Women Invent: 100 women in tech whose names you need to know

Role models deserve recognition, and every time you cite a woman in tech, you’re furthering the message that this industry isn’t just for the boys.

Women in tech are not so rare that they can’t be found, recognised and recalled for reference. It’s easy to rely on famous figureheads such as Elon Musk and Mark Zuckerberg when referencing the tech industry and, indeed, as easy to trot out the same reliable names every time a discussion about women in tech rolls around.

That’s not to diminish anyone’s achievements – you’ll find some instantly recognisable faces below – but we do a disservice to the multitude of women in this industry by allowing so many to exist in relative obscurity.

For three years, Silicon Republic’s Women Invent series has celebrated women in science, technology, engineering and maths and shared their stories. Armed with research telling us about the importance of role models to inspire more women into these fields, we published the first Women Invent 100 in 2014, featuring women across all STEM disciplines both from and working in Ireland.

Women Invent 100: celebrating leading women in tech

Today, we celebrate 100 women in tech from around the world – and we’re glad to say we had to specialise in the T in STEM because of the sheer wealth of suitable candidates. (Look out for more coverage to follow on the leading lights in the other disciplines.)

We found powerful and inspiring tech leaders from home andabroad, as well as phenomenal founders spanning the spectrum of opportunity in tech, plus amazing advocates directly working to change the face of the industry.

We were spoiled for choice, and this list is by no means definitive or based on ranking. It is a diverse collection of names for you to store in your memory bank (or bookmark in your browser) in order to ensure women in tech are part of a broader industry conversation – the kind of inclusive conversation you can expect when many of these women come to Dublin for Inspirefest this summer.