Hi there,

Where did we leave off? Oh right… the “AI Female Backlash.”
We’ll get back to that below… But first I need to tell you about my mom’s bucket list, which is not like the others.

She flew into Lisbon last week from Chicago (cleaning products from the MotherShip in tow for her equally cleaning obsessed son-in-law)

..with one reason for being here: to pick us all up before ticking off an item she has never let go of.

See Manchester United play at Old Trafford “BEFORE. SHE. DIES.” 🫠 (we love a good morbid deadline in my family.)

I am sorry, come again.
You heard me right.
​
My mom, the most die-hard Chicago sports fan (of literally ALL of them) you’ve ever met has taken on Premiere Soccer in senior citizen life (hard to believe she is right?!) like no one I’ve ever met.

At 70 years young. (Yes, she really is 70 and looks 50. She has never done anything to her face BTW. Get this woman a Substack!)

That’s her in the official Man U bar, pre-gaming and chanting Brit-style, Middle Ages Tribal energy, before the last match of the season in Manchester.

And as I watched her all weekend…sitting with my three sons who are equally obsessed with Man United (I really have no choice here in this matter…)

The one who raised me more or less solo.
Who was our rock among my dad’s addiction and mental illness.

Who worked her BUTT Off (to this day she works two jobs because when the 401Ks were drained via addict style you’re always playing catch up) and who has been my No. 1 hype woman since the day I arrived on this planet— I kept thinking: she just made this dream happen for herself.

Last year when she told me “We are all going to see a game at Old Trafford” I sort of dismissed it mentally. (do you know how hard it is to get tickets to a consistently sold out Man U home game, much less for 9 people?!).
​​
But her mind had already decided.. And once that happened there was no stopping that red and white train.

Not logistics.
Not the cost.
Not even my own quiet doubts about the feasibility of this coming together.

So many lessons here aside from the obvious “you’re here NOW so go make your dreams happen” but what happens when your mind is not to be messed with.

I’ve been thinking a lot about this kind of energy my mom brought to the table.
Because Lord knows I’ve needed it in the rooms I’ve been sitting in lately.

Specifically: investor rooms.

In the last month I’ve been “accused” of not signaling seriousness because I’m not raising a minimum of $5M or $10M for my angel round.

Say what?!

For an angel round.

For anyone new here (maybe from Gemma’s AI Unlocked Summit -hi, welcome aboard and glad you’re on this crazy train with us) -: we’re raising under half a million to put fuel on the already-profitable fire of My StoryPro, our AI storytelling tool. ​

Our traction (high) and churn (low) is something to write home about 💅

I’ve had some success… BUT.. BUT…BUTTT

I’m learning that raising under half a million is NOT SEXY.

I laugh (and cry a little) thinking back to telling a prominent San Francisco investor last November – with the full confidence of a toddler who doesn’t really walk yet – that I’d be wrapped by the end of January. 🤥
​
But the system is dumb.
And I know this for fact now.

A grounded 18-month growth plan to get “To the next level” is not what “they” want to hear.

What they want is chest out, Brit-style chanting, banging on the table:

“WE’RE THE NEXT UNICORN AND I WILL SACRIFICE EVERYTHING AND ALSO I AM FILMING THIS FROM THE CAR I AM SLEEPING IN BECAUSE I HAVE PUT IT ALL ON THE LINE AND I AM A FOUNDER AND THAT’S WHAT WE DOOOOO.” ***CUE actual chest pounding

Ok this is an exaggeration but only slightly because that is the underlying message.

Oh and don’t get me started on the “why don’t you go raise a friend and family round?”

My rant on the absolute privilege of that request is for another newsletter.

STAY TUNED PEOPLE I’m feeling spicy this month!

As if asking my peers for hundreds of thousands of dollars while they stare down untenable food, gas, housing and overall WTF is this cost of living prices in the States is the most logical option outside of their Silicon investor funds.

Sprinkle in a side dish of systemic racism if you’re not white and this “path to capital” is a huge pile of horse $hit.
​***does some box breathing… excuse me.

OK I’m back

The game rewards that performance but the game also wins the house 99.9% of the time.

So why do us female and minority founders keep trying to play a rigged system?
It’s not working.

I know what I want to build.

I want to build something that matters at mass scale AND go to my kids’ soccer tournaments and my mom’s ends-of-the-Earth sporting event bucket list items.

That is not a lack of ambition but a different definition of winning -and I think it’s the better one.

Oh and the data is on my side.

Female-led startups generate 35% higher ROI than male-led ones (BCG/MassChallenge).

Yet female founders still receive just over 2% of all VC funding.

Make it make sense.

And research out of Harvard shows we’re asked almost exclusively prevention-focused questions in the room -risk, burn rate, what could go wrong – while male founders get asked about vision and upside.

The game isn’t just uneven. The questions aren’t even the same.

And the money that IS flowing?

A lot of it is going to male-led companies with no traction, no real metrics, no revenue -propped up by chest-puffing and the right handshakes.

You know what happens next.

They fail. Loudly. Expensively.

And round and round it goes.

This has only made me more determined to stay in this lane.
Because it needs different builders who can then shape the system another way.

Which is exactly what I was reminded of last week.

Last week I spoke on an AI panel with host Gemma Bonham Carter, my former Bloomberg TV colleague Cris turned Main Street AI operator and a woman named Erin Perkins.​

We’re all women building in AI.

Erin is deaf.

She showed up and said things in that room that nobody else could have said — about what it actually means to need technology to work differently for you. Not just work for the majority and call it innovation.

And yet we keep having the same tired conversation: women in tech should opt out, or lean in so hard they lose themselves.

Girl boss or go home… although the vilification of women who “girl boss” AI right now is gross.

Go tell that to Erin.

She’s not waiting for the industry to figure out she exists.

And here’s what I do KNOW…. Erin would straight up not be funded in a traditional VC setting.

The same system that passes on female founders, that asks the wrong questions, that rewards chest-puffing over substance – that system would look right past her.

In what world do we keep passing up people like Erin?

That’s the world I’m not interested in building for.

My mom decided Old Trafford was happening.
Erin decided her seat at the table was happening.
I’ve decided to build My StoryPro the way I believe in – not the way the VC world is asking me to.

Nobody waited for permission.
Nobody asked if the room was ready.

So I am asking you…. what have you already decided?

And if any of this week’s newsletter landed for you… hit reply.

Tell me what bucket list thing you’ve been putting off!!

Talk soon,

XO
Patrice