Entrepreneurship is crucial for economic growth and societal progress, yet women remain underrepresented, making up less than a third of EU entrepreneurs. This limits the EU’s ability to address digital, green, and resilience transitions. In deep tech, the gap is sharper, with women-led companies receiving less than 2% of total investment. Women TechEU aims to address this by scaling collaboration between the European Commission and women-led deep tech startups, building a gender-balanced entrepreneurship ecosystem. The project will deploy €12M in equity-free grants for 160 women-led deep tech startups and provide additional tailored support services aligned with EIC Business Acceleration Services. The consortium combines leading innovation players, major investors, and women entrepreneurship networks to reach more than 15,000 candidates across all EU regions and technology domains. Core partners include EIT Manufacturing West (with EIT Manufacturing South and EIT Manufacturing East as Affiliated entities), Sploro, AcrossLimits, AwakenHub, EBAN, EIT Health, EIT Food, CKIC, AFAEMME, and FI.
Women TechEU’s main objective is to create a targeted programme for female founders, empowering women to grow into technology leaders. The consortium leverages its pan-European network to reach more than 15,000 potential applicants from Europe, including underrepresented regions and sectors. Through specialized outreach, Women TechEU strengthens female leadership and fosters an inclusive, vibrant startup pipeline.
Expected impacts include an increased participation of women in deep tech innovation, improved access to investment, reduced regional and sectoral inequalities, and the creation of sustainable support structures for future generations of women entrepreneurs. The project also integrates social sciences and gender equality actions to ensure broad and fair access to resources.
