Female Founders Monitor 2025 (Startup-Verband)

Summary

• The share of female founders in Germany's startup ecosystem has fallen for the first time, to 18.8%.p.7
• All-male founding teams still receive 91% of venture capital funding.p.7
• Since 2017, VC funding for startups with at least one female founder has nearly doubled, and total investment has almost quadrupled.p.7
• 60% of female students prioritize job security, compared with 32% of male students.p.7
• While 40% of male students consider launching a business or working in a startup, only 21% of female students do.p.7
• 87% of female founders see gender inequality in the startup ecosystem as a problem, but only half of male founders do.p.7
• Both women (81%) and men (60%) cite work-life compatibility as a critical factor in narrowing the gender gap.p.7

Key insights

1. Only 17% of female founders hold an engineering or computer science degree, compared with 44% of male founders.p.12
2. Against 19 percent female startup founders stand only 15 percent of financing rounds and 9 percent of investment volume for teams with at least one female founder.p.13
3. 11 percent of female students would like to found a company after their studies, compared with 24 percent of male students.p.13
4. Women account for 32 percent of founding-interested students, but only 19 percent of startup founders.p.13
5. 73 percent of employed women aged 20 to 49 with children under six work part-time, while 91 percent of men in the same group work full-time.p.18
6. Only 47 percent of male founders in all-male teams see the gender gap as a problem, rising to 64 percent in mixed teams.p.17
7. The Startup-Verband aims to raise the share of female founders to at least 30 percent by 2030.p.24