social justice and economic prosperity for all, we remain optimistic that together we have the power to build the world we want by just being more purposeful with how we spend our money.

ELIZABETH A. VAZQUEZ

Services We Deliver

For more than 13 years, the WEConnect International team has helped large corporations, multilateral organizations, and government agencies launch and build their gender-inclusive sourcing strategies, including customized projects designed to deliver on each partner’s unique goals in support of women’s economic empowerment.

• Registration and Certification for Women-Owned Businesses (at least 51% owned, managed, and controlled by one or more women) to meet the needs of a growing community of large buyers seeking to increase their spend with womenowned suppliers.

• WECommunity, a global and multilingual online platform for women to register their businesses to make it easier for WEConnect International Member Buyers to find them and do business with them.

• Networking opportunities online and in-person for Women-Owned Businesses to promote their solutions to a worldwide network of Member Buyers representing more than $3 trillion in annual purchasing power.

• WEConnect Academy, a state-of-the-art learning portal where Women-Owned Businesses and Member Buyers can access in-person business education and capacity-building training programs.

• Mentorship programs and preeminent forums for sharing advice and peer support.

• Matchmaking opportunities for Women-Owned Businesses and Member Buyers.

• Insights into key market opportunities and international trade trends.

• Brand promotions targeting clients, investors, and other key stakeholders.

• Pitch Competitions to identify women business owners offering compelling solutions.

• Platform for making public commitments that are measurable and newsworthy.

• Trade Shows that feature the solutions offered by Women-Owned Businesses, Member Buyers, sponsors, and partners.

According to the World Economic Forum, it will take another 136 years to close the global gender gap.

Certification in 50+ ECONOMIES

• Antigua and Barbuda

• Argentina

• Australia

• Bahamas

• Bangladesh

• Barbados

• Belize

• Bermuda

• Brazil

• British Virgin Islands

• Canada

• Chile

• China

• Colombia

• Costa Rica

• Dominica

• Ecuador

• El Salvador

• France

• Grenada

• Germany

• Guatemala

• Guyana

• Honduras

• Hong Kong

• India

• Indonesia

• Ireland

• Israel

• Jamaica

• Japan

• Kenya

• Macao

• Malaysia

• Mexico

• Montserrat

• Netherlands

• New Zealand

• Nicaragua

• Nigeria

• Panama

• Peru

• Philippines

• Poland

• Saint Kitts and Nevis

• Saint Lucia

• Saint Vincent and the Grenadines

• Singapore

• South Africa

• Spain

• Sri Lanka

• Switzerland

• Taiwan

• Trinidad and Tobago

• Turkey

• Turks and Caicos Islands

• United Kingdom

• United States

Year in Review

GROWTH IN OUR GLOBAL NETWORK

In 2022, our network has seen impressive growth across all metrics. There has been an increase in the number of markets served, Women-Owned Businesses registered and certified, Member Buyers, and the amount our Member Buyers spend with Women-Owned Businesses.

MARKETS SERVED

In 2022, WEConnect International expanded the number of economies we serve and where we offer Women’s Business Enterprise certifications. For example, Women-Owned Businesses registered in WECommunity in Cameroon and Niger for the first time, and certification was launched in Kenya and the Philippines.

+16% GROWTH IN REGISTERED SUPPLIERS

The number of registered suppliers in our network grew to 16,000, which represented a 16% growth rate in 2022. In fact, all regions grew in 2022, and South Asia experienced the largest growth rate at 36% over the course of the year.

+8% GROWTH IN CERTIFIED SUPPLIERS

The total number of certified Women’s Business Enterprises grew by 8% to a total of 923. The growth was driven by robust performance in the Asia and Oceania region, which grew by 45% in 2022.

+19% MEMBERSHIP GROWTH

Our number of Member Buyers reached 172 by the end of 2022, representing an encouraging 19% growth rate in one year.

+20% REVENUE GROWTH

The revenue growth rate continued to be in the double digits for three years in a row. Revenues grew by 20% in 2022, reaching $8.4 million, compared to $7 million in 2021.

IMPACT BY THE NUMBERS

$3,000,000,000,000

Member Buyer purchasing power in the United States

$20,700,000,000

Member Buyer total global spend with Women-Owned Businesses

$8,000,000,000

Member Buyer spend with Women-Owned Businesses based outside of the United States

28,700 Connections facilitated among Women-Owned Businesses and Member Buyers

16,000

Women-Owned Businesses registered in WECommunity

11,000 Women business owners trained in person and online

135 Countries with Women-Owned Business registration

50 Countries with Women’s Business Enterprise certification

172 Member Buyers

10 Languages available in WECommunity

Our Impact

We surveyed the Women-Owned Businesses we serve at the start of 2023 to measure the impact of WEConnect International support, and the changes in their personal and professional prosperity in 2022. The vast majority of survey participants grew in revenue, and they reported the following impacts to their businesses, lives, and communities:*

*Results based on 500 respondents to WEConnect International’s annual WomenOwned Business survey.

