Code First Girls is a company.
Code First Girls has raised $5.0M across 1 funding round.
Key people at Code First Girls.
Code First Girls has raised $5.0M in total across 1 funding round.
Code First Girls (CFG) is a nonprofit organization, not a traditional company, dedicated to closing the gender gap in tech by delivering free coding education to women and non-binary individuals globally.[1][2][4] It offers courses from beginner to advanced levels, including the intensive 16-week CFGdegree in software, full-stack, or data engineering, equipping participants with skills for roles like software engineer, back-end programmer, cloud engineer, and DevOps.[1][5][7] Serving women and non-binaries often underrepresented in tech (where women hold ~17% of roles), CFG solves the diversity and digital skills shortage by providing hard skills, community building, and job placement—boasting a 96% job placement rate, 98% retention, and 130+ employer partners across Europe, USA, India, Middle East, and Africa.[1][2][6] With over 300,000 free learning opportunities delivered and partnerships with firms like Activision Blizzard and Capital One, CFG has scaled massively, training 13,000 women projected in 2020 after starting with 60 annually.[1][2][6]
Launched in 2015 in the UK as a woman-led initiative by tech industry veterans and educators, CFG emerged to address the stark underrepresentation of women in tech, forecasting only 1 qualified woman per 115 roles by 2025.[2][6] Founders drew from their lived experiences navigating male-dominated tech environments to create free coding classes combining skills training with confidence-building community activities, initially training 60 women yearly with 200k hours of education and ties to 40+ employers.[2] Pivotal growth came from explosive demand: within five years, it expanded to project 13,000 trainees in 2020 (surpassing a 20,000 goal), evolving into the world's largest free coding education provider for women, now with a global community from 100+ countries, full-time staff, contractors, and hundreds of volunteer trainers.[1][2][3]
CFG rides the wave of tech's digital transformation and diversity mandates, upskilling marginalized groups amid workforce shortages from automation and growth in software/data roles.[2] Timing aligns with post-2020 remote work booms and corporate DEI pushes, as firms face talent gaps—e.g., Capital One's success recruiting non-traditional candidates.[6] Market forces like global skills demand (Europe to Africa) and gender imbalance (~17% women in tech) favor CFG's model, influencing the ecosystem by diversifying pipelines: alumni fill critical roles, boosting innovation and equity while partners like gaming giants create inclusive cultures.[1][2][7]
CFG's trajectory points to further global expansion, potentially hitting millions in trainees as AI and cloud demand intensifies skills gaps, with trends like hybrid learning and corporate upskilling amplifying its B2B arm.[1][2] Influence may evolve toward policy advocacy and advanced specializations (e.g., AI ethics for women leaders), solidifying its role as tech's diversity engine—transforming "only 1 in 115" forecasts into balanced workforces.[6] This mission-driven scaler exemplifies how free education unlocks talent, echoing its founding promise to rewrite women's tech futures.[2]
Key people at Code First Girls.
Code First Girls has raised $5.0M in total across 1 funding round.
Code First Girls's investors include 20VC, 7percent Ventures, Adverb Ventures, Airtree Ventures, Coatue, Concept Ventures, Felix Capital, Index Ventures, Insight Partners, sequel, StartHer, Sunfish Partners.
Code First Girls has raised $5.0M across 1 funding round. Most recently, it raised $5.0M Series A in September 2022.
| Date | Round | Lead Investors | Other Investors |
|---|---|---|---|
| Sep 1, 2022 | $5.0M Series A | 20VC, 7percent Ventures, Adverb Ventures, Airtree Ventures, Coatue, Concept Ventures, Felix Capital, Index Ventures, Insight Partners, sequel, StartHer, Sunfish Partners, Ian Hogarth, Jonathan Lenson, Tobias Tschoetsch, Tom Blomfield, Verena Pausder |
