New survey: Startup founders are postponing parenthood
An international survey conducted by Maria 01, one of Europe’s startup communities, reveals that startup culture significantly affects founders’ decisions about starting a family. More than half of childless founders have delayed having children due to entrepreneurial pressures, and nearly one in four feel they must choose between entrepreneurship and family life.
The qualitative survey was conducted in autumn 2025 in collaboration with Bamla, a Helsinki-based strategic communications agency. It gathered anonymous responses from 55 startup founders, CEOs, and aspiring founders across 9 countries. It is the first dedicated effort in the European startup ecosystem to map how founders experience the intersection of entrepreneurship and family life.
Among founders who are already parents, almost one in five delayed having children and over 14% limited the number of children they planned to have due to the demands of building a company. Half of parent founders report feeling stressed always or almost always trying to balance startup life and family. Among those without children, two thirds said entrepreneurship has influenced their thinking about starting a family.
“Across Europe, birth rates are at historic lows just as we urgently need more founders to drive the next wave of growth. We cannot afford to choose between the two. If we want more founders, more innovation, and healthier demographics, the structures around work, care, and entrepreneurship must change. Founders’ struggles with parenthood are not personal failings, but they do reflect deeper cultural norms and rigid systems that the entire ecosystem needs to rethink,” says Sarita Runeberg, CEO of Maria 01.
Cultural prejudices around parenthood remain a significant barrier, particularly for women. Female founders report hiding pregnancies from investors and avoiding startup events whilst visibly expecting. Many feel judged or perceived as investment risks for wanting children. Meanwhile, male founders taking parental leave is still not normalised in the startup ecosystem. Founders across the board describe wanting a culture where parenthood is visible, accepted, and not equated with a lack of career ambition.
“When I founded Yummy, I thought the toughest part would be building the business. In reality, the hardest part was what it did to my family life. Ironically, becoming a parent has made me a better entrepreneur, more focused, excellent at prioritising. But the ecosystem doesn’t necessarily make it easy to be both,” says Juhana Rintala, founder and CEO of Yummy.
The broader startup ecosystem is described as neutral at best and often hostile towards parenthood, even though immediate teams tend to be supportive. Grind culture, investor-driven pressure, and unrealistic expectations make it difficult to combine early-stage entrepreneurship with family life. Founders call for an outcome-focused culture with greater flexibility in time, location, and pace, rather than one driven by long hours and burnout.
The survey was conducted primarily among Nordic-based founders, making its findings all the more striking: even in the region with Europe’s most generous family policies, startup culture appears to operate by its own rules. Yet the results are not entirely bleak. Most founders believe parenthood actually enhances their performance, citing sharper focus, better prioritisation, and less tolerance for performative busywork. Many also highlighted the flexibility of entrepreneurship as a potential enabler of family life, if the ecosystem’s cultural norms would allow it.
“My life consists of three things right now: family, work, and sports. There’s no room for anything else, really. I wouldn’t have it any other way either, I’m incredibly happy to be a parent and proud of what we’re building at Measurlabs. I think we should be honest about what entrepreneurship actually costs. The startup world talks constantly about building sustainable companies, but rarely about whether the people building them are ok with the cost,” says Teemu Myllymäki, CEO and co-founder of Measurlabs.
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