83% Used the additional revenue to re-invest in their business

43% Gave their employees increases in pay

37% Invested in their personal development

37% Contributed more to their community

Powering resilience and economic opportunity

Select Projects

Strengthening Women Entrepreneurs in Value Chains Creates Global Prosperity in Partnership with Moody’s Global Financial skills training for women business owners results in access to capital and business growth sustainability. Expansion of this program that was first piloted in 2019, in 2022 leveraged the expertise of Moody’s financial decision-making bootcamps to train 270 Women-Owned Businesses in 13 countries on how to increase credit worthiness that translates into better access to capital and access to markets.

Harnessing the Power of Connections and Networks to Create a Value Chain Ecosystem of Women Businesses in Partnership with the U.S. Department of State, Bureau of South and Central Asian Affairs

The project significantly strengthened the business capacity of the Women-Owned Business participants in India, Bangladesh, Sri Lanka, and Maldives and simultaneously educated large corporations on the business case for gender-inclusive sourcing. Thousands of business connections were made as a result of the “Grow Your Network” conference series, which included matchmaking sessions that generated new business opportunities and diversified local value chains.

Building the Resiliency of Women-Owned Businesses Through Capacity Building in Partnership with Procter & Gamble and the Women Entrepreneurs Academy

WEConnect International and P&G concluded another successful year of training and development designed to help women entrepreneurs in Australia, Singapore, Japan, Indonesia, Malaysia, Costa Rica, and Dubai grow their business via training modules on operations best practices, procurement, leadership skills, sales, and company branding.

Promoting Supplier Diversity for Economic Inclusion in Partnership with We-Fi, the

InterAmerican Development Bank, and Arizona State University’s Thunderbird School of Global

Management

This 3-year Women Entrepreneurs Aspire, Activate, and Accelerate, or “We3A” project promotes the growth and resilience of Central and South American Women-Owned Businesses by training them and training hundreds of corporate procurement leaders on gender-inclusive sourcing best practices. The collaboration trained buyers in Costa Rica, Ecuador, El Salvador, Guatemala, Guyana, and Honduras, and the buyers that graduated from the program reported an average increase of 4.5% in spend with Women-Owned Businesses. The impact of this training positively resulted in more going directly into the hands of local Women-Owned Businesses, creating more jobs, building economies, and reducing poverty.

what our member buyers say

“Accenture is proud to be a co-founder of WEConnect International, whom we are actively helping expand worldwide. WEConnect International empowers women to succeed in global markets by convening corporations and WomenOwned Businesses to spur innovation and inclusion in global supply chains, generate more sustainable business models, and promote faster socio-economic advancement.”

“Walmart is focused on leveraging our size and scale to empower women across the globe. We believe increasing sourcing from Women-Owned Businesses is the right thing to do and will make us a better retailer by providing more products and services which align to the needs of our

our commitment to doing much more in the future in support of people and the planet.”

—Denise Naguib, Global Vice President of Sustainability and Supplier Diversity, Marriott International

Membership

Half of the Fortune Top 50 corporations are now WEConnect International Member Buyers. WEConnect International has the privilege to work with many of the world’s largest buyers committed to global supplier diversity and inclusion. Through gender-inclusive sourcing, they are helping to build more inclusive and sustainable communities around the globe. View the latest list of Member Buyers HERE.

MEMBER BUYERS

We help large buyers diversify their supplier base to:

• Innovate for competitive advantage

• Manage risk and costs through competition

• Increase shareholder value

• Demonstrate local and national content commitments

• Mirror citizen and employee bases

• Build community engagement

• Access local knowledge and networks

• Support local and global trade policy

• Contribute to inclusive economic growth

POLICY MAKERS

Inclusive sourcing is increasingly important to policy makers who want to see trade work for small businesses as an engine for economic growth and job creation.

MEMBERSHIP TRENDS

WEConnect International Member Buyers reported spending more than $8 billion with nonU.S. WomenOwned Businesses in 2022, an increase of 100% over 2021.

Members Membership in USD

Top Global Champions

In partnership with Disability:IN and the National LGBTQ Chamber of Commerce (NGLCC), WEConnect International announced its 2022 Top Global Champions for Supplier Diversity & Inclusion, recognizing some of the world’s largest buyers with a demonstrated commitment to global inclusive sourcing from diverse groups including minority-, women-, LGBTQ+- and disabled-owned businesses.

