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Pub. Date
Duration
Clone Wars, Euro-Meme Stocks & Magic Mushrooms
21 Feb 2026
00:42:47
For the week's latest news behind the headlines affecting European Venture, startups and investing.
Hosts: Dan Bowyer, Lomax Ward Guest: Eyal Malinger — Co-founder, Resurge Growth Partners (venture equity — the gap between VC and PE)
[02:18] Humanoid Robots at China's Spring Festival Gala Four Chinese firms showed off cable-free dancing robots. Eyal's reaction progression: "game over" → "Clone Wars" → "why are there swords near children?" China controls ~90% of humanoid shipments. H1/G1 robots going for $6-10K. Europe has… Neuro Robotics and OverSonic at Series A. Cool.
[05:59] Will Robots Replace Soldiers? Eyal: if you don't need to risk soldiers, you will use them. Lomax: nukes still deter total war, but skirmishes could proliferate. Everyone: yes, we'd have a robot butler. Lomax: depends on the price (he lives in Portugal).
[10:57] Raspberry Pi — Europe's First Meme Stock? Stock pumped after CEO bought shares + Reddit hype around OpenClaw. Trading at ~£600M. Edge AI debate ensues. Lomax: "Isn't this a time to celebrate Europe finally has its own meme stock?"
[14:36] AI Causing a Fuss: Anthropic vs The Pentagon Anthropic doesn't want autonomous kill decisions. Eyal channels Palantir's Alex Karp: "Our adversaries will not pause for theatrical debate." Lomax: Dario wants to have his cake and eat it. Everyone broadly agrees ethics are a luxury when the other side doesn't play by the rules.
[17:19] Peter Steinberger Leaves Europe for OpenAI Created OpenClaw, Europe celebrated for two weeks, then he bounced to San Francisco. Lomax: "I thought things had got better." Dan: who in Europe could've called him? Eyal: if he'd been in London instead of Austria, maybe different story. Cue weekly EU ecosystem lament. Macron pledged €30M for AI. Anthropic just raised $30B. Right.
[24:00] VC AI Toolkits — David Stark Open-Sources His Setup WhatsApp meeting briefs, auto-transcription, deal flow into HubSpot. Lomax calls it "cute." Eyal: most of this is just Zapier with extra steps. Real alpha = agentic AI that sources and approaches founders autonomously. Dan: if everyone has Harmonic, nobody has alpha.
[31:00] Munich Security Conference Recap 62nd edition. Rubio slightly less abrasive than JD Vance (low bar). Merz says the old order is over. Starmer accelerating UK defence spend to 3%. Stark (drones) raised big from Founders Fund — German defence minister uncomfortable with Peter Thiel on the cap table. Sovereignty debates continue. Lomax: "You can't tell Europe to be sovereign then beat them for being sovereign."
[37:56] Health & Bio Good News Compass Pathways nails second Phase 3 trial for synthetic psilocybin treating resistant depression — could be on market by 2027. Savo Health working on non-invasive CGM patches (goodbye arm claws).
[39:56] Deals of the Week
Quantonation — largest European quantum fund ever
Ineffable — $1B seed (!!) at $4B pre-money, led by Sequoia. David Silver (AlphaGo architect) leaves DeepMind
Netflix / Warner Bros M&A — Eyal hopes it signals FTC/DOJ reopening the exit valve for VC and PE
[42:30] Fin. 🎙️
Is AI Simply Making Work More Fun?
14 Feb 2026
00:46:42
01:52 - Anthropic's Insane $30B Round Started as $10B rumour, became $20B in January, closed at $30B.
03:21 - The Great Model Migration Sam finally kicked OpenAI off his iPhone homepage. Claude's in.
08:23 - Claude Code: Mads' Love Letter Mads hasn't looked back since discovering Claude Code's skills and agentic workflows. It's not just better writing anymore—it's a whole different way of working.
09:36 - HBR Report: AI Makes Us Work MORE Generative AI isn't reducing work, it's intensifying it. Turns out when you can do everything yourself, you just... do everything yourself. Constant dopamine hits.
14:07 - AI as Your Second Opinion Mads fed his DNA and blood work to an LLM.
19:38 - Alphabet's 100-Year Bond Google just raised £5B more than expected. Priced like government bonds. Too big to fail, baby.
22:59 - Your Pension is Funding US Hyperscalers €35 trillion in European savings. None of these pension holders know they're financing 100-year bonds for Google. The rules say "minimise volatility," not "maximise returns." Cool cool cool.
26:31 - European Sovereignty: Words → Action? Merz and von der Leyen saying the quiet parts loud. Two-tier EU? 28th regime? Ignoring planning rules? Also Mistral going from $25M to $400M run rate with a full sovereign stack (no US tech).
27:31 - "What Even Is an AI Business?" If you're not using AI for what you're doing... what ARE you doing? Material science? Better use AI. Biotech? Better use AI.
30:32 - The Only Office Suite Update Was Google European governments spend billions yearly on decades-old Microsoft IP. Open source alternatives exist. Nobody cares.
31:28 - Mistral: Not Dead, Actually Dan had written them off. Turns out they're crushing it with enterprise. Not a chatbot play—it's consultancy + transformation + Anthropic-level models.
34:50 - The China Manufacturing Model, Reversed German manufacturers using Chinese AI for factories? Probability: nil to zero. Regional fragmentation + massive AI growth = very large companies serving regional markets.
