WEgate 2020 – We open doors for women entrepreneurs
www.wegate.eu

POLICY BRIEF 3

SUPPORTING THE DIGITAL
TRANSITION - WOMENENTREPRENEURS THRIVING
IN THE DIGITAL ARENA
BY RESHAPING
THE WOMEN ENTREPRENEURSHIPSUPPORT, WE CAN IMPROVE
THE PROSPECTS FOR THE FUTURE
GENERATIONS OF WOMENENTREPRENEURS AND CONTRIBUTE
TO A BALANCED AND MORE
INCLUSIVE EUROPEAN ECONOMYThis policy briefsummarizes the findingsof the WEgate ThematicGroup on the Women Entrepreneurs andthe Digital Transition.
It highlights the key challenges
and provides recommendations forintervention at European and national
level in the following key areas:
Ethics in Artificial intelligence,
Gender & Cybersecurity,
Tech-readiness of female-led start-ups,
Gender gap in digital skills, andWomen & digital innovation

Co-funded by the COSME programmeof the European Union

Prepared by the WEgate ThematicGroup ‘Women entrepreneurs and the Digital Transition’Author:Foundation for Management and Industrial Research with the expert support of the WEgate
Thematic Group ‘Women entrepreneurs and the Digital Transition’.

Members of the Thematic Group ‘Women entrepreneurs and theDigital Transition’

Isabel Bustos
Leila MaidaneCheryl Miller Van DÿckCo-facilitated by the WEgate team members from theFoundation for Management and Industrial ResearchGabriela Kostovska BogoeskaEmilija Andonova

Co-funded by the COSME programmeof the European Union

The project is co-funded by the European Union.
This publication has been made with assistance from the European Union. The content of the publication is the sole
responsibility of the project implementers and can in no way be taken to reflect the views of the European Union.

ABOUT WEGATEThe European Gateway for Women’s entrepreneurship, called WEgate, co-funded by theCOSME programme of the European Union (EU), represents one of the key initiatives of theEuropean Commission for supporting women entrepreneurship (WE), aiming to becomea one-stop-shop where existing and potential women entrepreneurs can find assistance,
inspiration, motivation and get in touch with peers and stakeholders for facilitating theirgrowth and competitiveness. It features an online platform www.wegate.eu that offers
information and networking opportunities; commissions pan-European annual survey on
the needs of women entrepreneurs (WEbarometer); organizes numerous events, webinars
and b2b sessions, as well as the WEgate training academy for building individual skills within
the WE support eco-system.
One of the aims of the WEgate is to increase the visibilityof women entrepreneurs and to promote discussion
on important topics for improving the conditions for WE
development. To achieve this, the WEgate consortium ispromoting the creation of a large European WE communityof practice that focuses on engaging a growing and diverse
number of stakeholders supporting women entrepreneurs,with an emphasis on co-creation, networking anddevelopment of public policy resources. For addressing key
areas of interest of WE development, dedicated WEgate
Thematic groups (TGs) are formed as ad-hoc groups within
the WEgate Community. The third WEgate TG is dedicatedto digital transition for women entrepreneurs, analysing
the challenges and providing concrete recommendations
for reducing the digital gender divide in entrepreneurship.

WEgate Thematic Group “Women entrepreneurs and the DigitalTransition”
Represents one of the WEgate expert groups with an advisory roleto the WEgate community. The
thematic group defines concrete
recommendations for strategic
policy framework for women entrepreneurship development inEurope.

