DLI and partners of the ATHENA consortium have been awarded program funding from the EU Asylum, Migration and Integration Fund (AMIF) in order to support women of migrant backgrounds across Europe to take up entrepreneurship. Partners to the ATHENA (“Approaches To valorise the High ENtrepreneuriAl potential of migrant women”) project, which will launch in January 2021, include the following:
- The Chamber of Commerce of Seville, Spain
- International Consulting and Mobility Agency of Seville, Spain
- NOVA onlus Social Cooperative, Italy
- IHK Projecktgesellschaft, Germany
- Siauliu Prekybos Pramones Ir Amatu Rumai, Lithuania
- The Hellenic Foundation for European and Foreign Policy, Greece
DLI has also been awarded Erasmus+ funding to lead the WE4Change (“Girls and Women connecting for environmental change”) project, with the mission of increasing entrepreneurship in STEM fields by girls and women through climate change activism. Members of the WE4Change project include the following organisations:
- Stimmuli for Social Change, Greece
- AO Asociatia pentru Dezvoltarea Tehnologiilor Informationale EDUCAT aka GirlsGoIT, Moldova
- ZERO – Associação Sistema Terrestre Sustentável, Portugal
- Empow’Her, France
The DLI team is excited to take up these new projects that support our mission to increase entrepreneurship by girls and women, especially in science and technology fields, in 2021!
22 January 2020 – Uber “Diversity & Inclusion in a Changing World of Work” Luncheon Roundtable (Brussels): 
22 January 2020 – ESBA “New Brand. New Direction” Reception (Brussels): On 22 January in Brussels, 
4 February – EIB Annual Board of Directors Seminar with Civil Society 2020 (Luxembourg): On 4 February, 
11 February – Women in Science Day 2020 (Ghent, Belgium): 
17-18 February – Global Women’s Forum Dubai, We-Fi MENA Summit (Dubai, UAE): On 16-17 February in Dubai, UAE, 
24-27 February – GSMA Mobile World Congress Women4Tech Summit (Barcelona): On 24-27 February, 
6 March – EuroNEXT Bell-ringing & Women in Finance Roundtable (Brussels): In celebration of 
13-14 March – 64th Commission on the Status of Women – Beijing+25 (New York, New York): 
23 March – SHERPA Stakeholder Board Meeting (Brussels): On 23 March in Brussels, 
23 April – Brussels Region Digital Strategy Launch (Brussels): On 23 April, the 
During the event, Move It Forward project teams also benefited from expert mentorship and digital skills trainings–including website development, smartphone app coding, and data visualization–in order to develop initiatives that tackle economic and social challenges impacting the world’s girls and women as a result of COVID19.
24 September 2019 – Geena Davis Institute on Gender and Media Global Symposium (New York): 
14-15 October 2019 – INNOVEIT 2019 Conference (Budapest): On 14-15 October in Budapest,
23 October 2019 – Mobile World Congress – Women4Tech Summit (Los Angeles): On 23 October at the Mobile World 
15-16 November 2019 – Women’s Entrepreneurship Day: DLI joined global celebrations of 2019 Women’s Entrepreneurship Day, that took place around the world with flagship 
21-22 November 2019 – 4IR Conference (Madrid): On 21-22 November in Madrid, 
22 November 2019 – SheDIDIT Closing Event (Ghent, Belgium): 
25-27 November 2019 – SME Assembly (Helsinki): 
2 December 2019 – Work-Life Balance Conference (Brussels): 
Commissioner Gabriel officially opened this year’s celebration of the Ada Awards, affectionately named for Countess Ada Lovelace, the world’s first-ever computer programmer, with a message that technology is “a strategic tool for the empowerment of citizens—of women and of men—that we must continue to use to advance ourselves,” she said. The Commissioner counseled those present to spend less time on embellishments and to focus on taking action when a door is opened, saying she would both hold them to task, and committed to supporting them along the way. The Commissioner closed her message 
Ms. Dee Saigal, United Kingdom – 2019 European Digital Woman of the Year
Selin, from Turkey – 2019 European Digital Girl of the Year “11-14 Years Old”
“15-17 Years Old” Category
Anne, from Belgium – 2019 European Digital Girl of the Year “15-17 Years Old”
Alai-Miranda from Spain – 2019 European Digital Girl of the Year “15-17 Years Old”
Once homeless and a school dropout herself, Nadia’s work focuses on improving the lives of vulnerable groups, through education and creating more interest and enthusiasm surrounding careers within entrepreneurship and the digital sector. Today, she is an avid technologist social/tech entrepreneur, educator, a single mom, and studying cyber-security who seeks to help people evolve in a fast-paced world of technology and business. Nadia’s passion for sharing knowledge and constant learning, most especially improving her tech skills which she hones, birthed She Leads Digital, which is a Brussels based tech organization, aims at providing programs and initiatives that foster enthusiasm and encourage women and youth to pursue careers in science, technology, engineering, and math fields.
