22 years of the Hanover Women's Entrepreneurship Center: driving force for sustainable female economic power

© hannoverimpuls GmbH

"For me, the UZH is a power station that helps me generate five-figure sales every month - if you extrapolate that, we're talking about economic power in the millions that is generated here," says entrepreneur Gila Zirfas-Krauel, for example, who offers training, supervision and coaching with her start-up at the Unternehmerinnen-Zentrum Hannover. "I have three children and would never have dared to set up my business without the UZH," says Claudia Völkenig, whose company specializes in supporting gifted children and their families.

Subsidized rents, shared use of conference rooms and office infrastructure, tailored advice and lots of exchange and mutual support - these are the success factors of UZH, which will see its 131st tenant move in next month. With currently29 female entrepreneurs, the UZHisfully occupied and has always had an average occupancy rate of 97 percent in recent years.

"The many years of success confirm the concept of the UZH. There are still good reasons to motivate women even more to become self-employed and to make it easier for them to do so with a women's entrepreneurship center," saysDorisPetersen, Managing Director of hannoverimpuls,"Among other things, women start up more sustainably and for the common good." UZ Hannover GmbH has been a wholly-owned subsidiary of Hannover's business development agency since 2017 - it emerged from the association "Impuls und Praxis e. V. - Innovative Wege für Existenzgründerinnen" in 1997.

The first tenants were able to move in in January 2000. Prior to this, a leasehold contract had been concluded with the LHH and the buildings in Hannover-Linden had been renovated and converted. As part of EXPO 2000, the UZH was selected as the only women's business project in a demanding application process for the worldwide EXPO project "Business of the Future". The "365 Landmarks in the Land of Ideas" competition organized by the "Germany - Land of Ideas" initiative of the Federal Government and German industry recognized the UZH as a particularly innovative and creative location.

Thehannoverimpuls projectGründerinnen-Consults, together with the UZH, is the regional representative for the nationwide female founders' agency bga. Despite all the successes, the fact that one of the structural inequalities between women and men still manifests itself in self-employment remains a challenge for business development in the future: the compatibility of career, family and care work.

For this reason, gender-specific projects have also been developed inclose cooperation with the state capital, Department of Economics,for many years, such as the current "Digitalwerkstatt" project, which supports female founders in the digitalization of their business models. The results for the 20th anniversary of UZH, which is only being celebrated in its 22nd year due to the pandemic, are good: At over 50 percent, the proportion of successful female start-ups in the Hannover Region is well above the national average of around 38 percent - in addition to "Gründerinnen-Consult" and the "Female Health Incubator", this is also a success of the Entrepreneurship Center Hannover. The summer reception, whichwasalsoattendedbyAnja Ritschel,Hanover'sHead of Economic and Environmental Affairs, was therefore an exuberant celebration: A relaxed get-together with snacks and musical accompaniment from the Saxophonics as well asJoulesthe Foxanda poetry slam interlude byJessyJames LaFleur.