INTRODUCTIONDigitalisation can serve as an opportunity to increase women’s pay levels and leadershipparticipation while also offering a better work-life balance. However, there is a strong needfor protection against the systemic causes that cause the gender gap to continuously growin access to digital technology and education
While the digital transition provides a huge opportunity for women entrepreneurs
to access higher revenue sectors and attract investment, it also comes with risks
associated with certain uses of new technologies.
The guarantee of safe and fair technologies for all can only be achieved with a reinforcementof the European Union (EU) regulatory framework as well as a better gender representation
at every stage of the technology life cycle, from its creation to its access. The increase inparticipation relies on a European framework to guarantee excellence and trust in newtechnologies, ensuring that new technologies are at the service of all Europeans andsupporting all entrepreneurs regardless of their gender. Only then, once trust is established,
can all individuals appropriately leverage new technologies for themselves or their business.
Although progress in societies and in legislation has been made to overcome genderdisparity, there are still barriers for women entrepreneurs, more specifically barriers to theirdigital transition and success. Besides access to finance, skills and networks, ensuring a fair
TOWARD STRATEGIC POLICY FRAMEWORK FOR WOMEN ENTREPRENEUR-3

and safe digital environment is a key prerequisite for supporting women entrepreneurs andencouraging their growth.
There is a need for an overarching, strategic policy framework as a basis for actionablestrategies and incentives for supporting women entrepreneurs including support todigitalisation and equal participation in digital economy. The WEgate Digitalisation ThematicGroup jointly elaborated a set of recommendations on how to improve the strategic policy
framework for digital transition for women entrepreneurship.

Ethics in Artificial intelligence (AI)In the digital era, women entrepreneurs are heavily reliant on AI applications that can makelife-changing decisions and impact the success of their business. Women entrepreneurs
would sustainably benefit from the use of AI applications s they can make life-changing
decisions. Their ability to fairly promote their content on social platforms or attract capital
investment can be compromised by biased predictive models and deepen the gender gap inentrepreneurship. The under-representation of women in the tech workforce and the data
imbalance inherited from historical, social and cultural inequalities as well as the lack of a
dedicated framework and standardized approach for women entrepreneurs’ data collection
at EU and national levels make it impossible to establish an equitable digital society for all
without a robust regulation on AI systems.
Despite gender mainstreaming remaining a priority for the European Commission, genderanalysis and gender impact assessment in new technology is not done on a regular basis,and not across all policy areas. This is intrinsically linked to lack of a dedicated frameworkand standardized approach for women entrepreneurs’ data collection at EU and nationallevels. Hence, The EU and national institutions should invest in the structural and long-termcollection of high-quality key data that provide the evidence base for the effective genderanalysis and impact assessment in new technology.

Recommendations

4•

Establish a robust compliance framework for all AI-based tools and technologies - for ensuring gender neutrality, it is essential to assess AI-based technologies and rollout a certification that approves the safety and fairness of these technologies toits users. A certification establishes credibility and trust within consumers, stakeholders and other business partners. Such a framework would ease the compliance process at the local level as it would speed-up the review, reinforce theobligation of explainability to prevent Black-box AI, and provide clear guidelines
to meet compliance requirements.

•Define a risk management methodology with mitigation measures - to ensure that there
are solutions in place to tackle the misuse of AI. The monitoring of sensitive features during the training process should be automatically performed and various
tests on different groups of the population should be run to measure the fairness of outputs.

•Reinforce Corporate Digital Responsibility (CDR) - as a potential collaborative mechanism at the European level between political actors, civil society and citizens todemystify governance complexity and establish ground rules for AI usage.

POLICY BRIEF 1

Gender & Cybersecurity
In terms of global cyber security, gender matters. It defines access and authority, forms andimpacts online behaviour, and affects vulnerability - real or perceived - among other things.
Studies of online gender-based violence demonstrate a disproportionate impact on womenand girls. In fact, the dangers women confront online and offline cannot be readily or neatlyseparated. Women may be affected differently by data breaches and intentional disclosuresof personally identifiable information even when they are not directed specifically at them
due to underlying discrimination and inequality. This reality prevents women from thrivingin the digital arena, strengthens the feeling that they are being singled out and undesired,and negatively impacts their curiosity to explore digital prospects and use them to expand
their businesses.
The lack of women working in cybersecurity policy and diplomacy, including confidence- andcapacity-building measures, at national, regional, and international levels prevents furtherfocus on incorporating gender considerations throughout international cybersecurity policy
and practice, ensuring that cybersecurity increases the security of people of all genders. This
is in addition to the gender gap in participation within all aspects of the cyber security field.

