News
Why the #empowHER50 Campaign is a Call to Action to Democratize AI for All
By Chaitra Vedullapalli, Co-Founder, Women in Cloud
As Microsoft marks its 50th anniversary—celebrating five decades of innovation, leadership, and global impact—it’s a powerful moment to honor the people who helped shape the digital economy. Behind Microsoft’s trillion-dollar market shift are not only visionary founders and technologists, but also women whose contributions boldly transformed the world.
For over five decades, women at Microsoft—past and present—have been pioneers, expanding access, scaling innovation, and redefining what’s possible. Leaders like Nathalie D’Hers, Jacky Wright, Amy Hood, Sumit Chauhan, Joy Chik, Gavriella Schuster, Julia White, Dawn Trudeau, Trish Millines Dziko, and Kate Behncken embody the spirit of resilience, inclusion, and purpose that powers Microsoft’s enduring impact.
As we step into the next era of transformation, we rise as a united global force to democratize access, inspire future generations, and prepare women to lead in AI and next-generation technologies. Our collective legacy is a call to action to build a more inclusive, empowered, and prosperous digital economy for all.
That’s why today, with heartfelt gratitude, the Women in Cloud ecosystem is turning the spotlight on these extraordinary women. Through our #empowHER50 campaign, we proudly honor over fifty exceptional leaders who have helped power Microsoft’s trillion-dollar market shift and built the digital infrastructure driving today’s global economy. These women have democratized access to technology, created economic opportunities, and opened doors for millions. Today, we celebrate their impact, amplify their stories, and express our deepest appreciation for shaping a more inclusive and empowered future for all.
Their stories show that when women lead in tech, everyone gains.
Four Stories That Will Change How You See the Future
Here are powerful stories from the #empowHER50 honorees that will move you—and show how women have been instrumental in powering Microsoft’s trillion-dollar shift and democratizing computing access.
Yanna Andronopoulou: Building AI Access Across Europe
In Southeast Europe, Yanna Andronopoulou has been quietly leading a movement to bridge the digital divide. As Microsoft’s General Manager for Greece, Cyprus, Malta, and sponsor of Women Employee Resource Group (ERG), she launched the Women’s AI Hackathon across nine countries, attracting over 900 applicants and equipping 100 women with AI skills to shape the digital future in their communities. Her leadership extended beyond events—Yanna drove Greece’s largest AI skills program, AI School 360, ensuring 50% female participation, and partnered with local organizations to upskill 4,000+ women with digital literacy and career opportunities. Her work earned Microsoft Greece the Inclusivity Award and recognition as an international advocate for equity in tech.
“Together, we can ignite change and shape a future where women not only thrive but lead in technology,” Yanna reminds us.”
Gavriella Schuster: Architecting Allyship and Access
Gavriella Schuster is a force behind the structural shifts that expanded access for women in technology. As a Corporate Vice President at Microsoft, she not only transformed the company’s partner ecosystem but also became a global advocate for inclusion. Gavriella sponsored the creation of The WIT Network, now spanning 11,000+ members across 76 countries, providing mentorship and technical certifications to women in tech. She co-founded Women in Cloud, helping over 120,000 women access economic opportunities and cloud marketplaces.
Beyond corporate leadership, Gavriella has personally mentored over 100 women, launched mentorship rings, and delivered a TEDx talk calling for 8 million women to enter tech. She developed allyship training programs now used by Fortune 500 leaders to create inclusive cultures.
“If a person who is an ONLY in any group has an ally, they are not alone, #ALLIES step up in the moments that matter through the little acts they practice every day to turn moments of exclusion into moments of inclusion. ” Gavriella says—a message that has fueled a global movement.“
Jenny Lay-Flurrie: Making Technology Accessible for 1.3 Billion People
Jenny Lay-Flurrie’s story is a masterclass in how technology can be truly inclusive. As Microsoft’s Chief Accessibility Officer (CAO), Jenny leads one of the world’s most comprehensive accessibility initiatives, designed to empower the 1.3 billion people with disabilities worldwide.
Accessibility at Microsoft began in 1995 with Windows 95, but under Jenny’s leadership since 2016, it became an all-company movement. She helped embed accessibility training into the culture, reaching over 5 million people globally, ensuring every Microsoft employee knows how to create inclusive experiences.
From launching products like Read Aloud, Immersive Reader, Windows Captions, and Eye Control—used by millions monthly—to pioneering innovations like the Xbox Adaptive Controller, Jenny and her team have made it clear that accessible technology benefits everyone. She also championed hiring initiatives such as the Neurodiversity Hiring Program and led Microsoft’s Ability Summit, which grew from 20 attendees to over 20,000 participants in 2025.
