Mediterranean Tech Women Festival
30 November 2022, Madrid. As technology becomes ever more integrated in our societies and everyday lives, it is of critical importance to foster equal opportunities for women and girls to contribute to the emergent digital economy. Within this context, Mediterranean Tech Women Network Festival (MTWNFestival), organized by Womenpreneur initiative and supported by UfM, seeks to foster empowerment and development in the future innovative industries.
The Mediterranean Tech Women Network connects women across the Mediterranean for networking, learning and exchanging about talent, opportunities, and support. The aim is to fill the gap and create the first Mediterranean Network for Women working or wishing to engage in the technological sector.
According to the April 2021 UNESCO Science Report “The Race against Time for Smarter Development,” women now represent 33% of all scientific researchers. However, in the fields most important to the so-called Fourth Industrial Revolution (engineering, computing, physics, mathematics)—and in which there continue to be shortages of skilled laborers—women are still in the minority. Female-friendly start-ups still struggle to access adequate funding, with only 2% of all venture capital secured funneled to those founded by women.
In order to effectively tackle the current gaps, it is essential to address hostile work environments, parity in senior leadership, support for female STEM academics, and equitable educational opportunities.
For these and other reasons, MTWN provides spaces that expose women in tech to new skills, job prospects, and role models. MTWN focuses on creating sustainable economic opportunities for women by investing not only in training, but advocacy and policymaking centered on long-term economic collaboration in tech industries across Mediterranean countries.
MTWN is an initiative that followed Womenpreneur’s “Mediterranean Tech Women Week” (MTWW) in 2020 and the launching event in 2021.
This year MTWNFestival will take place at the Hotel RIU Plaza España, in Madrid, Spain, on 30 November 2022 from 8h30 to 19h CET.
The aim of the MTWNFestival is to connect female leaders across borders to create and multiply opportunities in the technology field for women and to provide role models for girls interested in STEM (science, technology, engineering, and math) careers. The goal is to encourage dialogue amongst stakeholders and women representatives on common topics and concerns—but with different regional and cultural backgrounds—which shall contribute to bridging the considerable gap in knowledge and capacity between EU and non-EU countries and strengthen transnational economic collaboration.
MTWNFestival will :
- Connect women through community support and spaces of synergy that generate economic opportunities across the Mediterranean;
- Give exposure to the successful stories of women in tech & innovative spaces;
- Support, train, and encourage female tech entrepreneurship that grows local economies and boosts job creation;
- Support women’s skills and resilience in times of crisis;
- Engage in advocacy about issues related to women’s economic capital in and access to tech fields.
The one-day event will gather inspiring talks on the issue, as well as a discussion on the Mediterranean Hub of the Future, a debate on the adequate investment in Tech Entrepreneurship and on how AI can change the future of humanity and therefore the importance of the involvement of women within that change. At the end of the event, a series of awards will be handed out to women tech leaders for their hard work, dedication, and creativity.
Register to the event here.