This distinction recognizes large buyers for achieving the highest percentages of nonU.S. diverse spend among all survey participants, and the awardees were announced at WEConnect International’s awards ceremony during the annual Global Symposium for Diversity, Equity & Inclusion.

2022 awardees were honored in platinum, gold, silver, and bronze categories. These WEConnect International Top Global Champion Award-winning multinational giants are leading the way toward more inclusive global value chains.

The 2022 Platinum Top Global Champions for Supplier Diversity & Inclusion included:  Accenture, Adient, CDW, EY, Ford Motor Company, Intel, Johnson & Johnson, Jones Lang LaSalle, Merck & Co., Inc., Procter & Gamble, Unilever, and The World Bank Group

In addition to holding our successful 6th Annual Global Supplier Diversity & Inclusion Symposium, we continued to host Best Practices webinars throughout the year, culminating in our first Environmental, Social, and Governance (ESG) and Global Inclusive Sourcing Forum on September 27th. Led by Sheila Gundersen, Former Moody’s Chief Procurement Officer, C-Suite and Senior Leadership peers gathered for a roundtable discussion on ESG, focused on sustainability, human trafficking, gender-inclusive sourcing and how to maximize measurable impact at scale. The full session can be viewed HERE.

Key Events Industry Groups

We were excited to launch two new Industry Groups in 2022: Healthcare and Technology, in addition to our existing Automotive/Manufacturing and Food & Beverage/Agriculture Groups. These Global Industry Groups bring together Member Buyers to focus on specific industry related needs, share best practices, and support one another with their global efforts.

RegionAL MATCHMAKING AND NETWORKING

Audited Financial Performance and Growth

STATEMENT OF ACTIVITIES FOR THE YEAR ENDING DECEMBER 31, 2022

With comparative totals for the year ending December 31, 2021

STATEMENT OF FINANCIAL POSITION AS OF DECEMBER 31, 2022

With comparative totals for the year ending December 31, 2021

STATEMENT OF FUNCTIONAL EXPENSES FOR THE YEAR ENDING DECEMBER 31, 2022

With comparative totals for the year ending December 31, 2021

Our Thank you

We are deeply grateful for the generous support we receive from our Member Buyers and Funders because WEConnect International could not serve Women-Owned Businesses based in 135 countries without their strong leadership and critical contributions.

01Booster

AIG

AbbVie

AB InBev

Accenture

Act 1 Group

Adidas

Adient

ADM

African Development Bank

Allstate

Amazon

American Express

amfori AISBL

AON

Arizona State University – Thunderbird School for Good Fund

AstraZeneca

Baker Hughes

Bank of America

Barclays

Barilla

BASF

Bayer

Business Development Bank of Canada

Bristol-Myers Squibb

BNY Mellon

Boehringer Ingelheim

Boeing bp

Canada Bread

Capgemini

Cargill

Cartier

CBRE

CDW

Chevron Cisco Citigroup

Colgate Palmolive

Compass Food Group

Corteva

CRISIL

Cummins

Cushman & Wakefield

DanTrade B.V.

DBS Bank HK

Dell Technologies

Deloitte

Delta

Diageo

Disibility:IN

Disney Dow

DSWL - Simply Ejibola Inc

Dun & Bradstreet

DuPont

Eaton

EDF

ELCATEX

Elevance Health

Enbridge

Enterprise

Entrepreneurs’ Organization

EOS IT Solutions

Ericsson

Estée Lauder

Export Development

Canada

ExxonMobil

EY

Fidelity International

Ford

Freeport-McMoRan

Freshfields Bruckhaus

Deringer

General Mills

Gilead

Goldman Sachs

Google

Grupo Boticario

GSK

HH Global

HSBC

Huge Inc

IBM

Inter-American Development Bank

IFF

Illumina

International Monetary Fund

Intel

Intuit

JLL

Johnson & Johnson

JP Morgan Chase

Kellogg Company

Kelly Services

Kohl’s

KPMG

Kroger

Kyndryl

Lion Beverage

Lloyds Bank

Logitech

L’Oréal

Macquarie Group

Magna

Manpower Group

Mapfre Seguros Gerais

Marriott International

Mars

McCormick

McKinsey & Company

Medtronic

Merck

Meta

MetLife

Micron Technologies

Microsoft

Mondelēz International

Moody’s

Morgan Stanley

Motorola Solutions

National LGBT Chamber of Commerce

NatWest/Royal Bank of Scotland

Nestlé

Netflix

Nike

Nippon Seiki International

Organon

OWIT International

P&G

Paragon Customer Communications

Pearson

PepsiCo

Pfizer

Pinsent Masons

Philip Morris International

Professional and Scientific Associates

Publicis Groupe

PVH

Randstad

Raytheon Technologies

Royal Bank of Canada

RELX

Roche Salesforce

Sanofi

SAP

Shell Sky Group

Sodexo

Sony

Standard Chartered Bank

Staples Promotional Products

Takeda

Target

TD Bank

TE Connectivity

The Hershey Company

TJX

Trane Technologies

TransCanada

Travel + Leisure (Wyndham)

