Women lead the way in the South West, Wales and Truro Looking at the regional breakdown, the South West and Wales are outperforming other regions in terms of the proportion of female directors. Over 25 per cent of all directors in Wales are female, while women make up over 26 per cent of all directors in the South West.

In 2007, female directors are most likely to be found in numbers alone in London (177,929), Birmingham (18,355), Bristol (15,406), Glasgow (13,639) and Manchester (13,057). Of this top tier, it’s Britain’s second city which has once again seen the biggest growth in the number of female directors between 2006 and 2007 with a 19 per cent increase (22 per cent from 2005 to 2006). Only Inverness and Chester experienced a bigger growth rate than this (both over 21 per cent) and together these three towns accounted for almost 10 per cent of all new female directors across the whole of the UK.

But it’s the large provincial towns where female directors are making the most impact. Truro comes closest to having equal numbers of men and women in the boardroom. Almost 30 per cent of directors of businesses based in Truro are female. Wells and Hereford follow close behind with females making up 28 per cent of the director population in each case. Armagh occupies fourth position and Bath is in fifth place with 2.5 male directors for every female. This means that four out of five of the top slots are occupied by cities in the South West.

At the bottom of the league comes Aberdeen, where only 18 per cent of directors are female, only slightly bettered by Manchester and Leeds (both with 19 per cent) and Hull (20 per cent).

Erika Watson, Chief Executive Officer of Prowess, the UK voice for women’s enterprise commented: “It is fantastic to see an increase in the number of female directors. Female leaders make great innovators, adopt a collaborative approach to management and invest in staff development – leading to highly successful businesses. Too many Companies are still missing out on the impact diverse leadership can have on their bottom line, but this report shows that we are making progress.”

Experian’s National Business Database on which the female director analysis was undertaken is one of the most comprehensive B2B marketing data sources in the UK. It contains a unique combination of independent and trusted data sources, including Yellow Pages, Thomson, Experian and Companies House information to provide five million business records and over two million mailable business records for direct marketing purposes.

For a copy of this press release and the Experian Female Director Report 2007 visit http://press.experian.com