Start-ups, in Italia only 13.6% are founded by women

In Italia, there are 1,648 innovative start-ups with a woman on the board. Despite the fact that both the number of female graduates and female employment levels are on the rise, the presence of female founders in the national innovative ecosystem remains at the pole. Thus only 13.6% of the overall 12,133 companies registered in the special section of the Companies Register are founded or co-founded by women, highlighting a strong underrepresentation in the sector.

Going into more detail, according to Unioncamere's 'L'imprenditoria femminile in Italia' report, these start-ups operate for the vast majority in the Services sector (almost 81%) and are attentive to sustainability. In fact, 16.6% are high-tech companies in the energy sector, while 3.5% are companies with a social vocation. 19.8% are youth enterprises, a higher percentage than non-female innovative start-ups, in a context where activities controlled by under-35s represent a symbol of economic regeneration.

On the intellectual property front, 16.9% are owners, depositaries or licensees of at least one patent - a useful parameter to measure the presence of women among inventors and thus the effective participation of women in innovation activities - or owners of software. Among their strengths, female entrepreneurs show on average higher levels of education than men, and are therefore more likely to turn knowledge into business. However, this does not automatically translate into more successful initiatives.

In fact, the demographic dynamics of these young companies point to certain difficulties. Sources of funding and resilience are two knots yet to be unravelled. Among the incentives offered by the public system, 1.7% of female start-ups made use of the Smart&Start call (managed by Invitalia) but, in general, women suffer a significant gap in terms of market support. Thus, for the start-up of a new project, female entrepreneurs rely heavily on family capital. This factor, while generating more initial stability, limits the propensity to innovate.

The difficulty in attracting funding is also visible internationally. In 2024, startups founded by women in Europe raised €5.76 billion, or 12% of total venture capital (down 12% on the previous year), while in the United States they catalysed $45.3 billion, or 22.7% of investments (-1.9% on 2023). Survival also remains a critical issue: five years after start-up there is a 5 p.p. differential in business retention between women's start-ups and other companies, and the gap widens in subsequent years.