Turkish Economy Bank

Twitter

UBS

Unilever

Unispace

United Nations Procurement Division

UN Women Regional Office for Asia and the Pacific

UPS

U.S. Agency for International Development

U.S. Chambers of Commerce

U.S. Department of State

Vanderlande

Vital Voices

VMware

Vodafone

Walgreens

Walmart

Warner Bros. Discovery

Wells Fargo

Westpac Bank

Whirlpool

Williams Sonoma

Women’s Business Enterprise National Council (WBENC)

Women’s World Banking

World Bank Group

WSP

Yanfeng Automotive

BOARD OF DIRECTORS

Peter Zerp, Accenture

Sara Nickovich, Bayer

Jessica Kolta, Boeing

Natalie Stirling-Sanders, ExxonMobil

Lorenzo Bell, EY

Selina McCole, Goldman Sachs

Jennifer Turner, IBM Corporation

Megan Stowe, Intel

Natalie Jaworski, Johnson & Johnson

Nancy Minchillo, JP Morgan Chase

Denise Naguib, Marriott International

Raul Suarez-Rodriguez, Merck

Thais Torritani, Procter & Gamble

Andrew Cannon Brookes, Standard Chartered Bank

Alex Tarmo, Unilever

Kris Oswold, UPS

Sarah Thorn, Walmart

Elizabeth A. Vazquez, WEConnect International

THE YEAR AHEAD

Did you know that if women and men were to participate equally as entrepreneurs, the global gross domestic product (GDP) could rise by 3% - 5%? The Boston Consulting Group calculates that this translates into boosting the global economy from $2.5 trillion to $5 trillion.

As we reflect on these forecasts and plan for the year ahead, we are excited about what is in store for our community in 2023 as we continue to move billions of dollars into the hands of women business owners, who are on the front lines of the circular economy and building more inclusive and sustainable global values chains.

This is a global movement, and we need many more organizations and individuals to actively engage and leverage their purchasing power to buy more from Women-Owned Businesses and other underutilized businesses that can deliver solutions to our collective problems. This is a team effort that is made possible by passionate leaders who work every day to help level the playing field for women and other underutilized owners of businesses.

Global Team

Elizabeth A. Vazquez, President, Chief Executive Officer and Co-Founder

Saritha Venumbaka, Chief Operations Officer

Ana Guevara, Chief Strategy Officer and Head of Global Markets

Soledad Gompf, Chief Development Officer & Head of Marketing & Communications

Michael Tobolski, Vice President Corporate Relations and Member Engagement

Eroshan Alagaretnam, Regional Director, South Asia

Ixchel Alcantara, Regional Director, Latin America and the Caribbean

Kristine Al-Haris, Membership Account Manager

José Cunningham, Director of Development

Jerome Flint, Regional Director, Europe and MENA

Stephanie Fontaine, Regional Director, Canada and the United States

Brittany Gonzalez, Associate Director, Membership Growth and Development

Dan Holdredge, Director of Global Training

Alexander Kangas, Certification Analyst

Gary Linden, Director of Global Markets

Desiree Megget, Human Resources Associate

Shorena Megrelishvili, Development Manager

Margaret Mutheu, Regional Director, Africa

Melanie Oliver, Certification Support Specialist

Courtney Pappas, Senior Instructional Designer

Arifur Rahman, Accounting Manager

Margaret Rush, Grant and Proposal Manager

Allie Syrell, Business Connections Manager

Minnie Venkatachalam, Regional Director, Southeast Asia and Oceania

Jithmi Wickramatillake, Certification Manager

WEConnect International is a member-led, global non-profit that brings motivated, large corporate, multilateral and government buyers together with women-owned suppliers around the world.

WEConnect International identifies, educates, registers, and certifies women’s business enterprises that are at least 51% owned, managed, and controlled by one or more women.

WEConnect International provides Registration in 135+ countries and Certification in 50+ countries that represent over 65 percent of the world’s population. For more information, visit: www.WEConnectInternational.org.

© 2023 WEConnect International. All rights reserved.