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November 30, 2020

Welcome to the initial blog post for the Ozmen Center for Entrepreneurship.  We’d like to take this opportunity to highlight one of the Ozmen Center’s premiere events, the International Women’s Entrepreneurship Symposium. 

On March 8, 2021, the Ozmen Center for Entrepreneurship, in conjunction with the College of Business at the University of ÁùºÏ±¦µä, Reno and a number of programs and entities within the University and the ÁùºÏ±¦µä community, will host the International Women’s Entrepreneurship Symposium 2021 (#IWES2021).  This will be the third annual IWES event and the first time the conference will be entirely virtual.  The event occurs in conjunction with the global celebration of .

The theme for IWES 2021, Innovation in a Changing World, derives from the challenges of the Covid-19 pandemic and its influence on business operations in every sector around the world. While not usually as abrupt and significant as what has occurred in 2020, change is often disruptive and continually presents new challenges and new opportunities. 

Women leaders are increasingly at the forefront of finding positive solutions in this changing world, but there is still much work to be done. We began our Women’s Entrepreneurship Initiative to address systemic differences around the opportunities for women entrepreneurs. According to , only 2.6 percent of all venture capital funding goes to women founders. Our efforts aim to help change the current dynamic of the entrepreneurial ecosystem with regard to diversity and inclusion, and we welcome all genders to attend the event.

IWES provides a platform and networking opportunity to thousands of women and their supporters. Our mission is to build a global community to support the creation and growth of women-founded companies across all geographies and industries. IWES 2021 will create a space that spans geographical borders and creates networking and learning opportunities for women founders everywhere.

The success of IWES has been dependent upon our stakeholders including, but not limited to:

• incredible speakers and panelists
• event sponsors
• volunteers, and most of all
• event attendees 

We hope you will join us in one or more of these capacities for IWES 2021, and that you will share this opportunity with others who might benefit from participating.  Visit the IWES page to learn more about the event and how you can get involved.