International Women's Day: More female founders needed

8 March 2021

Women underrepresented in startups worldwide - Startup-Unit Hamburg helping women get started

Hamburg Invest’s Startup-Unit is joining forces with organisations in Berlin, Cologne and Munich to host the interactive “Walk the Talk” panel to mark International Women's Day on Monday (March 8, 2021). Experts will discuss the importance of gender diversity in startups and how to achieve this in practice. Women account for only a small share of founders despite all kinds of bright business ideas ranging from e.g., sustainable goods in a digital farm shop, intelligent software solutions to zero-plastic innovations. Many of the ideas put forward by women are promising, successful and economically viable in the long term. "Anyone keen on starting up a business is in good hands in Hamburg," said Tarek Müller, 32, who hails from the innovative district of Harburg and founded his first company at the tender age of 13. Several years later, Müller set up Hamburg's first unicorn company, About You, backed by the Otto Group. Female founders are the missing ingredient, he opined, and many others agree.

Women underrepresented in startups

Across Germany, only 15.7 per cent of all start-ups were founded by women in 2020, according to the Female Founders Monitor. And the situation is similar in Hamburg. Only 15.3 per cent of slightly under 1,300 startups have a female CEO, and the trend is rising. Veronika Reichboth, Director of the Startup-Unit at Hamburg Invest, noted: "Women are strongly represented in start-ups. Yet, there is plenty of room for improvement among start-ups nationwide. Women are significantly underrepresented in information and communication technology and other technology-orientated courses at universities, and this continues in start-ups."

#FemupStartups organising events and campaign

The Startup-Unit Hamburg and the German startup hotspots Berlin, Cologne and Munich founded the #FemupStartups Initiative to raise the share of women founders and investors in the national startup scene. All four cities organize regular joint events like the "Walk the Talk" panel or launch campaigns for more publicity. Diverse organisers in those cities create offers for women keen on setting up businesses in regional networks.

Successful founders from the Hamburg Metropolitan Region

Although startups by women are still underrepresented, several women's startups are based in Hamburg. The following are just some of many examples:

ai-omatic solutions
Co-founded by Lena Weirauch, ai-omatic solutions is a companion in all areas of data science. Emphasis is on automatic text recognition for social analytics, knowledge management and predictive maintenance. The company is funded by the InnoFounder programme, among others.

Frischepost
Founded by Juliane Willing and Eva Neugebauer (see cover photo) in Hamburg, Frischepost's digital farm shop now has branches elsewhere. The digital shop brings together farmers and regional producers with consumers on site. A transshipment warehouse is created in each place to assemble the baskets of goods. A self-developed IT platform means typical stages of trade are no longer required. The producers set the prices themselves and manage the business sustainably.

Miraminds
Co-founded in Hamburg by Sofia Gertzen in 2016, Miraminds is a pun on "miracle" and "mind". Miraminds develops intelligent solutions for sharing software knowledge easily and swiftly. Miraminds' documentation software "FlowShare" creates automated step-by-step instructions - thanks to grants from the IFB Hamburg and EU funding for expert know-how.

tisch
Founded by Elisa Witt, the tisch co-working café in Schwerin offers work spaces, a venue for meetings and table tennis matches. Only advance bookings are being accepted at present owing to the pandemic.

Reichboth stressed: "The Startup-Unit is keen on bringing together female founders, startup backers, media representatives and other strong women. We always have them in mind in our advisory services, at events and during international networking, Women founders are the future. Made in Hamburg."

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Sources and further information

www.hamburg-invest.com

Numerous events planned

Starterin (Hamburg Startups)
The Hamburg Startup Community will be voting for the STARTERiN Hamburg 2021 up to and including April. The aim is to raise the visibility of female founders, who are shaping the city and networking actively with decision makers and investors. The award is cross-sectoral and highlights the diversity and femininity of Hamburg's startup ecosystem.

Ladies Dinner (German Innovation)
The Ladies Dinner brings together female entrepreneurs, multipliers, women entrepreneurs and women leaders to promote exchange at eye level and to network women sustainably. The Ladies Dinner is held annually and was last held digitally on November 25, 2020.

Female StartAperitivo
Organized by the IFB Innovationsstarter, WEstartupSH and Startup-Unit Hamburg, the Female StartAperitivo will premiere on November 18, 2021 to mark Women's Entrepreneurship Day.