35:42 - Europe Finally Saying It Out Loud Von der Leyen threatening breakaway subset unless countries get on board. Big words from the "protein" European government. Tax attempts always flounder but... momentum feels different?
38:07 - Space: Orbex Down, Data Centres Up? UK's Orbex (low-carbon micro launcher) filed for administration. £49M debt. Government didn't support. Meanwhile: Elon eyeing Google's orbital data centre research.
40:45 - Billionaires Should Burn Capital McCalip's plea: goad more billionaires into irrational high-variance projects that advance civilisation. "No one cares about your Loro Piana." Build cathedrals. Fund ugly metal. Light up corners of the future.
42:00 - Europe's Launch Problem No European small launcher has reached orbit. Not one. Airbus worked because we collaborated. Launch requires same logic. "We are mid-sized countries pretending we're still empires."
43:15 - Fusion: Europe's Real Shot? Should Europe double down on quantum and fusion instead of chasing AI? Mads: "Fix capital markets union first." Everything circles back.
45:04 - Deal of the Week: Olix 25-year-old British founder James de Combe raised £220M at $1B+ valuation for AI inference chips. Also runs Comind (raised £100M as a teenager). Is this our Elon without the red cap?
46:22 - Upside Closeout "Nothing happens until somebody decides to do something." More entrepreneurs. Less standing in their way.
Hosted by Dan Bowyer & Mads JensenGuest: Sam Marchant
Europe’s Comeback - Brexit 2.0 - Another ‘Code Red’ & Roll Up Roll Ups
06 Dec 2025
00:45:57
Upside #69 - For the real news behind the headlines affecting European venture, startups and investing. Every week Mads, Lomax, Andrew and myself (Dan) get together and chat.
Bending Spoons
01:27 Berkshire-like roll-up; mostly debt-funded; big integration/tech-debt execution risk.
3:30 “US→Italy arbitrage”—cut expensive US costs, rebuild with top Italian talent + high-efficiency culture; cash-cow ops; high employee satisfaction.
05:13 Success likely hinges on better distribution/ops than previous owners.
Brexit + Europe’s challenges
07:01 “trade intensity” vs G7—UK uniquely diverging down since 2019; services don’t offset goods loss.
09:20 Labour red lines may shift; customs union helps goods but politically messy (standards).
12:30 VW/Europe: China competition + governance/union constraints; Europe slow to reform; supply-chain ripple risks.
23:00 Ecosystem fix: more R&D, talent/immigration, cut red tape, govt as buyer; biggest issue = late-stage capital/pensions.
AI Corner 32:20 OpenAI “code red” on Google; distribution battle; OpenAI focusing on product vs ads/monetisation.
36:03 Winners = product + distribution + cost at scale (Google infra/TPUs advantage).
39:03 Anthropic IPO rumours (2026) debated: access to bigger pools vs “top of cycle” cynicism.
Deal of the week 41:54 Black Forest Labs — $300m at $3.25bn; image-model leader; strong ARR rumoured.
43:13 ICEYE — €200m at ~€2.5bn; SAR satellites; defence demand.
44:05 Expedition Growth Capital fundraise — €323m.
44:23 Neurocore — ~$2.5m; platform tooling for robotics ML teams.
God AI - A German Ecosystem Deepdive - Part Time VCs - Google Hot Or Not?
29 Nov 2025
00:50:17
Upside #68 w/ Robin Haak (Robin Capital), Lomax (Outsized), Mads and Dan (SuperSeed).
Topics: Germany’s slowdown • Social media bans • UK budget • Solo GPs • N26 • Europe vs Big Tech • AI Corner
01:21 – Robin’s Background
100+ investments, 8 unicorns. Co-founded SmartRecruiters → sold to SAP ($100M ARR). Former GP at Revaya (€600M AUM). Now building a 50-year solo GP franchise.
03:58 – Social Media Ban for Under-16s
Mads: EU Parliament pushes advisory resolution; strong evidence social media harms teen mental health, especially girls.
06:39 – US Says “Go Easy on Big Tech”
Lomax: US Commerce voices warn EU that tech regulation ties into trade/tariff negotiations. Don’t conflate antitrust with child safety—two different battles.
10:00 – UK Budget
Improved EMI stock options - More flexible EIS / VCT rules. Nice to hear a Chancellor talk about startups & innovation.
12:17 – EU Space Surveillance
ESA launches its first military space programme (€1B). Far behind the US, but a step toward defence autonomy.
13:19 – N26 Troubles
Regulatory caps slowed growth for years, BaFin repeatedly intervened. Leadership now reshuffling. Big question: Would N26 be Revolut-sized if founded outside Germany?
18:49 – German Economy Reality Check
GDP still below 2019 levels. Insolvencies highest in a decade. Restaurants down 20–40%. Years of underinvestment in tech, infrastructure, energy. Early nuclear shutdown = higher energy costs, fallback to coal.
25:04 – Why No Nuclear Return?
Public wants it (~75%). Politics block it; ideology > pragmatism.
27:07 – German Decline Impact on Startups
ESOP improved (still heavy tax). Bureaucracy is brutal: notaries, translations, delays. Many founders incorporate Delaware C-Corp + German GmbH.
Solo GP / Part-Time VC Trend
34:21 – The Movement
US led the way: Elad Gil, Auren, Buckley.
