The Wall Street Journal quotes a variety of sources who say companies are cultivating more women for CEO status.

A list of 10 such female executives includes Marissa Mayer, 36, at Google, and Michelle Gass, 44, at Starbucks.

Although there are only 35 female chief executives at Fortune 1000 companies, Maggie Wilderotter, CEO of Frontier Communications Corp., says “she wouldn’t be surprised if the number of major-company female CEOs doubled by 2017.”

Meanwhile, Catalyst, a New York research group, found that nearly 73 percent of Fortune 500 companies now have at least one female executive officer, though women are still just 14 percent of executive officers.

The Journal article also mentions a study by McKinsey & Co., to be released Monday, that finds 24 percent of senior vice presidents at 58 big companies are now women.