Welcome to the Female Foundry State of Gender Diversity in European Venture report - The most comprehensive analysis of the funnel of female innovation in Europe. We believe that data is a powerful catalyst for innovation. We have analysed the funnel of female entrepreneurship and the investment landscape in the European ecosystem to provide the most accurate and vivid picture of the investment opportunities to back female entrepreneurs and investors in Europe. Welcome to the Female Foundry State of Gender Diversity in European Venture report The most comprehensive analysis of the funnel of female innovation in Europe 645,375 European companies analysed 1,168 Founders and investors answered our survey Start the journey AS COVERED IN 70 Founders, investors and ecosystem players interviewed The Community By founders and investors for the entire venture ecosystem The essence of our report extends far beyond the realm of data and statistics.The report is a reflection of personal stories, achievements and a celebration of the vibrant community of European innovators, trailblazers and thinkers. Meet the Launch Event Speakers Watch the Launch Replay The Report Despite the challenging times, female founders and investors in Europe continue to innovate The essence of our report extends far beyond the realm of data and statistics.The report is a reflection of personal stories, achievements and a celebration of the vibrant community of European innovators, trailblazers and thinkers. Our Sponsors Get to know our Sponsors & Partners The State of Gender Diversity in European Venture report would have not been possible without the great support from all our sponsors and partners. The Community Supported by industry leaders Our Partners of all venture activity in Europe 96% 18 countries representing approx. The Reach Detailed analysis of major European venture hubs It has taken significant effort to depict the European venture ecosystem, not only at the Pan-European level but also on a country-by-country basis. Throughout the report, you will find country-focused data and country-specific statistics in the 'Location in Focus' chapter. Lisa Gradow Claire Murray Bao-Y Van Cong Sarah Werner Mirjam Staub-Bisang Rob Moffat Jérôme Wittamer Daniela Sjunnesson Marion Verles Felicia Mundhenke Apostolos Apostolakis Judith Data Oana Jinga Marta Palmeiro Dr Elena Gross Start the journey 0 From Female Foundry Learn about the people and the mission behind the report, its sponsors and partners before diving into the numbers. Explore the chapter

Delve into the state of the European investment landscape and the funding opportunities available to female emerging fund managers. 2.4 VC Landscape The Stepping Stones There has been a gradual improvement in gender representation across European funds, as our data demonstrates. However, the proportion of women in decision-making roles within venture capital firms still lags behind, highlighting the need for continued efforts to create an environment that can attract more women into investment roles. Key insights 17% of all top decision-makers in European VC firms are women. Female general partners and female partners still constitute a small proportion of all venture capital partners in Europe. 82%, female founders say that the gender composition of their boards is important to them. Unlike the gender of investors, the gender composition of the board matters to female founders in Europe. French venture capital funds have the highest number of female general partners in Europe. This is a paragraph where you can include any information you’d like. It’s an opportunity to tell a story about the company. Representation of women in top positions in European venture capital funds remains low Female general partners and female partners still constitute a small proportion of all venture capital partners in Europe. According to our analysis, only 17% of all top decision-makers in European VC firms are women. Percentage of women in general partner and partner roles in Europe of all general partners in VC firms in Europe are women. 17% Notes: Source: Female Foundry, Crunchbase, Pitchbook LinkedIn Copy link Like Download the Report Female founders have mixed opinions when it comes to the significance of the gender of investors backing them In our survey, we wanted to gain more insight into just how important the gender of investors is for female founders creating businesses in Europe. We received mixed responses. Although gender appears to be more significant for female founders who have not yet received any funding, in general, the responses are inconclusive, with a slightly higher proportion of female founders indicating that it does not matter for them. Does gender of an investor matter to you? Female founders only Notes: 'Funded' founders are those who have raised any amount of funding. Source: LinkedIn Copy link Like Download the Report Associate, Earlybird Natalia Ahmadian Germany "I have definitely seen a positive impact of being part of a diverse investment team. This year, we seen a growing number of female founders proactively approaching us. Participating in events (both as an attendee and organizer) dedicated to female founders has been incredibly rewarding and led to very strong connections between founders and VCs. This also gave me the chance to leverage my network to encourage more female entrepreneurs to step forward, start their ventures, and connect with relevant stakeholders such as VCs and angels." 