Unemployment rates among women in the MENA region is alarmingly high- in some cases close to a quarter of the female labor force are looking for jobs. This is in view of the fact that female labor force participation in the region is the lowest and in some countries it has declined in the past few years due to the political unrest. Ironically, women’s education has been on the rise for some time. It seems education has not translated into an increase in employment. Perhaps unsurprisingly because it appears that attempts by policy makers at national and international levels to address the unemployment problem have focused on the paths Morocco and Jordon have taken. In both cases labor-intensive manufacturing for export- typically low pay and often coupled with precarious working terms- has been adopted successfully and in both countries employment for women has increased. Yet, one can hardly view these types of employment options as ideal. This paper focuses on how women’s high education can be channeled into small and medium enterprises using their high skill level, especially in the digital world. The paper will draw upon a white paper written for the ADB on the topic of Women’s Economic Empowerment through SMEs in North Africa and reflects on some of the successful examples, such as a recent increase in educated women’s entrepreneurship in virtual spaces and in high tech enterprises. New estimates suggest that well over a third of tech entrepreneurs in the MENA may be women, much higher than the estimated 10% for the rest of the world. It is a very new trend that has come to be called “start-up spring.” New information technologies (IT) offer significant opportunities for the region’s educated women to participate in the economy as SMEs. Indeed such employment may be viewed as a more favorable option than labor-intensive manufacturing for various reasons other than wages. IT allows work to be done via home-based activities and in asynchronous ways, thus facilitating economic activity through flexibility of time and location of work. This possibility could reduce the tensions between labor force participation and social constraints such as gender segregation that are prevalent in the region.