You Can’t Be What You Can’t See! – Increasing Visibility for Female Founders in Medical Technology

Diverse teams are more successful – as highlighted in McKinsey’s recent report, Diversity Matters Even More [1], which means both ethnic and gender diversity. Despite the clear advantages of diversity, women are still underrepresented in leadership positions, executive boards, and founding teams – particularly in the healthcare sector [2], the core area of MII. To counteract this imbalance, we regularly implement initiatives that amplify the visibility of female founders: from podcast series and virtual networking events to pitch sessions.

Female Founders in MedTech still Underrepresented

There is still a strong imbalance between the representation of women and men in the healthcare industry. According to the PWC report „Women in Healthcare 2020“, only 24% of management positions in established MedTech companies are held by women, with an even lower figure of just 13% for board members. [2] When looking specifically at startups in the MedTech and BioTech sectors, the proportion of female founders is just under 15%. [4] Similar trends are observed in data from the European Patent Office, where only 10% of all patent applications in Germany name female inventors. [3]

However, the imbalance goes far beyond the lower representation of women: in 2023, just 2% of the capital invested in Germany went to all-female founding teams and 11% to mixed teams. In contrast 87% went to all-male founding teams. [5]

There is no question that there is still a need for action. As an institution that supports startups and young entrepreneurs in this sector, one of our core tasks is to develop valid, sustainable, and successful business models. This includes actively empowering female founders and encouraging more women to become entrepreneurs.

FEMture – Female Founders’ Stories in a Podcast Format

With her podcast „FEMture“, Nadine-Shirin Zimmermann aims to increase the visibility of female leaders. In collaboration with MII, a 7-part MedTech series was launched in 2024. The first episode featured Dr. Ramona Samba and Lea Renz, who highlighted the challenges faced by young companies in the healthcare sector.

Following this, female founders from the 4C Community took center stage, sharing their founding stories, visions, and key learnings: Nadine Kwit, CEO and co-founder of MindAhead, shared why involving the target audience early in development is crucial for both usability engineering and product acceptance. Maria Enge, co-founder of RooWalk, discussed the significant gap between „technologically possible” and “available to patients” that exists in the healthcare industry due to high regulatory hurdles. Other guests in the podcast series were Christina Scherzer (Puray), Julia Zimmermann (EVERSION Technologies), Pauline Nöldemann (viatolea), and Vera Claas (MentalStark).

Virtual After Lunch – Exchange with Peers & Networking with Role Models

We already invited female founders from the 4C Community to 11 editions of our Virtual After Lunch series. Participants discussed various (female) entrepreneurship topics in a relaxed atmosphere – always embedded in an inspiring keynote speech from a role model. For example, Lisa Figas, founder and CEO of TelemetryDeck, shared her personal “Do’s & Dont‘s” of networking. Dr. Birgit Stelzer and Melanie Kamrath from Entrepreneurs Campus led a discussion on alternative success definitions beyond financial achievements. Petronela Sandulache, founder of CorDiFio Health, highlighted the „Gender Data Gap“ and its drastic impact on women’s healthcare. Other topics included team communication, sales strategies, personal branding, and mental health as a leader.

Online Pitch Event – Presenting to Experienced Female Entrepreneurs

Recently, we joined forces with the European Women’s Management Development Network (EWMD). This international, non-profit network founded by women in 1984 strives to increase the visibility and participation of women in leadership positions, improve management quality through more female representation and diversity, and foster political discourse.

Together with EWMD Baden-Württemberg, we organized an online pitch event. Participants from the EWMD network met five female founders from the 4C Community and learned about their visions for the future of healthcare: Larissa Niemeyer (eatappie), Julia Zimmermann (EVERSION Technologies), Dr. Teresa Wagner (immuneAdvice), Dr. Shaymaa Abdelhamid (Powered Orthotics), Sarah Wali (BugSense Diagnostics).

During the Event with the EWMD, the female founders had the opportunity to exchange ideas with experienced female entrepreneurs and leaders and make important contacts.

With formats like these, MII has already successfully strengthened the visibility of female founders and women in leadership positions – and we would like to continue this in the future while also creating further opportunities for mutual networking. Because: You can’t be what you can’t see! 

Written by Lea Rebholz
March 18, 2025