Three types: Lifelong solo GPs. Solo-to-multi-GP founders. Part-time solo GPs (e.g., 11 Labs’ Carlos Reiner). It works at $15–30M scale; Fund II usually becomes full-time.
40:10 – OpenAI, Google & Anthropic
OpenAI may need $200B+ by 2030. Google’s Gemini 3 beating OpenAI on many benchmarks. Monetisation gap: only ~5% of ChatGPT users pay. Warren Buffett buying Google is a signal?
44:57 – The Scary Bit: God-AI
Robin cites Eric Schmidt: If an adversary builds god-AI first, “we might have to bomb it.”
We Get Slush’d - Germany Gets Space’d - As TPU’s Crush
22 Nov 2025
00:47:25
This week in Upside #67 Mads returns from Slush with 24 one-to-ones under his belt and a head full of insights. Dan and Lomax dig into Germany’s €35B space strategy, the surprising data behind immigrant-founded unicorns, and Europe’s defence-IPO boom. They break down Vinted’s huge secondary, the EU’s attempt to kill cookie banners, and the UK’s sudden wave of AI investment initiatives.
In AI Corner: why 70% of AI startups now ship on open-source models, Google’s new TPU-trained Gemini 3, and another blowout quarter from Nvidia. Plus: Deal of the Week — Voize, the AI tool transforming nursing-home documentation.
03:15 — Slush Deep Dive Mads on Helsinki’s neon-lit founder festival, matchmaking tables, and why Slush still beats Web Summit.
07:45 — Germany’s €35B Space Strategy Why Berlin is going big on space-as-defence — and whether Europe can ever compete at scale.
12:10 — Immigrant Founders Powerhouse The surprising stats: 50–90% of US unicorn founders are immigrants; half of the UK’s fastest-growing companies too.
26:10 — Cookies Out, AI Regulation Rolled Back The EU’s Digital Omnibus: fewer cookie banners, looser GDPR for AI training, and a major regulatory U-turn.
46:40 — AI Corner: TPUs vs GPUs & Open Source Wins 70% of startups using open-source LLMs; Google’s TPU-trained Gemini 3 beats benchmarks; Nvidia still sold out through 2026.
Tech Sovereignty And Becoming Full Stack Nations
15 Nov 2025
00:53:10
Each week a small bunch of us try and makes sense of the latest news affecting European venture.
Upside #66 - The theme this week is back to tech sovereignty, what that really means, what’s trade, what’s security - and ultimately will we all become full stack nations?
01:04 – UK exit tax: what it was and why it was dropped The mooted UK “exit tax” (tax on unrealised gains when leaving the country), why it would be disastrous for founders, political “pitch-rolling” before budgets, and Tom Blomfield’s alternative idea of taxing gains accrued while in the UK.
08:17 – State of AI (McKinsey / QuantumBlack report) Quick take on enterprise AI: almost every large org says it’s using AI, mostly for agentic/workflow use cases, but only ~1% report mature deployment or meaningful bottom-line impact, implying a long runway but slower-than-hyped progress.
09:54 – Nexperia & Europe’s chip vulnerability Deep dive into Nexperia’s role in Europe’s mid-tech auto chips, EU–China tensions, how wafers are made in Europe but packaged in China, and what that reveals about the fragility of the European automotive supply chain.
13:15 – Ripping out Huawei/ZTE from 5G Discussion of the EU’s move to give legal force to removing Chinese vendors from 5G infrastructure, the huge retrofit costs for telcos (esp. German operators), and whether this is driven by trade, security, or both.
16:18 – Einride SPAC & Palantir / Alex Karp Einride’s US SPAC at a $1.8B valuation vs the Nikola fiasco; Palantir’s soaring stock, Alex Karp’s persona and “word salad” style, his emphasis on privacy-centric data architectures for governments, and the tension between admiration for serious infra and discomfort with founder-power.
23:06 – AI market wobble & Michael Burry’s bearish case The recent pull-back in Mag7/AI names (esp. Nvidia), and whether it’s a blip or bubble-pop; Burry’s big short on hyperscalers and AI plays, and his history as an early Cassandra of the GFC.
23:52 – Chinese open-source models & hyperscaler accounting games How Chinese open-source models (e.g. Kimi K2) are catching frontier labs and threatening closed-source economics, plus Burry’s argument that hyperscalers are overstating profits by stretching GPU lifetimes (4→6 years) and front-loading capex based on optimistic AI revenue expectations.
33:28 – Tech sovereignty, AI-powered cyber attacks & kill switches Anthropic’s disclosure of LLM-assisted cyber attacks using Claude Code via social engineering; concerns over remote kill switches in Chinese-made buses in UK/Scandi fleets; broader questions about dependence on Chinese vendors and the push for “full-stack” sovereignty.
41:45 – De-globalisation & the cost of going ‘full stack’ Debate over whether every region trying to do everything domestically is sustainable; loss of cheap-labour-driven low inflation, need for critical minerals and energy at home, and how much poorer or safer societies might become under techno-sovereignty.
47:49 – Deals of the Week: BillionToOne and Gamma BillionToOne’s ~$4.5–5B IPO (YC 2017; strong European VC participation); Pfizer’s $10B acquisition of GLP-1 player Metsera and what it signals for biotech; Gamma’s $68M Series B at a $2.1B valuation as a potential disruptor of the traditional Office/Slides stack.
