GCB Inside – Womenize! with Ruth Lemmen and Madeleine Egger

With leadership positions held almost exclusively by men and just 25 percent of team members being women or non-binary individuals: Despite many efforts toward inclusivity and diversity, women and non-binary individuals still face greater hurdles than their male colleagues in the tech and gaming industries.

Womenize! aims to change that. This series of events and initiatives is specifically and exclusively for women, non-binary people, and other marginalized voices in the gaming and tech industries.

Womenize! is community-oriented, open-minded, and inclusive. The initiative brings together up-and-coming talent with inspiring figures from the gaming and tech industries. What began in 2014 as a networking initiative with email lists has, since 2015, evolved into a major live event featuring workshops, talks, and in-depth discussions.

The 11th edition of Womenize!, held on June 4, 2026, at the Institut Français in Berlin brought 170 attendees to the Ku’damm to see, among others, Candela Ayala Vizán (Partner and Influencer Manager at Gameforge), Anne Sauer (Playing History), Valeria Spirande, Olivia Trigg-Simpson (Kolibri Games), Anna Gruzina (InnoGames), and Leonie Wolf (Fem Devs Meetup).

Of course, current developments in the industry were also on the agenda—such as the recent waves of layoffs in the tech scene or the impact of AI on jobs and coding. A sense of crisis? Not at all! And that’s why Womenize! is so important: Together, we can find much better solutions and new approaches than we can on our own.

I came to Womenize! and it was just … It was magical. The atmosphere, how the people talked to each other. I felt completely safe and I felt welcome. That’s what makes it so special.

My name is Ruth Lemmen. I‘m the co-founder of Womenize! And I’m Madeleine Egger and I’m Head of Womenize!

It is the combination: we have a conference program, where we are putting role models on stage. And then we have workshops, masterclasses where people can really learn from one another.

What we are experiencing now is that due to the geopolitical situation and all over the place, we noticed that the funding is getting less. People are less supported. And this is always impacting marginalized groups in the first place. The stat is staying the same all over the place: across the industry, we have 25% of women in the industry working there and it’s getting less until the leading positions. So you have almost no women in leading positions. So this is really something crucial that needs to be changed.

Womenize! just helps empower so many people here in Berlin and all the other regions we are planning to evolve to. So Womenize! always teaches us new things. I learn so many things through all the speakers and attendees every time. And that’s what I love about this event, that we continue to grow together. We even had those success stories that people were finding their jobs through Womenize! And they were coming as students and the next year they were on stage being, for example, product owner.

I’ve learned so many things since moving to Berlin seven years ago. The city is vibrant, the energy. It’s just the right place for Womenize!, for its home. I think what is special in Berlin is that an event like Womenize! is perfectly well matching the DNA of the city. This is in the first place something that is important and we were very much supported from the very beginning. And that’s something we are really grateful for.

I hope for the future that we are the first place people start looking for speakers. Because in the past so many times we heard “Oh, we didn‘t find a woman”. Or “we didn’t find someone marginalized”. So, we want to build a network. People come here and look for speakers and then people cannot tell us anymore that there are no women because they can find them here.

Published 3 August 2026