“Accessibility makes technology easier for everyone,” Jenny says. Her work is proof that inclusive design isn’t optional; it’s essential.”
Melissa Mulholland: Turning Personal Adversity Into Industry Impact
For Melissa Mulholland, technology and impact are inseparable. While at Microsoft, she confronted a life-altering moment when her unborn son was diagnosed with a rare and life-threatening condition. That experience reshaped her perspective on how AI could be used to improve healthcare outcomes.
As Director of Business Strategy at Microsoft, she began advocating for the responsible use of AI in patient care. Today, as CEO of Crayon, she leads efforts to apply AI in healthcare at scale, including partnerships with Oslo University Hospital to enhance cancer screening and real-time patient monitoring.
Mulholland’s story illustrates how personal experience can sharpen a leader’s vision—and how technology, when grounded in purpose, can drive lasting change.
The Power of Collective: Women in Cloud’s Impact
The #empowHER50 campaign is part of a broader movement to democratize economic access for women in technology. At Women in Cloud, we have built a global platform to remove barriers and create pathways to opportunity. Over the past five years:
- Generated $500M+ in economic impact, supporting 120,000+ members worldwide.
- Empowered 5,000+ women in 80+ countries with Microsoft AI and cybersecurity certifications, accelerating their careers in DevSecOps.
- Engaged 4 million+ individuals globally through 300+ events and 32 industry partnerships, including setting a Guinness World Record for the largest vision board video hangout.
- Launched the empowHERaccess Prestige Awards, recognizing 2,500+ women, allies, and organizations driving inclusive innovation.
- Received formal recognition through Washington Senate Resolution 8621, honoring Women in Cloud’s role in inspiring women and girls in technology.
We believe that access to technology is access to opportunity, and when we invest in women, we invest in the future.
A Historic Celebration: Honoring the Women Who Powered Microsoft’s Trillion-Dollar Shift
As Microsoft marks its 50th anniversary, it’s time to recognize the women whose innovation, leadership, and vision helped shape the digital economy. The #empowHER50 campaign highlights those who expanded access, built critical infrastructure, and helped drive Microsoft’s trillion-dollar market shift—women who changed the trajectory of technology for billions.
Their contributions underscore a clear truth: inclusion is not optional—it’s a competitive advantage. The next trillion-dollar shift in tech will be defined by who builds it.
Join us on July 18, 2025, at the empowHERaccess Awards and Recognition Gala to celebrate the women who helped shape Microsoft and the global tech industry—and connect with those building what’s next.
Their stories shaped our present. Your presence will shape the future.
Women’s health has become one of the most searched and shared topics online, from cycle syncing and cortisol management to menopause hacks, supplements, hormone testing and clinician-creator content.
That surge in attention, sometimes dubbed “healthmaxxing,” is changing how women find, evaluate and act on health information, and it is starting to reshape the relationship between patients, clinicians and the companies building products for this market.
For providers, the shift means patients are arriving better informed but also more exposed to unverified claims, putting pressure on clinicians to engage with online narratives rather than dismiss them.
For femtech and pharma companies, it opens a route to reach and educate consumers at scale, but also raises the stakes on credibility: products and messaging that ride the trend without clinical grounding risk eroding the trust the industry has spent years building.
Investors are watching the same dynamic from a different angle.
Attention-driven demand can be a signal of where the next wave of femtech growth will come from, but distinguishing genuine clinical need from viral momentum is increasingly part of due diligence.
The net effect is a widening gap between companies that treat cultural attention as a distribution channel for credible, evidence-based care, and those that risk being swept up in trends with little clinical substance behind them.
How that gap plays out will shape patient trust, clinical relationships and commercial opportunity across the women’s health industry for years to come.
These themes will be explored in more depth in an upcoming webinar, “Women’s Healthmaxxing: The Opportunity & Risks of Cultural Attention for the Women’s Health Industry,” hosted by the Women’s Health Innovation Summit (WHIS), featuring Ellen Wilcox (Listen Ventures), Jessica Bell van der Wal (Frame Fertility), Dr. Tosin Sotubo-Ajayi (NHS, BBC and more) and Nora Lansen (Elektra Health).
Register free for the webinar on 23 July 2026 at https://events.virtualpro.com/womens-health-series-webinar-july-2026/registration
More young midwives are leaving the NHS before 35 as burnout adds pressure to stretched maternity services, new research has revealed.