A Baltic Boom, Matt Clifford Rouses, A Tale Of Two Quants
08 Nov 2025
01:00:42
Upside Ep #65 - A Baltic Boom, Matt Clifford Rouses, A Tale Of Two Quants
A weekly show that unpacks the shenanigans affecting European venture.
Dan (host), Mads, Lomax, Special Guest: Jone (Yo neh) — Managing Partner, First Pick (Lithuania)
3:26 — Pre-seed vs Seed in the Baltics •Why pre-seed fits: seed still feels early; when companies inflect, foreign funds out-gun local check sizes. Funds in region typically €10–€100M AUM, so Series A+ is handed off.
05:39 — Foreign funds’ interest & “guarding the land” •Active sharing with bigger EU funds; Creandum dinner takeaway: Baltics are insanely good at distribution; product/elite-tech depth thinner than popular myth, but revenue ramps fast.
07:29 — Baltic bootstrapping culture •Many regional champions are bootstrapped (e.g., Hostinger, Kilo Health, NordVPN/Tesonet group influence). Venture is used sparingly; winning a VC spot is hard as rounds are scarce/oversubscribed.
10:49 — Defence: Rheinmetall–Lithuania invests €300m •Facts: €300M JV; Baisogala site; ~340 ha footprint; ~150 jobs; ground-breaking 4 Nov 2025; ops start 2026 with ramp in 2027. •Why Lithuania? Panel view: incentives, speed, and financing (tax holidays, fast-track planning, heavy local co-funding) plus NATO signaling despite border-risk optics.
15:15 — Matt Clifford @ LFG: “Permissionlessness” & the stagnation decade •Vibe check from the room: energising, pro-growth, anti-bureaucracy. •Core claim discussed: ~17 years of UK productivity stagnation → lost income per head; call to cut red tape and celebrate building. •Reflexive critique: does it resonate beyond London; EF’s Delaware flips vs UK nation-building narrative tension.
29:26 — Quantum UK - Can we? •FT-sparked chat on UK/EU quantum software (e.g., Phasecraft, Riverlane) and hardware roots (PsiQuantum, Quantinuum) with UK lineage; big valuations, long road to revenue.
32:09 — Quants (trading): Yes we can! •UK bright spot: quant trading still world-class; XTX building a ~25k-GPU cluster (context: new German “AI factory” cited at ~10k GPUs). •Talent gravity: CS/math grads pulled into quant comp; debate on startup talent crowd-out vs recycling (e.g., XTX backing AI seeds).
39:57 — AI Corner •Funding loops & hyperscaler deals: OpenAI multi-year cloud commits; when is it circular vs normal vendor financing? Panel splits hairs on cash vs credits and market discipline. •CALM (China): continuous autoregressive idea = interesting/iterative step, not a “DeepSeek moment.” •OpenAI & legal: limiting in-app legal advice framed as product direction/lead-gen potential for pros. •Nvidia + Deutsche Telekom: ~€1.2B / ~10k GPUs in Germany—welcomed, but scale gap vs US mega-centres. •Nebius “Token Factory”: EU-HQ’d “neo-cloud” (Yandex spin-out context) aggregating low-cost OS models; compelling for cost-sensitive workloads if 95–99% “good enough.” (Regional perception note: in Baltics it’s still seen as “Russian-adjacent”, brand kept intentionally low-key.)
53:53 — Deal(s) of the Week) •Nexus AI (LT) — $8M on deck from Index, followed swiftly by Avantar/Creandum; Tesonet/NordVPN founders; routing/LLM infra for companies; signalling win for Vilnius scene. (Raised on deck, then followed up quickly.) •Poolside (FR/US) — Rumoured $2B round; Nvidia up to $1B; valuation jump $3B → $12B; deeper code-gen/automation focus; meaningful transatlantic footprint.
Should You Raise Right Now? Should Govts Buy Stocks? Should NVIDIA Have Bought Nokia?
01 Nov 2025
00:48:48
The pod that unpacks the real news behind the clickbait affecting European venture.
Hosts: Dan, Mads, Lomax, Andrew
02:41 — Bending Spoons deep dive Debt-fuelled roll-up, “Berkshire of consumer apps” analogy; Ukrainian peer Gentek noted; why more post-COVID roll-ups didn’t materialise.
04:34 — US debt vs Europe risk Market’s view on capital allocation/dynamism; Decacorns vs unicorns; power-law returns reinforce Botha’s point.
06:01 — “VC isn’t an asset class” debate Power-law concentration, PR angle, and incentives; media takeaways.
07:31 — Euro VC vibes Lakestar & optics; ecosystem still 5× over decade despite headlines.
08:30 — Feature: Should governments buy stocks? Khosla’s 10% stake in all public companies to offset AI/AGI shocks:
Pros: Alignment with growth; potential UBI funding; sovereign-wealth-style upside.
Cons: Partial nationalisation optics, execution complexity, tying state finances tighter to market swings.
Middle paths: SWF/index recycling of taxes; robot/compute taxation; focus on efficient government vs expropriation.
17:45 — Back-of-envelope math US equities ~$60T → 10% ≈ $6T; even 10% yield wouldn’t cover current US interest bill; cautions on bull-market assumptions.
Founder advice: avoid doom loop—head down and build; some may move to US, less so Dubai.
