Europe’s AI Boom Overlooks Femtech
▼ Summary
– Europe’s overemphasis on AI investment is diverting crucial funding away from femtech, exacerbating a women’s health crisis despite a projected €30bn market by 2032.
– In 2023, European femtech received only €164mn out of €8.3bn in healthtech funding, while US counterparts raised €4.5bn since 2019, highlighting a severe capital allocation disparity.
– Female-only founding teams received just 2% of global VC funding in 2024, worsening gaps in women’s healthcare infrastructure and leaving proven solutions for conditions like endometriosis underfunded.
– General-purpose AI often perpetuates medical biases and misdiagnoses in women’s health, whereas specialized femtech solutions with AI applications remain overlooked by investors.
– To address this, Europe must balance AI investments with dedicated femtech funding, support women-led investment teams, and reform R&D structures to recognize women’s health as essential rather than niche.
Europe’s surging investment in artificial intelligence threatens to sideline one of the most critical areas of healthcare innovation: women’s health technology. While venture capital rushes toward AI, femtech startups, addressing the medical needs of half the population, are struggling to secure the funding required to scale solutions and close alarming gender health gaps.
In 2021, global femtech investment reached a high of €1.89 billion, only to plummet to €1.1 billion the following year. This sharp decline coincided with a broader tech funding downturn and a massive reallocation of capital toward AI ventures. Though market conditions and investor caution played a role, the timing underscores a troubling pattern: as AI booms, women’s health innovation wilts.
Across Europe, the figures are especially stark. In 2023, femtech companies secured just €164 million out of a total healthtech funding pool of €8.3 billion. By comparison, U.S. femtech startups have raised €4.5 billion since 2019. This growing disparity risks worsening a healthcare crisis in a region that once led the world in gender-sensitive medical innovation.
Today, a startling 44% of European femtech startups have never raised external funding, despite market projections valuing the sector at €30 billion by 2032. Promising companies focused on endometriosis, menopause, fertility, and maternal health, each serving vast, underserved markets, are consistently passed over in favor of flashy, general-purpose AI proposals.
There’s a painful irony at play. Many AI startups attract investment by promising to predict future health issues, while femtech founders, who are often already solving urgent, real-world problems, can’t get a meeting. This isn’t an argument against AI; many femtech firms are integrating AI into their products. But investor fixation on broad AI applications is starving specialized health solutions of essential capital.
The human impact is profound. When funding bypasses women’s health, real people suffer. The average woman with endometriosis waits seven years for a diagnosis. Up to 70% of those with polycystic ovarian syndrome worldwide remain undiagnosed. These aren’t abstract statistics, they represent millions of lives hampered by systemic neglect.
Worse, AI developed without a focus on healthcare equity can deepen these very problems. Studies from UNESCO and UN Women confirm that AI models trained on biased data often reinforce male-default assumptions, leading to misdiagnosis, delayed care, and prolonged suffering.
The funding gap also reflects a stark gender imbalance. In 2024, all-female founding teams received just 2% of global venture capital, compared to 84% for all-male teams. This disparity isn’t just unfair, it’s bad business. Women-led investment teams consistently demonstrate a stronger grasp of femtech opportunities, yet they remain severely underrepresented.
Europe has a proud history of leadership in women’s health, home to pioneering companies like Flo Health, Clue, Natural Cycles, and Ava. But that advantage is fading fast. To reclaim its role, the region must reframe femtech not as a niche interest, but as a foundational component of public health and economic growth.
Investors must balance AI enthusiasm with support for proven healthcare solutions. Dedicated femtech funds and more women-led investment teams are essential, not as token gestures, but as smart strategy. Countries with active female angel networks, for example, see 27% higher early-stage funding rates for women entrepreneurs.
Policymakers also have a role. Public R&D funding must reflect the scale of women’s health needs. When government grants flow disproportionately to AI, it signals that women’s well-being is still not a priority.
Europe doesn’t have to choose between AI and femtech. The goal is equitable investment, not redirected resources. Femtech isn’t a passing trend, women’s health demands don’t vanish when the next hype cycle begins. If the sector continues to be undervalued, the consequences will extend far beyond financial returns. Women will endure unnecessary suffering, preventable conditions will go untreated, and health systems will remain unequipped to serve everyone equally.
Ignoring femtech doesn’t just hurt startups, it hurts society. With women already spending 25% more of their lives in poor health than men, the time to act is now.
(Source: The Next Web)
