Female impact founders: This is the magical spot in Europe to raise cash

Finland is far and away the best place in Europe for female-founded companies to attract venture capital, according to this year's The Female Innovation Index, released on Tuesday. In Finland, 30 percent of VC cash raised by startups was invested in companies with women at the helm in 2024. This compares to a figure of just 12 percent across Europe.

Denmark and Norway ranked second and third place for the average portion of venture capital invested in female-founded companies. However Sweden, often celebrated for its approach to gender equality, came seventh below Austria, France and Estonia.

Finland's position in the rankings will come as little surprise to observers of the Nordic country's growing tech and impact sectors. Despite its small size (it has a population of just 5.5 million people) Finland has cultivated a thriving startup ecosystem over the last decade or so that's produced global success stories including gaming giant Supercell (creator of Clash of Clans), Rovio (the company behind Angry Birds), food delivery service Wolt (which DoorDash snapped up for €7 billion), and health tech innovator Oura with its popular sleep-tracking rings.

Alongside this strong ecosystem, Finland consistently tops global gender equality rankings, with the World Economic Forum ranking it second globally in its 2024 Gender Gap Report, reflecting the country's robust parental leave policies, high female workforce participation, and one of Europe's smallest gender pay gaps.

The Female Innovation Index purports to be the most comprehensive European analysis examining the innovation pipeline and capital allocation spearheaded by women entrepreneurs. It was developed through collaborations with more than 35 private equity and venture capital organisations and ecosystem players spanning 20 nations across Europe.

A total of €5.76 billion in funding for female founders

Despite market headwinds, European women entrepreneurs demonstrated remarkable resilience in 2024, according to the index, securing €5.76 billion ($6.06bn) in funding. While this reflects a 12% year-over-year decline from 2023's €6.56 billion, it's worth noting that this reduction mirrors the broader European venture capital landscape, which contracted by 11% across all founder demographics.

The United Kingdom emerged as the top investor in terms of total capital, with €1,541 million deployed to women-founded ventures, followed by France with €1,072 million and Germany with €708 million.

Europe's female-led impact unicorn

The report also nods to the core role of women entrepreneurs in Europe's impact sector. It highlights France's Newcleo (greener nuclear energy using lead-cooled fast reactors) as one of just three European female-founded companies achieving unicorn status (surpassing the €1bn valuation mark) in 2024.

The others are Pigment, a French AI-augmented planning platform, and Germany's Cardior Pharmaceuticals (developing innovative treatments for heart disease).

Health, fintech, and food attracted the biggest proportion of venture capital investment flowing into female-founded companies in 2024, receiving €2.06B, €1.01B and €591M respectively.