22:25 — Should founders raise now (pre-correction)?
Consensus: If you can raise on decent terms, extend runway; always-be-raising (selectively).
Don’t panic or over-dilute; keep shipping.
If no PMF, fix product/positioning before chasing capital.
29:02 — AI Corner
NVIDIA at $5T: Hyperscalers’ capex still ramping; huge backlog; dominance but margins likely compress with competition/custom silicon.
Nokia stake: Smart edge/5G–6G positioning; GPUs closer to towers for network optimisation & edge AI.
OpenAI recap: For-profit structure finalised; Microsoft looks like the clearest public proxy (exclusivities, licenses).
Meta’s mixed moment & layoffs framed more as performance-management cycles than AI doom.
42:58 — Deals of the Week
Sales Patriot (Warsaw): €4.2m to modernise defence procurement; aim to be system of record.
Legora (legal AI, Stockholm): $150m at $1.8B, ~5 months after Series B.
Robin AI: Sale process after $70m raised—cautionary tale on GTM/scale.
Bending Spoons ↔ AOL/Vimeo: More roll-up momentum.
Synthesia: $200m at $4B; reportedly turned down a $3B Adobe offer—go-for-growth stance.
45:50 — UK quantum spotlight QFX round (Paul Graham involved); UK’s deep quantum bench (PsiQuantum/Quantinuum roots; Oxford Ionics ~$1B sale to IonQ). Challenge: scaling while keeping firms in the UK.
The Robots Are Here Already?! - UK Govt Wasting Time In AI Sandboxes - 28th Update.
25 Oct 2025
01:00:20
Upside - the weekly pod exploring the real news behind the clickrage affecting European venture, startups and investing.
04:56 - Amazon, Robots & Europe’s Automation • Amazon aims for 75% robotised operations by 2033 in the US. • Automation = productivity growth, not mass layoffs. • Europe: >80% of warehouses still manual; Germany highly automated. • Debate: displacement vs. growth; Europe can't fall behind.
18:50 - AI & Europe’s Industrial Revolution • Can Europe capture AI’s value? • Most AI projects fail due to lack of readiness, not tech. • The human in the loop - Underinvestment in training and integration. • Discussion: China racing ahead; Europe needs tech-smart leadership.
39:04 - UK AI Sandbox - What a waste of sand? • New UK initiative to test AI under relaxed rules. • Unlike fintech, AI isn’t “gate-kept” - barriers are procurement and deployment. • Use NHS as testbed for AI admin tools to cut waitlists.
50:13 - EU “28th Regime” - Directive or Law? • Proposed single EU startup entity (like a Delaware C-Corp). • Regulation = uniform law; Directive = messy national versions. • Local tailoring inevitable - but harmonisation could save €2B/yr in admin costs.
59:54 Deal of the Week - Comind • Comind raises $102M Series A (Plural) — non-invasive brain-computer interface. • Mentions: Revolut ($75B raise rumour), Wayve ($2B fundraise).
VC's Fun'raising - Has China won AI already? & The WHY behind bubble-talk AI
Key Topics • Fundraising climate in European for VC - friend or foe? • Goldman Sachs’ Industry Ventures acquisition - getting into alternatives?! • Nobel Prize in Economics: Why does this matter to VC and Europe? • What's fuelling the AI bubble headlines? Hype vs fundamentals • China’s physical AI advantage - have they won AI already? • Europe does have a strategic path • Deal of the Week: ecoRobotix
03:01 – VC Fundraising Outlook • Post-2021 pullback continues. • Flight to top brands: most LP capital going to top 30 funds. • More government/EU money = policy strings. • Low DPI but potential relief from Klarna IPO. • Market consolidation = stronger survivors.
07:08 – LP Sentiment • Big AI rounds crowding noise → more space for overlooked gems. • Growing interest in early-stage, AI, defence, resilience.
09:23 – GS Buys Industry Ventures - Why? • Traditional finance deeper in VC. • Secondary liquidity engine + huge data moat (700 funds / 10k co’s). • Smart strategic move for Goldman.
12:36 – Nobel Prize in Economics? • Aghion & Howitt’s work proves innovation drives growth — VC validated. • Missing pieces: state de-risking, catch-up growth, China’s dual strategy.
20:42 – AI “Bubble” or Just Massive Bets? • OpenAI’s trillion-dollar compute plans (NVIDIA, AMD, Broadcom, Oracle). • OpenAI vs Google monetisation war. • Circular financing risk with negative margins down the stack. Will retail be left holding the baby? • Long-term value in vertical AI with data moats.
31:11 – China’s Physical AI Advantage • Western Execs return “shaken” from dark factories. • BYD rising fast. • China deploying “good enough” open-source AI into everything.
39:24 – Europe’s Playbook • JP Morgan’s $1.5T “security & resiliency” plan shows capital *can* be mobilised. • Europe’s challenge: reallocate pension/government capital to productive tech.
45:43 – Deal of the Week: ecoRobotix • Swiss physical AI agri-robotics. • Precision spraying cuts pesticide use 95%. • €90M Series D led by Highland Europe & McWin.
Upside #61 - Defence Special PLUS what IS the AI bubble really?
11 Oct 2025
01:00:21
Voices: Nicholas Nelson (Archangel) • Dan • Lomax • Mads
TL;DR
Defence-first wins on capability and returns; primes are partners and channels.