Recommendations•Implement Women-led cybersecurity policies at national and EU level - to avoid discrimination in security policy and diplomacy and ensure the incorporation of gender considerations. Roll-out a gender analysis of international cyber security togenerate more nuanced understandings of the dynamics that shape policy andpractice in this area.

•Increase regulatory framework to protect women against cyber violence - and reinforce
stronger security methodologies for new technologies to avoid the breach ofimportant and personal gender data.

•Increase financial support at a European, national and regional level to establish cybersecurity tools and ensure that women-led businesses are not exposed to gender-based cyber violence. Provide cyber security capacity building training for
women in business to defend themselves against online threats.

Tech-readiness of female-led start-ups
One of the most prominent and pervasive issues in entrepreneurship is the gender funding
gap. Women only co-found or are the founders of 15% of deep tech firms. Only 13% ofventure capital (VC) partners are female, while 85% of investment committees are entirelycomposed of men. Deep tech start-ups tend to have longer R&D cycles and often take moretime and capital to build than other start-ups. While much is done regarding increasing theopportunities for start-ups owned by women to access the capital and funding needed to
grow sustainably, there is still a lack of women in investment committees and organizations.
Less money is raised by women-led firms than by their male counterparts; in Europe, about
2% of venture capital funds all-female teams, while about 5% funds mixed teams. Initiatives

TOWARD STRATEGIC POLICY FRAMEWORK FOR WOMEN ENTREPRENEUR-5

like Supernovas by EIT Food, EIT Manufacturing, and EIT Urban Mobility have been developedin an effort to address these numbers. In order to achieve a more sustainable, connected,innovative and inclusive investment ecosystem in deep-tech, there is a need to increase thenumber of women on both sides: the investment decision-making panel and the deep-techstart-up scene.
While an increasing number of programs are actively working to close the gender financing
gap, more may be done to prepare female-led businesses for the digital age. The growing
proportion of VC investments in digital start-ups demonstrates that the problem cannot besolved just by accelerator programs that prioritize financial and international development
support. For women entrepreneurs to have better access to financing, female-led businesses
must become more tech-ready.

Recommendations•

Reinforce regulatory frameworks - to avoid abusive equity deals for women-owned
deep-tech start-ups due to lack of knowledge, power and gender vulnerability.
Release First-class training and coaching for women in business who are readyto enter the capital investment world to give them the tools to watch out for thecontract terms and negotiate the agreement.

•Launch digital accelerators for VC investment readiness - improve the attractiveness of
women-led enterprises by embedding technology in their business. The digital
accelerator would follow the principles of a funding accelerator but will focus on
closing the skill gap of women enterprises which will in turn attract more interests from various investment companies.

•Provide financing to support the cost of a technical workforce - public support for R&D
activities have provided a tremendous help to women entrepreneurs. However,the cost to hire a technical team is quite heavy and prevents women from embedding technology in their products or services. A subsidy or a prime could beenforced nationally or regionally to encourage the growth potential of female-led
start-ups and boost their enterprises scalability.

Gender gap in digital skills
Socioeconomic differences between men and women have always been at the centre of
discussion for being a key factor perpetuating the gender gap in digital skills. While efforts toincrease internet adoption, literacy and access among women have been put in place, there
is still a need for a balanced and digitally-enabled society. This situation strongly affects
women entrepreneurs, making it harder for them to succeed in a very demanding and techdominated world.
The digital gender divide is known to be generated during the very early years of educationand it is usually strengthened during the university stage. The percentage of women whochoose careers in the STEAM sectors are still very low compared to the percentage of men.
Since most social and gender stereotypes are created during childhood, children should be
exposed to adequate role models and to equal opportunities.
Equal digital training is therefore a must when reducing the digital gender gap. Legislativereforms and initiatives across Europe have significantly improved digital adoption and fluency
among women entrepreneurs. However, women entrepreneurs are still at a disadvantaged

6

POLICY BRIEF 1

position when accessing digital training due to social, economic and cultural norms. This iseven more accentuated for girls and women in rural areas and hard-to-reach regions where
the lack of infrastructure and technology prevents them from owning or accessing digitaltechnologies.

