European startups founded or co-founded by women raised €10.2B in 2024 across nearly 2,000 transactions, according to Pitchbook’s latest study. This represents a slight increase from 2023, when female-founded startups collectively raised €10B. The total amount has been rising since 2014, with peaks in 2021 and 2022.

However, there is little reason to celebrate. These €10.2B represent only 20.6% of the total VC investment in Europe for 2024. In terms of deal volume, women-led startups accounted for 24.7% of all transactions—a decline of 1.4 percentage points from the previous year. The gap is even wider when considering startups with exclusively female founders. In 2024, these startups secured just €814M across 396 funding rounds across Europe. By contrast, startups with all-male founding teams raised €38.3B across 5,830 rounds.

Stricter Judgement of Female-Led Teams

“In early-stage funding, founders have faced a lower risk tolerance from investors,” the Pitchbook report highlights. “And female founders have experienced more severe valuation drops.”

This disparity is also reflected in startup valuations, with significantly lower figures for businesses with one or more female founders. At the pre-seed stage, startup valuations have been on an upward trend since 2014. However, those led by women remain undervalued compared to the overall average. The European average pre-seed valuation stands at €5M, while mixed-gender founding teams are valued at €4.4M. If the founding team is entirely female, this figure drops further to €3.7M.

The discrepancies persist at later funding stages. By Series B, the average startup valuation in Europe exceeds €12M. For startups with female founders, this figure falls to €10M. If the founding team is exclusively female, valuations do not even reach €5M, averaging just €4.8M.

Underrepresentation in VC Firms

In France, 228 funding rounds were secured by startups with at least one female founder, amounting to €1.4B. Overall, French startups raised over €7B last year. Yet, on the investor side, women remain underrepresented in decision-making roles.

Within European VC firms, female representation remains too low. Only 15% hold General Partner (GP) positions—such as managing partner, partner, or principal—in European funds managing over €50M. Among firms of this scale where women make up the majority of strategic decision-makers, the figure drops to just 8.6% across Europe.

These proportions vary depending on the sector. Women are better represented in health and biotech-focused VC funds, making up nearly 15% of GPs. However, in funds specialising in media, AI, or hardware, female representation decreases even further to around 8%.