82% of female founders say that the gender composition of their boards matters to them Unlike the gender of investors, the gender composition of the board matters to female founders in Europe. In an overwhelming majority, 82%, female founders who participated in our survey stated that the gender composition of their boards is important to them. Does gender composition of your board matter to you? Female founders only of female founders say that gender composition of their board matter to them. 82% Notes: All female founders. Source: LinkedIn Copy link Like Download the Report VC investor, Molten Ventures Paul-Louis Lepine United Kingdom "The distinctive value added by women in board positions goes beyond diversity or the fostering of an inclusive company culture. Companies catering predominantly to female demographics, such as femtech, fashion, home & design, health & wellness, or groceries, should and are actively seeking female board members to leverage their insights and deeper understanding of the customer base." France has the highest number of new funds with at least one female general partner in 2023 Our analysis of funds with at least one female general partner reveals that France, the United Kingdom, and Germany have the highest number of funds with female General Partners. Geographical location of new funds with at least one female general partner, 2023 Tap on a bar to reveal the exact number Notes: Source: Dealroom LinkedIn Copy link Like Download the Report Geographical location of new funds with a female general partner over the years See how the number of new venture capital funds with at least one female general partner has been evolving over the past five years in the countries within our scope in Europe. New funds with a female general partner per country, 2019 to 2023 Tap on a bar to reveal the exact number Notes: Source: Dealroom LinkedIn Copy link Like Download the Report Associate, Eurazeo Carole du Fretay France "The diversity of individuals you engage with and the intellectual stimulation you experience daily make a VC role ideal for someone who is hyper-curious. For me, venture capital is synonymous with my passion. I enjoy talking with people who are driven by making changes in the world. In this role, it's of course essential to assess risks, yet equally important to dream and believe in opportunities, focusing on the upside rather than the downside! The human aspect and the necessity to trust your instincts add an extremely exciting dimension to the job, which I can genuinely enjoy." Over a third of principals and mid-level investors at European VC firms are women We wanted to find out how many female principals and mid-level investment positions there are in European VC firms to better understand what the gender representation looks like for positions just below the Partner level. We found that over a third of those positions are currently filled by women. Proportion of female principals and mid-level investors at European venture capital firms of principals in European venture capital firms are women. 34% Notes: Positions classified as 'principal' encompass vice-president and director levels. Funds with over $25m AUM, everywhere in Europe. Source: Female Foundry LinkedIn Copy link Like Download the Report 15 women were promoted to partner level in 2023 We have been monitoring the promotions of female venture capital investors in 2023. A total of fifteen female investors were promoted to partner level. female investors in the European VC firms were promoted to partner level in 2023. 15 Notes: Source: Female Foundry, Pitchbook, Dealroom LinkedIn Copy link Like Download the Report Up next 3 Environment Macroeconomic forces play a crucial role in shaping the venture capital landscape, influencing investment strategies and startup valuations. Factors such as inflation rates, interest rates, and economic growth patterns can significantly impact investor sentiment and the availability of capital. Learn how the macroeconomic forces have been shaping the venture capital ecosystem of today. Explore the chapter

