The Ira Scholarship aimed at identifying and rewarding female leaders of the future will award £5,000 each to top female students at five schools in India.
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The scholarship is launching in India as a ‘key growth market’ before rolling out in other regions, such as Mexico and Brazil.
“The Revolut Ira Scholarship is a step towards my dream of bringing about a workplace evolution, where an equal number of brilliant men and women occupy boardrooms,” Revolut India CEO Paroma Chaterjee said.
“I am actively encouraging this approach in Revolut’s hiring in India, and I am delighted we hired an equal gender split last quarter.”
Revolut has one of the worst gender pay gaps in the digital banking space. Most recently it shared that women at the company were earning 25% less than their male counterparts in a decrease of just 0.4% points from its first report for 2021.
Studies paint a mixed picture for women in finance. Though the percentage of men and women entering the field is roughly equal, men typically rise to the top faster than women do. For example, among senior roles in venture capital (VC) firms, only 4.9% of the partners are female.
Overall, women outnumber men in the finance and banking industry, but the reverse is true at the most senior positions.
At the beginning of 2021, women accounted for about 52% of the industry, according to research by McKinsey, but their representation fell at every step up the corporate ladder. In the C-suite, white women accounted for only 23% of executives, and women of colour for another 4%.
“The aim of the scholarship is to ensure that bright female students are identified and rewarded early on, so that they can focus on their studies and maximise their potential as they work to become future female leaders within the fintech sector,” Revolut wrote in a press release.
It added that, “Revolut strives to ensure women are provided with fair and equitable opportunities”.
“Revolut values the skills, abilities and creativity that diversity brings to a business and we feel investment in young female talent will help create a more equitable global fintech industry,” Revolut global head of HR Alexandra Loi said.
