European VC female founders dashboard

Venture capital funding overall has surged in recent years, but the numbers haven’t leapt forward for female founders at the same pace. Last year, companies founded solely by women garnered just 0.9% of the total capital invested in venture-backed startups in Europe. But that number doesn’t tell the whole story. VC funding for female-founded or co-founded companies in Europe has been trending up in recent years, and 2021 saw the creation of several women-led funds, incubators for female founders and more new companies. We took a deep dive into European investment trends for women in VC over the last 14 years, diving into deal counts by country, industry and stage. The data below is sourced from the PitchBook Platform and will be updated monthly.

The charts below detail investment trends related to female-founded startups. Filtering of one chart affects the data behind the others giving you the ability to slice and dice the data however you like.

Source: PitchBook.

Some interesting discuss from the readers:

Angelica Sanchez January 13, 2022 at 7:08 PM Why do you think female start-ups are not getting enough VC?

Hilla Shaviv January 7, 2023 at 12:27 PM Women are not willing to take the same risks as men do with their money. While wealthy women will be willing to open their wallets and donate lots of money for a philanthropic activity that supports their values, they will not be willing to take the same money and invest it in risk-associated activity. By doing so, they are harming women in two significant ways: 1. Women’s health and wellness remain a desert of research and innovations 2. The gender gap and attitude toward women remain the same. Until women do not invest their money in pre-seed, seed, and post-seed ventures, we women will continue to experience gender inequality. And if we won’t change, this is the legacy we’ll leave for our daughters. Reply

Faye November 2, 2022 at 3:33 PM Hi Angelica, there are myriad complex and systemic reasons why so few Female founders seek and secure VC funding, but research out of the US suggests that principally it is due to ‘people like us’ thinking and ‘non-fit’ mentality. Put simply, female founders are sub-consciously judged as being less able to service and succeed in male-led, male-dominated industries. Often this discrimination will be rationalised via other criteria yet this is statistically proven to apply to tech, science and engineering, but also financial services. More importantly, how do we solve for it? Whilst there has been small progress in terms of governments, financial institutions and VCs themselves recognising and acknowledging the inequity, there has been minimal progress in addressing the structural and mental barriers that a Female or indeed any ‘non-standard’ (middle-aged white guy) Founder may face in securing VC funding. Such Founders need additional recognition, backing and support, with pro-diversity policies to help overcome the discriminatory barriers they face. An opportunity for PitchBook to redress the balance perhaps? Reply

Anukriti September 8, 2022 at 11:10 AM Angelica Sanchez, I do think its got a lot to do with the mindset that women may not be able to manage the business owing to other commitments/provide the required returns to investors. Women entrepreneurs have always been in lower numbers across the world owing to many socio-economic reasons, lack of financial education, family commitments, financial dependence etc. But this trend is now definitely changing, with women taking charge of their financial goals and becoming more financially independent along with better support systems being provided by society now than ever before.

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https://suninnovationhub.wordpress.com/2023/02/06/european-vc-female-founders-dashboard/