Helsing: buys platforms/revenue for access; layers AI—different from Anduril’s buy-TRL-tech + scale model.
Beyond drones: biggest gap/opportunity is tactical EW.
Procurement: more fast lanes (SOF, pilots); primes getting easier to work with.
AI: real profits exist (esp. NVIDIA), but value chain is fragile; expect a correction, not a collapse. Picking winners > timing.
02:40 — Why defence-first Beats dual-use on outcomes and returns; lifelong focus.
🌉 EF exits Europe, launches “Bridge” Bay Area program (Sifted)
🎬 Sora 2 video model - Sam A videos. Bwahaha
10:00 – EF’s US Pivot
EF closes Paris/Berlin, focusing on US founder “sheep-dipping.” Validation of EU founder quality but reminder: growth capital + urgency still American advantages.
17:00 – Germany’s Lithium Discovery
43M tons found in northern Germany — ~$600B in-ground value.
DLE extraction (from brines) cleaner but unproven.
Europe could cover 50 years of demand, yet permitting, costs, and NIMBY issues loom.
Real win may lie in refining and gigafactory build-out, not mining alone.
22:00 – London’s IPO Decline
London slips to #23 globally; IPO volume down 69% ($248M → $42M).
Causes: low equity appetite, no tech weighting, over-regulation, pension conservatism.
UK guarantees £1.5B loan to JLR (post-cyberattack).
Critics: moral hazard, no cyber-insurance, political pork-barrelling.
Compare: Germany’s bold €500B public investment plan.
Consensus: backstop only if government gets warrants + drives reform.
41:00 – Reinventing VC
US mega-firms become RIAs, investing across public/private assets.
New players: Evantic ($400M), Striker (10 LPs × 10 startups).
AI models now beat humans at picking founders.
Europe lags — still relationship-driven, early-stage remains “artisanal.”
51:00 – Deals of the Week
💥 Concept Ventures – £88M pre-seed fund (UK)
🧪 Periodic Labs – $300M seed (ex-DeepMind/OpenAI)
💼 Creator Fund – €80M pan-EU deep tech
⚖️ Legora – raising $100M @ $1.7B
🧠 Black Forest Labs – $4B valuation talks
🦄 Cleo, Tide hit unicorn status
57:00 – Defence & Tech
Highlights from London Resilience Conference: surge in EU defence startups, faster US build cycles, procurement reform lagging.
MI6’s real “Q” reveals gadget: surveillance dog poo.
59:00 – Wrap
Europe’s week in contrast: industrial ambition (Germany), structural pain (London), creative churn (VC & AI). Momentum builds — even amid the mess.
AI Wars, SaaSpocalypse & Muskonomics
07 Feb 2026
01:00:44
Upside captures all of the week's news affecting European Venture.
01:22 — AI models: two flagships drop 20 minutes apart Anthropic ships Opus 4.6; OpenAI replies with GPT 5.3. Key tension: best model vs stickiest workflow (tooling + habits = raw benchmarks). China keeps coming: Kimi K2.5, Qwen3 Max — strong performance at lower cost, plus “swarm”/multi-agent vibes.
07:02 — Recursive AI + security flex OpenAI: “GPT 5.3 helped build itself” (debugging training pipeline). Anthropic: claims model found 500+ serious open-source security issues → “bots find bugs better than eyeballs.”
11:06 — Alphabet CapEx shock Alphabet expected $180B CapEx in 2026 → market flinches despite earnings beat. Take: hyperscalers signalling capacity constraint and “you ain’t seen nothing yet.” Debate: monster spend now vs how long monetisation takes (ads, pricing, enterprise budgets).
18:53 — “SaaSpocalypse” ~$300B wiped off software stocks on fear that seat-based SaaS collapses into usage/agent-driven economics. Claude Code “agentic workflows” spook the market: if models do the work, why pay the tool tax? Counterpoint: SaaS doesn’t die—it de-rates (from “growth multiple” to “utility multiple”). Lomax: market likely overcorrecting; enterprise adoption is slow and messy.
26:07 — EU–US tech uncoupling (or… vibes?) France moves to ban civil servants from Zoom/Teams/WebEx → pushes homegrown “Visio” by 2027. Germany (Schleswig-Holstein) + Austrian army shifting off Microsoft to open-source alternatives. Group take: sovereignty goal is real, but government-built software ≠ winning strategy; better to back founders + procurement pathways.
32:44 — Spain vs social media Pedro Sánchez pushes: CEO accountability, misinformation/hate speech enforcement, under-16 social restriction. Smart framing: shifts from “free speech” to public health. Pushback: slippery slope risk → censorship-by-proxy debate.
39:20 — Muskonomics: SpaceX + xAI + “data centres in space” Core claim gets roasted: physics/energy/cooling/payload/latency all feel brutal. Bull case (Lomax): if anyone can brute-force iterate at scale, it’s Musk + launch cadence. Bear case (Mads): narrative may be a financial wrapper to justify merging/funding xAI via SpaceX halo.
51:10 — Anthropic Super Bowl ads + OpenAI shade Anthropic pokes OpenAI over ads in AI (“we’d never”). Take: brand landgrab + positioning move; debate whether the ads were funny or cringe.