Get a better understanding of the methodology behind the numbers we have captured. Methodology Companies in the report Dealroom and Female Foundry worked together to identify over 12,000 startups, which forms the basis of insights provided in this report. To be considered in the scope of this report, all companies must meet a number of criteria, including: Being a startup, according to the Dealroom definition (see below), and practical implications and limitations therein. Having at least one (co-)founder identified as a woman (see below); Being based in one of the 18 countries which fall within the scope of this report: United Kingdom Germany France Spain Portugal Denmark Luxembourg Poland Switzerland Norway Austria Sweden Norway Finland Estonia Ireland Berlgium Netherlands Notes: The company’s primary location, or main center of business, is determined by a number of factors including: (1) the existence of a legal entity in the country (2) the location of the majority of its headcount and/or (3) the location of the majority of its management team, starting with its (co-)founders and/or CEO and c-level executives. Startups which were founded in one of the scope countries, which later relocated their main address (legal or executive, often to the United States) to another country, regardless of the purpose of relocation, are included in this report. What is a startup? Dealroom’s definition of a startup. All companies in this report are startups. A startup is defined by Dealroom.co as a company designed to grow fast (either developing tech or using tech to operate its business). In practice, a startup is a company which: Was founded in or after 1990 (i.e. it was founded in the information age); Is currently active, i.e. the company’s website is active, and its online presence exhibits signs of activity, including recent headcount growth and/or recent (professional) social media activity , and/or significant traffic on its website. Exited, acquired or public startups are included in this report, so long as they maintain a distinct legal and/or effective existence from the holding company; Has been identified by Dealroom.co as a company with a VC-backable business model, leveraging Dealroom’s industry taxonomy. More on Dealroom’s startup definition HERE . Categorisation, Industries and Taxonomy This report uses the standardised categorisation and proprietary tech taxonomy developed by Dealroom. Industries: startups, as well as capital invested in them, are categorised under minimum one, and up to two industries as defined in Dealroom’s industry taxonomy . Therefore the sum of investments made by industries (or verticals) should not be aggregated as double counting may occur. Business focus: startups may be categorised according to one of two business focuses: B2B or B2C. Some startups may offer products qualifying them as both B2B and B2C. Business Model: eCommerce & Marketplace: A place connecting a buyer(s) and seller(s) where goods or services are bought, sold or exchanged. Manufacturing: The making of goods by hand or by machine that upon completion the business sells to a customer. SaaS: Software-as-a-Service, a method of software delivery and licensing in which software is accessed online via a subscription, rather than bought and installed on individual computers. More on Dealroom’s proprietary tech taxonomy HERE . Cohorts Startups may also be categorised according to their founding year. All startups were founded in or after 1990 (information age). The founding year of a startup is determined by the startup themselves (self-reporting) on Dealroom.co directly, in publicly available content (news article, interviews), or as reported by the companies’ (co-)founder(s), investor(s) or backer(s). On growth stages, funding and VC backing Stages, rounds and maturity. In this report, startups are categorised in two main ways: Early-Stage - companies that have raised less than €5m in total funding. Growth-Stage - companies that have raised €5m or more in total funding. Out of those which are VC-backed, startups are categorised according to the latest funding round disclosed. Categorisation is not based on the startups’ (self-)reported round label. Instead, this report uses the disclosed amount as leading factor, following Dealroom’s standardised approach: Pre-Seed: all startups with a disclosed VC-type funding round of <1M US$ Seed: all startups with a disclosed VC-type funding round of min. 1M and up to 4M US$ Series A: all startups with a disclosed VC-type funding round of min. 4M and up to 15M US$ Series B: all startups with a disclosed VC-type funding round of min. 15M and up to 40M US$ Series C: all startups with a disclosed VC-type funding round of min. 40M and up to 100M US$ Mega(round): all startups with a disclosed VC-type funding round of min. 100M and up to 250M US$ Mega(round) plus: all startups with a disclosed VC-type funding round of over 250M US$ Funding rounds which are not classified as VC-type, including grants, debt, and other forms of funding, are excluded from reported VC investment figures. However these may be used to qualify a startup’s most adequate stage when no other form of funding has been disclosed. Round stages and cutoffs are based on US Dollars. This report uses the Euro (EUR) as standard reporting currency. For those transactions in US$ or any other currency in circulation in scope countries, Dealroom.co applies a fixed conversion rate as follows: Funding v. VC-backing In order to grow fast and amplify their impact, many startups receive third-party support. This support may come in various shapes and forms. VC-backed The main route is to be VC-backed, i.e. to receive growth capital in return for a share of the company’s equity. Growth equity provided to startups by Venture Capital funds, as well as