The trend has raised concerns about the quality and safety of care for mothers and babies in understaffed maternity units.
During 2025-26, 1,669 midwives aged 34 or under left the health service in England, representing 57 per cent of the 2,949 midwives of all ages who resigned.
The pressures of maternity care, including increasingly complex childbirth and the risks involved, are thought to be among the factors behind the trend.
Hannah Leonard, deputy chief midwife at the Royal College of Midwives, said the exodus of midwives under 35 was “deeply worrying” and showed that too many were ending up “burnt-out within a few years of qualifying because every shift means too few colleagues, missed breaks and unpaid hours”.
She added: “Losing these midwives, and students, even before they qualify, is a terrible waste of talent.”
The figures, revealed in parliamentary questions tabled by the Liberal Democrats, show that 205 of last year’s younger leavers were under 25, while 655 were aged 25 to 29 and 809 were aged 30 to 34.
The number of midwives under 35 leaving the NHS has risen sharply in recent years. The 2025-26 figure was 59 per cent higher than the 1,051 who left in 2014-15, according to NHS figures.
Burnout means long-term physical and emotional exhaustion, often linked to sustained pressure at work.
Separate figures obtained by the Liberal Democrats suggest almost one in four midwifery students are leaving before completing their three-year degree.
In 2021, 3,565 students started a midwifery degree, but 2,725 graduated in 2024, meaning 840, or 24 per cent, did not complete the course.
Midwifery students spend much of their second and third years learning on the job in maternity units.
The loss of staff and students underlines what the Royal College of Midwives has described as a “staffing emergency” in maternity care across the UK.
A recent survey by the Royal College of Midwives found that three-quarters of midwives had considered leaving the profession over the last year, mainly because of concerns over staffing levels and patient safety.
Both recent large-scale reviews of maternity care in England, led by Donna Ockenden and Valerie Amos, identified staffing shortages as a key problem affecting patient safety.
Helen Morgan, the Liberal Democrat health spokesperson, said: “These statistics reveal an alarming crisis in maternity, with far too many midwives burning out early in their career and in their training. Patients are paying the price, and mothers are left with no alternative but to give birth on understaffed and unsafe wards.
“Rather than throw money at yet more new recruits who quit under intolerable pressure, the government needs a new approach. Through guaranteeing protected, year-round training and professional development we can help midwives cope with rising complexity and risk.”
About 10 per cent of all midwives leave the NHS each year.
However, the figures show higher leaving rates among younger midwives, with one in seven, or 14.6 per cent, of those aged 25 to 29 and one in six, or 16.6 per cent, of those aged 30 to 34 leaving during 2025-26.
A Department of Health and Social Care spokesperson said: “Under this government we have a record number of midwives in the workforce and we value the vital service they provide in maternity and neonatal units across the country.
“To make the NHS the best employer it can be, we have introduced new NHS staff standards to improve health and wellbeing support, promote flexible working, as well as crucial measures to tackle violence, sexual harassment or abuse and racism.
“Alongside consecutive above-inflation pay rises, we’ve bolstered the midwifery workforce through our graduate guarantee and recently opened up 1,000 more midwifery roles backed by £10m to help prevent student midwives leaving the profession.”
Department of Health and Social Care figures show a record 25,500 full-time-equivalent midwives are working in the NHS, 2,000 more than when the Labour government took office in July 2024.
Nearly six in ten young women get health and wellness advice from influencers, new research shows.
Women aged 18 to 29 were more likely than young men to use online influencers for health information.
The topics included beauty, alternative medicine, mental health, weight loss and fitness.
The Pew Research study found that 57 per cent of women aged 18 to 29 said they get health and wellness information from online influencers, 10 percentage points higher than young men.
While Americans still mostly rely on healthcare providers, the research suggests social media influencers also play a major role in how young people find health advice.
Among women who get health and wellness information from influencers, 51 per cent said they often hear about beauty and appearance, compared with 18 per cent of men.
Young women were also around twice as likely as young men to say they see content about alternative medicine, meaning treatments or health practices used outside mainstream medical care.
A third or more of both young men and young women said they often hear about mental health and weight loss from influencers.
Around half or more of both groups said they often see fitness content.
When asked why they seek health and wellness information from influencers, around half of young women said they wanted to make a change to their health or lifestyle.
That compared with 37 per cent of young men.
The research also found that 23 per cent of young women said hearing from people who share their background or beliefs was one reason they used influencers, compared with 14 per cent of young men.
A further 19 per cent of young women said they learnt about things they did not want to ask their doctor, compared with 10 per cent of young men.
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