53:52 — Europe corner: critical minerals reality check EU auditor warns Critical Raw Materials Act targets likely missed (dependency on China still extreme). Problem isn’t geology—it’s permitting + processing + time (10–20 years to mine/start). US hosts rare earth summit; Europe tries to coordinate while still exporting heavily to the US.
56:53 — Deal of the Week Lomax’s portfolio: Portuguese founder Pedro building LLM-driven clinical trial planning → reduces protocol amendments/costs. Raises $52.5M Series A (one of Iberia’s biggest; top-tier EU Series A scale). Dan: January saw 5 new European unicorns (Aikido shoutout highlighted). Mads: new European growth fund Cambara targeting €30–50M checks; €750M raised toward €1B.
Upside Ep #59 — UK at a Crossroads, AI Surge, Defence Tensions, H1B Shock
27 Sep 2025
01:01:11
Yes we're European VCs so YES we're talking AI and defence! But there's still more of the pie to eat, so dig in.
02:00 🇬🇧 UK in the doldrums * Little to no growth (1.5% vs US 3.8%). * Inflation stubborn at 3.8%. * 130k jobs lost since last budget. * Housing, Heathrow, HS2 — stalled megaprojects.
06:30 📉 Structural weaknesses * UK pensions: only 4.4% in UK equities (vs 50% in past). * FTSE = $2.8T — smaller than Apple alone. * R&D spend at 1.7% vs US 3.5%.
10:00 🚀 Reasons for optimism * Revolut hits 70m users, Canary Wharf HQ, £3bn UK investment. * UK AI leaders: Wayve, ElevenLabs, Synthesia, Cleo. * Nvidia building Europe’s biggest GPU cluster (120k Blackwells by 2026).
13:00 🤝 Trump visit & £150bn US deal * Breakdown: £90bn Blackstone, £22bn Microsoft, £5bn Google, £1.5bn Palantir, £3.9bn Prologis. * UK pledges $80bn procurement from US tech/defence. * Historic scale, but execution challenges loom.
18:30 📝 What the UK must do — 5-Point Plan 1. Regulatory bonfire 2. Pension capital unlocked 3. Energy independence 4. Planning revolution 5. Startup Central (“29th Regime”)
24:00 🌍 H1B debacle * US slaps $100k fee on new H1Bs (was $1.5k). * Big Tech shrugs, startups squeezed. * Europe’s opening: 24h visas for £100k+ roles could flip the script.
28:30 🤖 AI Corner * Nvidia invests $100B into OpenAI — vertical integration play. * Cohere hits $7B with AMD deal; Modular raises $250M to break CUDA lock-in. * DeepSeek achieves GPT-4-level performance at 1/20th cost. * JLR cyberattack halts production for 3+ weeks; systemic risk exposed.
37:00 🛡️ Defence Corner * Russian drones breach NATO airspace — first NATO shots fired. * Copenhagen airport shut, Polish & Baltic incursions. * NATO launches Eastern Sentry, Europe boosts spend to 3.5% GDP. * Defence unicorns rising: Helsing ($12B), Quantum Systems, Tekever.
45:00 💸 Deals of the Week * nScale: £1.1B raise at £3B — Europe’s newest AI datacenter unicorn. * Ōura: $875M raise at $11B valuation. * Aerospacelab: $110M for satellite constellation.
On today: Dan, Mads, Lomax, Andrew.
Upside #57 - What's Hot & Not in European Tech w/ Mike Butcher from TechCrunch
13 Sep 2025
01:05:12
This week we chat with Mike the ex editor of TechCrunch, getting his take on the past, present and future of all things Euro-startup. Mads shares his thoughts on the All In Summit. We chat about defence strategies, pension funds and Euro cash injections, Germany moving and shaking their startup scene, Draghi's anniversary, the EU Inc guys / 28th regime - and what this all means for us in venture, for founders, investors and startups.
00:35 – TechCrunch Europe → reset Redundancies post-Yahoo sale; Mike takes a breather, experiments with social video.
01:29 – Mike’s showreel ’95 journo → FTGuardian → joins TechCrunch Europe in ’07; spins up The Europas and Techfugees.
03:51 – New media > old blogs Creators (MrBeast, Bari Weiss, Cleo Abram) now disrupt the disruptors; social is the front door for news; AI reshapes formats.
06:02 – Europe’s vibe, not the Valley’s Fragmentation persists, but Slush VivaTech Web Summit LTW etc. anchor a distinct EU flavour.
09:24 – Culture shift needed Be candid *and* boosterish; being bigger and bolder.
12:17 – All-In Summit debrief Robotics “hand problem” (26 actuators arm; supply chain missing), AGI ≈ 5–10y, China’s practical AI push, enterprise AI moats (boring infra), Europe’s latent talent vs weak commercialisation; “physical AI” window is NOW.
16:27 – EU Inc & Draghi (1-year on) EU-wide startup entity push; Draghi’s 383 recs: only ~40 actioned; public consultation live at eu-inc.org.
18:29 – What to fix in Europe Planning gridlock (HS2 file bloat; energy permits ~44 months) + misallocated pensions (€16T, >55% in bonds ~3%). Shift saver incentives and trustee “prudence” toward productive assets to unlock ~€970B yr.
20:56 – Implementation drag Only a sliver of Draghi implemented; call for a “crack” execution unit; R&D under-invested vs US. EU grants take ~240 days from green light to cash.
