Percentage of Female founders Rises in Estonia

The proportion of female start-up founders has gradually increased in Estonia in recent years. In 2020 the proportion was 15 per cent which hit 17 per cent last year, reported by Commercial Register and Startup Estonia.

Presently there are 1,448 startups that function in Estonia out of which 289 startups or one in every five are established by women or at least one woman is present among the founders. Female founders can be mostly seen in health and educational technology startups ranging to 30 per cent. About 24 per cent of women are the founders of communications, food, and agriculture technology startups and 22 per cent are deep-tech founders.

CEO of Startup Estonia, Eve Peeterson stated that Estonia has about the same proportion of female entrepreneurs as the rest of Europe.

He further added that women make up to 15 per cent of startup founders in Europe. The same pattern can be seen in Estonia, young female entrepreneurs are more actively participating in establishing startups.

14 per cent of startup founders are women with less than five years of expertise. Meanwhile, women make up only 6 per cent of European startup founders who have more than 15 years of expertise according to recent data from the State of European Tech. The report also states about the startup founders who gained funding in 2022.