Women have driven some of the most profound shifts in industry and society, with breakthroughs in digital technology and security today. In Ukraine, for instance, Maria Berlinska has redefined modern warfare by training drone operators and championing women’s integration into the Armed Forces. Yet despite such achievements, the glass ceiling still looms large, casting its shadow even over the most forward-looking sectors.
In the European Union, women account for just 26% of senior defense ministers, even as this figure has more than doubled over the past decade.
Defense is far from the only field where women remain underrepresented. With today’s spotlight, building on earlier efforts to showcase female achievements across the ecosystem, we aim to highlight some of the prominent women shaping defense tech in Central and Eastern Europe.
If you’d like to suggest someone for our upcoming spotlights, don’t hesitate to drop us a line at teodora@therecursive.com.
Ukraine
Eveline Buchatskiy
Managing Partner, D3 Defense Tech Fund
Eveline is the Founding Managing Partner at D3, a seed-stage venture fund dedicated to defense-tech startups that “Dare to Defend Democracy”. With over a decade of experience scaling high-growth startups, Eveline has backed roughly 100 companies across multiple sectors, including during her time as a director at Techstars Boston Accelerator.
Kateryna Bezsudna
Co-founder of Defence Builder
Bezsudna is an entrepreneur and strategist, best known as the co-founder and ex-CEO of Defence Builder, a defence-tech startup accelerator launched in 2023 to help Ukrainian innovators transition from prototype to scalable solutions and secure funding. She stepped down as CEO in September 2025, remaining a co-founder as the organization transitions to broader international outreach. Kateryna is also the co-founder of Buntar Aerospace, a Ukrainian startup developing UAV solutions for long-range reconnaissance missions.
Maria Berlinska
Co-founder of Victory Drones / Dignitas
She is a Ukrainian military volunteer and women’s rights advocate. After serving as a drone operator in Donbas, she founded a free aerial reconnaissance school and has since championed women’s integration into the Armed Forces. She coordinated the Invisible Battalion reports, produced films on women veterans, co-founded the Women’s Veteran Movement NGO, and helped drive legal reforms on gender equality in the military.
Nataliia (Natalia) Kushnerska
COO at Roboneers
Nataliia Kushnerska is a defense technology leader with over 15 years of experience in project management and events. In early 2023, she became the founding leader of Brave1, Ukraine’s premier defense-tech cluster, uniting startups, government agencies, and investors to accelerate battlefield-ready innovation across UAVs, robotics, AI, and electronic warfare. Currently, she is the COO at the Ukrainian defense tech startup Roboneers.
Viktoriia Yaremchuk
Co-Founder & CEO, Farsight Vision
Viktoriia Yaremchuk is the co-founder and CEO of Farsight Vision, a Ukrainian–Estonian defense-tech company specializing in UAV data processing, geospatial analysis, and 3D terrain modeling for battlefield intelligence. Her company’s digital-twin mapping technologies have been deployed by Ukraine’s Armed Forces and other security services since 2024 and are now part of defense innovation clusters like Brave1 and IRON Cluster.
Czech Republic
Lucie Brešová
Partner, Presto Tech Horizons
Lucie Brešová is a Partner at Presto Tech Horizons, a Czech-based venture fund backed by Presto Ventures and industrial giant Czechoslovak Group (CSG), focused on defense, security, and dual-use technology investments across NATO and allied countries. Under her leadership, the fund has made early investments in frontier technologies such as AI-driven acoustic battlefield detection systems (Vidar Systems), autonomous drone navigation (Bavovna AI), and enterprise automation tools with potential for defense logistics (Tur.ai).
Baltics
Brigita Bimbiraitė
Head of Operations, ScaleWolf
Brigita Bimbiraitė is the Head of Operations at ScaleWolf VC, a Vilnius-based venture capital firm and accelerator focused on dual-use technologies with both defense and commercial applications.
Sille Pettai
CEO, SmartCap
Sille Pettai is the CEO and Fund Manager at SmartCap, Estonia’s state-backed venture capital firm managing over €400 million in assets. At SmartCap, she leads three core funds, including a groundbreaking SmartCap Defence Fund, which supports growth and innovation in the defense sector.
Viktorija Trimbel
Managing Director, Coinvest Capital
Viktorija Trimbel is a venture capital leader serving as Managing Director at Coinvest Capital, a sovereign VC fund that has co-invested over €35 million in Lithuanian startups, including €6.3 million in defense, dual-use, and aerospace ventures since March 2023. She brings over 30 years of experience as a certified board member, digital entrepreneur, and strategic advisor.
Poland
Izabela Albrycht
Director, AGH Cybersecurity Centre
Dr. Izabela Albrycht is the Director of the Cybersecurity Centre and Rector’s Plenipotentiary for NATO DIANA Accelerator at AGH University of Kraków. Her role aims to bridge academia, cyber policy, and defense innovation. She has served on Poland’s Council for Digitization and the Security and Defence Council under the National Development Council, and represented Poland in NATO’s Advisory Group for Emerging and Disruptive Technologies (2020–2022).
Slovakia
Simona Franková
CEO and co-founder, NG Aviation
Simona Franková is the CEO and co-founder of NG Aviation, a Slovak startup dedicated to the digital transformation of both civil and military aviation industries through unified data platforms and streamlined information exchange.
