A fashion brand just filed to go public on the strength of its women customers. A record number of women are now running the biggest companies on earth. And at the same time, one of the most valuable companies in the world quietly lost almost every senior woman it hired.
The headlines sound positive. The numbers tell a more complicated story.
Reformation Is Going Public. Why Investors Are Paying Attention.
Reformation, the sustainability-first fashion brand founded by Yael Aflalo in 2009, has officially filed to go public.
Under CEO Hali Borenstein, who took over in 2020, the company has become one of the fastest-growing fashion businesses in its category.
The numbers behind the IPO
$507.1 million in revenue in 2025 (up 15.7% year over year).
$112.3 million in Q1 2026 alone (up 30.4%).
20 consecutive quarters of double-digit growth.
1.1 million active direct-to-consumer customers.
90% of sales come directly from customers, rather than wholesale.
Why this matters
Reformation's IPO is significant because institutional investors typically only back companies with strong financial fundamentals — and Reformation's growth story is compelling.
But there's an important catch
While revenue increased, profit actually fell.
2024 | 2025 |
|---|---|
Net income: $32.6M | Net income: $12.6M |
This is a good reminder that:
Revenue growth = how much money a company brings in.
Profit = how much money it keeps after expenses.
A company can have a record year for sales while making significantly less profit.
The ownership story investors are watching
One of the biggest questions isn't whether Reformation is successful — it's who will control the company after the IPO.
Right now:
Private equity firm Permira is the largest shareholder.
The Aflalo family trust is the second-largest owner.
After an IPO, control can shift between founders, private equity investors, and new public shareholders. That often influences everything from long-term strategy to whether a brand stays true to its original mission.
One small detail worth noticing
In its IPO filing, Reformation also listed AI as a business risk, specifically mentioning concerns around:
Data privacy.
AI-powered product recommendations.
Potential technology risks for the business.
It's a small detail, but it shows how seriously companies are now treating AI as a business consideration.
The bigger picture
This isn't just a story about a fashion brand.
It's a story about women's spending power becoming a serious investment thesis. Brands built around female consumers are increasingly being treated as valuable financial assets, not simply lifestyle businesses.
OpenAI Hired a Wave of Powerful Women. Two Years Later, Almost All Are Gone.
As OpenAI grew into one of the world's most valuable companies, it recruited an unusually strong group of senior women leaders.
Who joined OpenAI?
Fidji Simo (former Instacart CEO).
Kate Rouch (Chief Marketing Officer).
Denise Dresser (former Slack CEO, hired as Chief Revenue Officer).
Sarah Friar, who joined as CFO around the same period.
At one point, Fidji Simo had roughly two-thirds of the company reporting into her.
What happened next?
Within two years:
Fidji Simo left for health reasons (she has POTS and remains an advisor).
Kate Rouch also departed for health reasons.
Denise Dresser left in August 2026, less than a year into the role.
Sarah Friar is the only senior woman from that hiring wave still in her position.
Every executive who left has been replaced by a man. Denise Dresser's successor is Dali Rajic, previously President and COO of Wiz.
Why this matters
Each departure has its own explanation. But taken together, they reflect a broader pattern that researchers often describe as the glass cliff.
The glass cliff refers to situations where:
Women are appointed to highly visible leadership roles.
Those roles come during periods of intense pressure or change.
Once the organization stabilizes (or struggles), women leave.
Leadership is then handed back to men.
This isn't unique to OpenAI. Similar patterns have appeared across Big Tech for more than a decade.
Why the timing is especially important
AI companies are making decisions right now about:
AI safety.
The future of work.
How these technologies will shape society.
The important question isn't only why these women left. It's also who is still in the room making those decisions.
A Record Number of Women Run the World's Biggest Companies. It's Still Only 6.8%.
This year, 34 women are CEOs of companies on the Fortune Global 500. That's the highest number ever.
It's also just 6.8% of the list.
Gail Boudreaux CEO of Elevance Health
The numbers in perspective
34 women lead Fortune Global 500 companies.
The Global 500 generates $43.1 trillion in annual revenue.
These companies employ 70.2 million people.
In the U.S. Fortune 500, women lead 55 companies (11%).
Elevance Health, led by CEO Gail Boudreaux, is the highest-ranked woman-led company on the Global 500. However, it is the only woman-led company in the Global 500's top 33.
The bigger insight
Women are increasingly leading big companies, but they are still rarely leading the biggest companies. And that's an important difference.
34 out of 500 still means:
466 of the world's most powerful CEO roles are held by men.
What These Three Stories Tell Us Together
Women's economic power is growing
Women are building valuable businesses.
Investors are backing women-focused brands.
More women are reaching CEO positions.
But institutional power is still fragile
Senior women are still disappearing from the biggest decision-making tables.
Representation at the highest levels remains extremely low.
Progress can reverse surprisingly quickly.
The takeaway is simple: Always read past the headline. The number underneath usually tells the more interesting story.
Also Moving the Market: Paramount's $111 Billion Warner Bros. Deal Just Got Stuck in Court.
One of the biggest corporate deals of the year has suddenly been delayed.
Paramount Skydance's $111 billion acquisition of Warner Bros. Discovery was expected to close this September.
It won't.
A U.S. federal judge has now scheduled a trial for 2 March 2027, putting the entire merger on hold.
What happened?
The lawsuit comes from 12 U.S. state attorneys general, led by California Attorney General Rob Bonta. They argue the merger could lead to:
Higher prices
Less competition
Lower-quality content for consumers
The case is based on Section 7 of the Clayton Act, one of the main U.S. antitrust laws.
Why is this surprising?
Because the deal had already received:
Approval from the U.S. Department of Justice.
Approval from shareholders of both companies.
In other words: Federal approval does not guarantee a deal will close. States have the legal authority to challenge mergers too.
Why this matters for business
An 18-month delay is expensive. While companies wait for the court's decision:
Financing costs continue.
Integration plans stall.
Both businesses operate in uncertainty.
It's a useful reminder of one of the most important ideas in business and investing: "The deal is approved" and "the deal is closed" are two very different sentences.
Sometimes, the gap between them is measured in years, not weeks.
