The greatest challenges facing industry today could soon have champions, as the European Commission reveals the results of the first wave of its new Women TechEU pilot programme, selecting 50 women-led businesses to drive tech innovation.
Women in tech. Credit: metamorworks / Shutterstock
Credit: metamorworks / Shutterstock
Located across 15 different countries, each will be offered mentoring and €75,000 in funding to help grow their companies, alongside opportunities to work with experts in their fields, ranging from early cancer diagnoses to reducing methane emissions.
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So-called "deep-tech", which is a label given to startups whose sole purpose is tackling pressing issues in the industry, makes up around one-quarter of the EU's startups, the Commission estimates and is valued at around €700 billion.
Deep-tech companies tend to spend more time and money on R&D and often require greater capital to get up and running. A significant amount also tend to falter or fail in their early years, which can only increase costs.
40 of the companies selected come from EU member states with one-fifth selected from countries under the jurisdiction of Horizon Europe's widening scheme, which seeks to support countries who "lag behind in research and innovation", primarily in Eastern Europe.
Another one-fifth come from nations associated with the Horizon scheme.
Most of the companies will be looking into tech that furthers the bloc's sustainability targets, including tackling climate change, reducing food waste, as well as widening access to education and empowering women.
"I am particularly proud of the successful outcome of the first Women TechEU call", Mariya Gabriel, Commissioner for Innovation, Research, Culture, Education and Youth said in a statement. "The high number of outstanding applications confirms there is a need for women in deep-tech to get support for their companies at the early, riskiest stage".
"We will assist these 50 women-led companies with funding, mentoring and networking opportunities and we will scale up this programme in 2022".
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The projects are expected to commence work in the spring and are expected to run for between 6 to 12 months.
The bloc is also expected to renew the programme for a second run, due to the response to the first pilot. The Commission revealed it will be upping the overall funding to €10 million, up from €3.75 million for the first wave, to be used to fund as many as 130 companies.
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