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Hi Sifted Reader,

It's that time of year again: your Twitter feed is full to the brim with companies' International Women's Day messaging. And, if your startup isn't perhaps doing as much as it could be around diversity, equity and inclusion, you might be wondering whether you should hire an in-house head of DEI...

Today, our opinion writer Laura Smith shares a checklist to run through before anointing someone with the often-poisoned DEI chalice, plus: 

• How can Europe wean itself off Russian power?
• The biggest salary hikes in UK tech last year
• Europe's revenue-based financing competitors, compared

Do you want to do more around diversity, equity and inclusion at your startup?

Then hire a head of DEI! Or... perhaps don't.

Read this from Laura Smith, former head of DEI for Estonian mobility giant Bolt, first.

Grow by SAP is a programme for hypergrowth companies. Sign up for a dedicated package designed to help your startup grow, supported by a customer success executive.

Get more information here.

Putin’s invasion of Ukraine has accelerated Europe’s need to end its dependency on Russian oil and gas, so Sifted is taking a deep dive into the European startups with the most innovative energy solutions.

One of them is Estonian startup Fermi Energia, which believes nuclear is the answer.

It's already working on small nuclear reactors, and if everything goes to plan, the first nuclear reactor in Estonia could be up and running by the early 2030s. 

Mimi Billing finds out how this could power thousands of homes. 

18 (!) revenue-based financing (RBF) startups have been founded in Europe since 2019 — and last year alone they raised $671m. 

That means it's a bit of a land grab for them startups right now. But what do the likes of Uncapped, Silvr and Capchase actually do? Who's got the most dosh? And how do they plan to grab customers before their rivals do? 

Amy O'Brien spoke to founders and investors to find out.

It’s a good time to be a jobseeker in European tech. 

And it's a really good time to be a data scientist on the hunt for a pay bump or a new role, according to jobs platform Otta. 

Kai Nicol-Schwarz helps you work out if you're due a pay rise.

📗 London-based startup Apolitical has just raised a £5m Series A, which included participation from Kevin Efrusy, the lead investor for Accel’s legendary bet on Facebook. Apolitical is building a learning platform for government employees, and its key focus is climate change. 

🛸 Flying taxi company Volocopter has poached Airbus’s former CEO. Dirk Hoke will take over as CEO in September, as the company gears up to offer flying taxi services at the Paris Olympics in 2024. Yes, you read that right. It just raised a $170m Series E to do exactly that. 

🧨 Job titles matter in a startup — so take the time to get them right. Laura Warnier, chief growth officer at GoStudent, has seen first-hand how a decent title can keep employees motivated — and what founder doesn't want that? 

🇺🇦 Members of Europe's startup community in Ukraine are taking up arms, donating blood and hacking Russian websites to defend their country. We suspect that you, like us at Sifted, are looking for ways to support them — so we've updated our list of initiatives here. 

It's International Women's Week at Sifted HQ. Here are some of our articles highlighting women in Europe's startup ecosystem:

👩💻 Our recently updated list of 270+ European female VC partners, covering every corner of the continent and every vertical known to tech — read it here. 

🦸♀️ 130+ women CTOs in Europe. A list.

👩🏾 40+ Black and mixed-race women founders in Europe. From Sweden to Switzerland, these Black and mixed-raced women are building biotech businesses, banking apps and more. Meet them here.

💁♀️ The VCs who’ve backed the most female founders. Women currently scoop up just 1.3% of all VC funding in Europe. See what percentage of the deals done by European wealthiest VCs were into companies with a woman founder here.

👼 100+ active women angel investors in Europe. Let us know who's missing from this list — we'll be updating it this week.

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