Dee Saigal is the Founder, CEO & Creative Director of Erase All Kittens – an adventure game designed to give girls the confidence to code, whilst teaching digital and 21st Century skills. Like many women, Dee grew up believing that careers in technology were more for boys, which is why it took her years to follow her dream of getting into game design – and why she founded EAK. She and her team spent 12 months interviewing hundreds of students before designing their product, in order to create a coding tool that girls genuinely love. EAK has 150,000 players in over 100 countries, and 95% of girls want to learn more about coding after playing. Dee’s goal is for EAK to transform the way that children perceive coding and engineering, and to empower millions of girls worldwide with transferable, digital skills.
Eva is the 21 year old founder of GirlCode, an international nonprofit who aims to reduce the gender gap in the STEM industry by offering free coding lessons to girls of age 7 to 17 in their schools. She also created a mentorship program through which GirlCode students can meet entrepreneurs, scientists, and all-around girl bosses in order to help them find their STEM superstar. 
Tayra is 10 years old and was born and lives in Sofia. Besides the gift of learning foreign languages (at the age of 8 she speaks some German, English, Chinese and Turkish), Tayra has another talent in the field of modern computer technologies. At the age of 8 Tayra participated in the IT Znayko award contest and won a prize for an original idea and, as a member of the Coder Dojo club, won an award from the Bulgarian version of Coolest Projects Sofia 2017. The great victory comes in Dublin, Ireland, at the international competition Coolest Project 2017 involving more than 1,000 children from 17 countries. She won in the Scratch category at Coolest Projects 2017, when she is only 8 years old with her awesome project ABCD Code, which is a Scratch game developed to help children learn about healthy eating and the benefits of fruit and vegetables with the help of Makey Makey. The Healthy Eating project in English and Bulgarian version also became involved in the kindergarten process. She personally organizes and participates in workshops. At the age of 9, on 25.03.2018 she won a special prize from the Softuniada Kids (organized by Software University in Sofia, Bulgaria) with an amazing project (scratch project- “Three bears farytail”with the sign language videos for deaf kids).
Selin is 13 years old and loves building robots and coding also loves animals and travelling. She started coding when she was 8 years old. Selin won first prize in the Hardware category at Coderdojo’s Coolest Projects International in 2018 with iC4U, her robot guide dog for the visually impaired. She was also a finalist in the Open Innovation category of the European Youth Awards 2018. In 2019 she received a 100% educational scholarship and attended a Robotic and Engineering summer camp held at Stanford University. She is presently working on the second version of her robot guide dog, the Raspberry Pi version and on a robot that aims to make life easier in schools and hospitals. She is hoping that her robot will help to make children’s stay in hospital a little easier if only to make them smile. She codes in Python language. She is working on integrating image processing, voice control and artificial intelligence assisted dialogue capabilities in her robot project. her aim is to study robotics at MIT or Stanford University and to build a humanoid. Selin speaks English, Turkish and French, she is also learning Python, C++ and Java. She facilitates workshops, mentors her peers and gives presentations at technology related events in order to inspire others especially girls. She lives in Istanbul, Turkey with her mum, dad and dog Bailey.
Anne Maelbrancke, 15 years old, student at the Bernardustechnicum Oudenaarde, Belgium. Anne has been a member of Coderdojo Belgium since 2014. In 2015 she was confronted with a friend who had to stay at the hospital for quite a long time. She proposed to start an initiative called Clinicoders (
Alai’s passion for STEM began when she was 7 years old. She has experience coding in multiple code languages, and has attended STEM workshops from textile technology to designing and 3D prototyping. In 2019, she was invited to speak at the Amazon Web Services Summit in Madrid to discuss her experience as a girl in technology. Additionally, this past May she was invited by Google to Women TechMakers Alicante to discuss her experience and future projects.