Recommendations•Public-private partnerships to ensure that access to technology is available in all areas.
Strong focus on creating the necessary infrastructure in rural and remote areas to provide equal access to technology for girls and women. This can only beachieved through national funding and cooperation with corporations. Provide
financial support to vulnerable social families in rural areas to increase their accessibility to technology and the digital world.

•Strong awareness campaigns to sensitize children and adults about the need for
digital equality.

•Ensuring gender mainstreaming since the early years of education, providing children with enough education tools and skills. Redesign European and nationaleducation and digital training methodologies to make them more inclusive anddiverse.

•Capacity building for media professionals and regulatory frameworks to ensurethat media consumed by the young generations reinforces the need the close
the gender gap in digital skills. Providing support for women entrepreneurs andthus preventing the lack of work-life balance to be a barrier for them to participate in adequate digital training and education. Capacity building for educators
at all levels in gender mainstreaming and equality.

•Provide digital access and technology for women entrepreneurs making e-skills, upskilling and reskilling available and accessible to all, including through paid apprenticeship programs that target mature women and women in transition.

Women & digital innovation
The lack of representation of women entrepreneurs in the digital and technological fields
creates a digital innovation gap that is also increased by the worrying marginal percentageof women who participate in the society as founders and owners of start-ups, venture
capitalists and investors. This digital bias directly affects the development of new potential
technologies that would otherwise positively benefit communities and nations alike.
This hidden and untapped potential perpetuates the gender gap in all fields, boosting
innovation in all male-related and dominated sectors. For example, while more women are
driving innovation in e-health, there’s still plenty of room for innovation in those areas thatare directly linked to women’s health.
Work-life balance is also key when exploring the causes of the lack of women innovators
in technology. Women entrepreneurs find it difficult to spend time experimenting with
innovative solutions due to the amount of time they spend in unpaid care and domestic work.
Women are still the main caregivers and the job market, led predominantly by men, favours

TOWARD STRATEGIC POLICY FRAMEWORK FOR WOMEN ENTREPRENEUR-7

younger single male employees. This situation hinders innovative and entrepreneurialactivities led by women.
European, national and regional authorities should focus their efforts in boosting
entrepreneurship and innovation among women entrepreneurs by raising awareness offinancing opportunities. Even though funding for innovation has increased over the years,
the unequal access to digital information and technology prevents women entrepreneurs
from applying. Hence why, financing institutions should grow their efforts to increase theirvisibility and investments for women entrepreneurs.

Recommendations

8•

Awareness campaigns reinforcing the need for innovations related to female problems. Promoting and celebrating innovations developed by women for women.
Prevent under-representation of women innovators and entrepreneurs by raising awareness.

•Enabling access to technology for all women entrepreneurs via economic support,
capacity building and policy making. Mentoring women entrepreneurs in innovative solutions for their businesses. Increase awareness, access and availability ofe-learning platforms where disruptive ideas and solutions are encouraged andshared.

•Boosting high-impact innovations that would significantly benefit marginalized
women by lowering the risk of research and development.

•Improve research and innovation where women are represented and taken intoconsideration. This is specifically more important in the medical and engineering
fields where women are under-represented and could end in incorrect diagnoses
and treatments.

•Ensuring work-life balance by providing parental leave for both men and womenand equal job opportunities.

POLICY BRIEF 1

WEgate 2020 – We open doors for women entrepreneurs
www.wegate.eu

POLICY BRIEF 3
SUPPORTING THE DIGITAL
TRANSITION - WOMENENTREPRENEURS THRIVING IN
THE DIGITAL ARENAWEgate 2020 – We open doors for women entrepreneurs
www.wegate.eu