Samar McHeileh & Roo Harris

We sat down with Samar Mcheileh and Roo Harris, two of the three co-founders of Scale Investors to talk about being Australia’s First Women-Led VC Fund backing Women-Led Startups. Founded in 2013 as a gender-lens syndicate, Scale Investors launched its debut venture capital fund in 2025.The fund is backed by the Forrests’ Minderoo Foundation, the family of the late, iconic, female entrepreneur, Carla Zampatti, as well as the Thickins Family Office, founded by Celina Thickins and her husband, Joel Thickins, the head of private equity firm TPG Asia. They have raised over $30 million to date for early-stage, women-led ventures and have already made their first investment through the fund.