other types of investors, so long as the (stated) goal is to accelerate growth or finance business expansion, is considered VC. However not all startups are VC-backed: in fact only about 50% of startups in this report are. Funded startups All VC-backed startups are funded by definition. Additionally, some startups are classified as funded only, meaning that they have received a form of third-party support, often in the form of funding, but are not (yet) VC-backed. Funding in this context includes equity-dilutive as well as non-equity dilutive financial support, the most common such types being loans/debt and grants. Funding may also include in-kind support, or a mix of financial and in-kind support, including being part of an acceleration or incubation programme, being a corporate or academic spinout (or spinoff), or receiving other forms of backing, including media for equity, or other undisclosed forms of support (support program). In this report, the majority (7.3K) of startups are funded according to this Dealroom definition. However fewer than 1K startups are funded but not VC-backed. Bootstrapped and undisclosed funding All other startups, or about 5K (~40% of the total) are either Bootstrapped or have received third party funding without disclosing it. These startups are overwhelmingly early-stage companies: 40% were founded in the last 5 years, 80% in the past 10 years. The vast majority of these startups are believed to be bootstrapped, i.e. to self-fund their growth with generated revenue, without third-party funding or support. On identifying founders, co-founders, and their gender identities Startups are founded by individuals who embark on the entrepreneurial journey in various ways. In the context of this report, a founder or co-founder, as there is no hierarchy between the two, is defined as an individual who self-identifies as such. Identification is primarily sourced from a company's legal filings, its website or the website of its (VC) investors or backers. It may also be retrieved from (professional) social media, media or blog articles published, edited or featured by the startup or the founder(s) themselves. Other forms of official communication issued by the startup , its investor(s) or backer(s), or reported in media articles may also be used. Generally, a founder may be defined as an individual who started the company. However (co-)founders may join a company at a later date: there are cases where an individual’s impact on a startup, usually at a very early stage, has been pivotal in a way that allows them to describe themselves as (co-)founder. Thus, there may be cases where not all (co-)founders were involved in the company’s operations from the start, but the vast majority of founders have played a foundational role in setting up the company. Conversely, (co-)founders may leave the company but will remain (co-)founders even if they are no longer part of the management team of said company. Therefore, while not all (co-)founders hold a position of significant influence at present in the startup which they founded, the majority of them do. Startup (co-)founders usually hold a “c-level” position in their respective startups, usually in their capacity as CEO (Chief Executive Officer) or CTO/CSO (Chief Technology Officer / Chief Scientific Officer). Other active (co-)founders may exert influence in their capacity as strategist, or in honorary functions or non-executive functions, in particular for those startups which have been acquired, have excited, or have gone through extensive restructuring. In this regard, while founders usually retain a significant (or majority) equity stake in the company which they have founded, there is no minimum ownership or equity-holding percentage applicable in the context of the identification of a (co-)founder in this report. Not all startups disclose the identity of their founders. Not all startup founders, whether current or past, wish or decide to (self-)identify as such. In spite of our best efforts, not all disclosed identities may be captured, and therefore associated with active startups. When founding teams are identified, they are assumed to be complete. However it cannot be excluded that (former) (co-)founders, or (co-)founders with a more limited online presence or level of involvement in the startup, may have been omitted. Founder gender is retrieved in two main ways. In the case where an identified (co-)founder has self-identified on the gender spectrum publicly and explicitly, either directly, on the Dealroom platform, or one of its partner ecosystem platforms , or indirectly, by submitting gender (self-)identification data to one of Dealroom’s data partners, then the gender of the individual who is identified as a (co-)founder will serve as a base to identify the startup as (co-)founded by a woman. In the case where none of the identified (co-)founders has self-identified on the gender spectrum, then Dealroom may have identified the founding team as (1) gender-diverse, or as (2) an all-women founding team which is constitutive of Dealroom’s Woman Founder categorisation. Identification of