Entrepreneur Evan Thornley caused a stir with comments at a start-up conference. Credit:Luis Enrique He told the conference that LookSmart, an online advertising company which reaped millions in licensing fees from Microsoft in the 1990s, made an "unusual" effort to hire more women than other companies in the tech sector. "Call me opportunistic, I just thought I could get better people with less competition because we were willing to understand the skills and capabilities that many of these women had," he said. "There's a great arbitrage there, we would give [women] more responsibility and a greater share of the rewards than they were likely to get anywhere else and that was still often relatively cheap to someone less good of a different gender." While Mr Thornley said he wasn't advocating that the gender pay gap should be perpetuated, he said it provided "an opportunity for forward thinking people".

A slide Mr Thornley used in his presentation. A number of online commentators, as well as Australian start-up blogs, have since said Mr Thornley's comments were sexist.

The Australian version of Business Insider, which Fairfax Media owns through its stake in Allure Media, labelled the use of the slide "outrageously sexist", while said it was "cringe worthy" Technology consultant Kate Carruthers said Thornley appeared to be advocating paying woman less. In an attempt to clarify his comments, Mr Thornley left a comment on an opinion piece on the Startup Daily website, which conceded that he had "stuffed ... up" with his remarks.

"What I was trying to say folks was 'gender inequality sucks everywhere but [especially] in tech - I do what I can to combat it'. Sorry it didn't come out that way," he wrote in response to the post, titled "Well s**t, that was a dumb thing to do at a start-up conference", written by publisher Matt Beeche. I'm sorry I made such a mess of this discussion. Evan Thornley Mr Thornley added that he had "always paid men and women exactly the same" for the same work. "... You will find a large group of fantastic talented women I've worked with who will vouch for that," he said. "What I was trying to say was that I don't hire that group of men in our industry that are over-rated and over-paid ... and that others may find it a good decision for their business to hire talented women and pay them properly rather than hire less talented men and over-pay them.

"Sorry that didn't come out right the first time." Mr Thornley said he found the image used in his presentation hours before his talk, on a US law firm website which specialises in representing underpaid women. "It was their ironic take on the stupid labour market in which we live," he said. "I'm sorry I made such a mess of this discussion but I'm glad it has brought attention to the issue of gender inequality in our industry." In another comment on the article, he was challenged by a woman around his use of "arbitrage", "somewhat cheaper" and "great opportunity". He responded by saying the woman's points were "fair". "As I said at the [conference], my approach to all team members is 'tell me how much money you need to live on and I'll tell you how many stock options you get'. That puts us all on the same team and any cash savings a start-up can make get returned in upside if we are successful."

Technology consultant Kate Carruthers, a member of FITT (Females in IT and Telecommunications), said Mr Thornley appeared to be advocating paying women less "as a sensible business strategy while being simultaneously aware that it was kind of a bad thing to do. That was how I read it". She said he was effectively "capitalising" on the gender pay gap in the tech sector. "He stood up and said I'm exploiting an information asymmetry in a particular group of people and he implied that he's probably going to keep doing it. He [also] implied that it was probably good business practice, and because of who he is — the $54 million man — you should probably consider doing it too while it exists." Ms Carruthers added the comments displayed a gender bias and were therefore sexist. Feminist activist Jenna Price, who co-founded Destroy The Joint, an online group that actively seeks to shine a light on sexism and misogyny, said Mr Thornley's comments "articulated what a lot of men secretly" think and do. "And when you let the sunlight in, you begin to fix the problem," she said.

Although she hated his remarks, she said that it was great he had actually said them. "I understand that's what he's saying. He's articulating what happens. That's great. I hate that he thinks like that, but I'm glad that there's finally someone saying it out loud," she said. "Show me any other person that is doing that." Nicole Williamson, a Sydney start-up consultant, said she believed Mr Thornley's "heart was probably in the right place" when he made the remarks and they helped highlight the issue of the gender pay gap. "I think there's clearly an under representation of women in tech," she said.

"Lots of us are working to do something about that in different ways." Niki Scevak, who organised the conference, said conference feedback, received through an online survey, indicated that Mr Thornley's presentation overall was the most valued of the day. He added Mr Thornley's comments were "coarsely worded" and that of the 800 or so people who attended the conference, very few were women. Business Insider pointed out that there was only one female speaker at the conference, Melanie Perkins, from design marketplace Canva. "I'm embarrassed there wasn't more women in the audience," Mr Scevak said.