founding teams is based on a variety of factors including news coverage of a startup and its founding team, the participation of individual (co-)founders or of the startup itself in women-entrepreneurship (support) programs, or the backing that the startup may have received from investors and support programs tailored for women entrepreneurs. On the State of gender diversity in European venture survey Respondent Categories In the context of our study, Female Foundry conducted an online survey targeting five key demographic segments: Female Founders - Restricted to female entrepreneurs operating in Europe. Female Emerging Fund Managers - Also gender-restricted, operating. This category includes fund managers who have not yet raised a fund but are in the process of doing so, extending up to those who have successfully closed their third fund. Venture Capital investors - Open globally to VC investors of all levels of seniority who have made at least one investment into European companies. Limited Partners - Open globally to Limited Partner investors of all levels of seniority who have made at least one investment into a European fund. Angel Investors - Restricted to angel investors based in Europe. The Survey Period The survey was conducted over an eight-week period, beginning on October 11, 2023, and concluding on December 6, 2023. Validation of Responses To ensure data integrity, we conducted a thorough vetting process for each survey response. This included the exclusion of responses that failed to meet specific criteria, such as appropriate geographic location (Europe for female founders, angel investors and emerging fund managers), and the necessity for a valid, disclosed email address, alongside other identification methods, using Linkedin and other platforms, such as Crunchbase and Dealroom. The verification process was manual, with a strong emphasis on maintaining data confidentiality. Responses that were dubious in terms of their authenticity were excluded from the analysis. Survey Outcome Overall, the survey received 1,202 responses. After the meticulous validation process, 1,168 of these responses were confirmed as valid and reliable. These responses were then included in our final analysis and the insights drawn from the survey. On investors, funds and their managers Data pertaining to individuals who are (angel) investors or fund managers in their capacity as partner or general partner are included in the scope of this report. The gender of individuals, whether in their capacity as founders or investors, follows the same rationale (see “On identifying founders, co-founders, and their gender identities.”). In the context of this report, “Funds” refer to disclosed (investment) vehicles. The Fund is dated to the first public disclosure of the vehicle. The amount associated with the Fund corresponds to the highest amount which has been publicly disclosed, regardless of date of final close. Funds are managed by investors (i.e. investment firms). Analysis on people data focuses on individuals who are part of the (management) team of investment firms (self-)described or categorised as (i) Venture Capital (ii) Corporate Venture Capital (CVC) (iii) Private Equity, insofar as at least one fund under management is classified as VC, and (iv) Family Offices. On 50 Top Rounds List Demographic data When compiling the list of the Top 50 Rounds in 2023, we used publicly available data to confirm the identities of founders involved in the biggest European rounds. Where we had doubts about the identity, education, or demographic profile of an individual, we excluded that person from our analysis. Company and round data We tried to allocate just one sector per company, which we understand has its limitations. All the rounds were converted into € using average currency exchange rate of 2023. Up next 5 The Community This report is not really about the statistics. It is about real people. Connect with the vibrant community of European innovators, trailblazers and thinkers and continue the conversation. Explore the chapter

01. Enter The market reset European economies are gradually recovering from the Covid-19 pandemic and the heightened cost of living resulting from Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. The pace of economic recovery varies between countries, with service-oriented economies recovering faster and manufacturing-oriented economies experiencing a slower recovery. Despite a gradual decline in inflation, most countries are yet to meet their inflation targets.

Shaping the Future of European Venture 6 mins From the Creators

Shaping the Future of European Venture 6 mins From the Creators

01. Enter The market reset European economies are gradually recovering from the Covid-19 pandemic and the heightened cost of living resulting from Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. The pace of economic recovery varies between countries, with service-oriented economies recovering faster and manufacturing-oriented economies experiencing a slower recovery. Despite a gradual decline in inflation, most countries are yet to meet their inflation targets.