24:02 – UK pensions: rhetoric vs mechanics Fee caps & plumbing still block meaningful allocations despite political cheerleading.
28:28 – Germany’s draft startup tax reform Founder and VC-friendly fixes from German Govt (e.g., ESOP dry income relief, longer deferral, broader eligibility).
35:39 – Deal of the week: ASML → Mistral (€2B) Mistral >€100m ARR; ASML’s strategic seat to frontier models; comps far below US hypers; BNP with 800+ use cases. Raises EU late-stage capital question; balance sheets stepping in.
48:48 – Defence - UK Strategy, Russian Drones and NATO/European Reaction Poland shoots down Russian drones; UK to 2.5% GDP defence by 2027 (+ regional £250m hubs). Good signal, too small; procurement speed is the moat; Eastern front buying *now*.
Upside #56 - Most Euro Pension Cash Ever, The Power of Xi, & Let Chaos Reign
06 Sep 2025
00:43:25
Let markets drive early-stage VC; fix EU growth/IPO capital via pension reform. Win AI as power users, not model builders. Geopolitics demands EU/ally coordination. Quantum’s having a moment.
This week it's Mads, Lomax and Dan. All European early stage VCs looking behind the headlines to explore what's affecting venture, founders and investors.
00:00–03:07 — “28th regime” for EU VC?Dan proposes a structured EU venture vehicle
03:07–07:46 — Let chaos reign- Bottom-up or top-down? governments already big LPs; VC must deliver performance to unlock pensions.
07:46–13:11 — Macro & pensions.Dealroom report: EU VC-backed value ≈ $3.5T; domestic pensions rising but tiny vs need; UK fiscal context not worst in G7.
13:24–16:46 — Macro vs micro - Do we care?Great teams still raise; next KPI is a Europe-born “Mag-7-scale” company.
16:46–19:49 — Why UK tax payers support MAG7.Rules favour bonds (low fees/vol); reform prudential & tax to channel savings into EU productive assets.
19:49–21:25 — Can EU scale.Capital aggregation at multi-billion rounds remains the choke point.
22:41–25:48 — Google antitrust.No breakup; must share index/click data on commercial, non-discriminatory terms—light remedy.
26:18–30:16 — Isambard & AI adoption.UK supercomputer is symbolic; real edge is becoming the best AI adopter (health/life-sciences, public services).
32:25–39:47 — Power of Xi.China’s manufacturing lead; EU needs re-armament, industrial base, and alliances (US + Asian democracies).
This week on Upside – It's a digital sovereignty deeper dive - what does it really mean, Nvidia is up but kinda not, Apple vs CMA - stormy teacup, and Governments Buying AI - which is a a great thing! Yes it is.
With Mads, Lomax, Andreas and Dan.
00:52 – Why Nvidia is “the poster child” Picks & shovels of AI; outsized share of data-centre capex; sheer scale of valuation and index weight.
01:49 – Numbers that bend the mind $100B rev $25B net income quarter; growth decelerating (YoY strong, QoQ data-centre +5%) and mostly “priced in.”
04:33 – Europe’s chip toolkit ASML, STMicro, Infineon, ARM as the homegrown counterweight—and the media’s US-centric bias.
06:07 – Apple vs UK CMA Interoperability, payments, “Apple tax,” and the tension between competition policy and platform control.
08:05 – When regulation helps Open banking as a rare win; risk of “fighting the last war” on phones while AI becomes the real battleground.
16:36 – Antitrust lessons for AI Need smarter, transatlantic, pro-innovation guardrails before AI market power locks in.
18:55 – Creative destruction vs. cops Markets toppled IBM/Microsoft; you can’t regulate your way to greatness—create conditions to compete.
21:05 – Sovereignty kicks off: US buys 10% of Intel Equity via CHIPS grants; debate on retroactive terms, national champions, and when government should own.
28:26 – Europe’s long tradition of state help Airbus, satellites, energy—how “strategic” differs from picking winners.
30:42 – What should be sovereign Compute/chips, energy, critical minerals, food/health inputs, and space—areas where hands-off fails.
37:12 – UK gov is buying AI (a lot) Spend surges; Microsoft & Palantir dominate; case for being a “power user” while seeding EU/UK alternatives.
43:54 – Can startups sell to government? Procurement is the moat for incumbents; call for sandboxes, fast paths, and small experiments.
50:01 – What is digital sovereignty (really)? Acting without others’ permission; Europe’s dilemma: US defence, China manufacturing, and now US AI.
52:07 – China’s playbook Back sectors, unleash brutal competition (EVs), let winners emerge—then scale.
57:33 – Follow the money EU pension funds underweight EU VC; stop funding US dominance if we want sovereignty.
Fast takeaways
* Nvidia remains the bellwether, but the growth rate is normalising at hyperscale. * Apple vs CMA = overdue competition questions, but don’t fight 2010’s war in 2025 - aim rules at AI. * Sovereignty ≠ autarky: diversify dependencies, go big on adoption, and grow local apps/infra. * Procurement reform (sandboxes, smaller tickets) is the cheapest way to catalyse EU/UK AI champions
Upside #53 - EU vs US Wealth Creation, Energy Breakthroughs, M&A Boom Means?
16 Aug 2025
00:48:55
For the real news behind the headlines affecting European venture.
Hosts: Dan Bowyer & Mads Jensen, with Joe Knowles from Smedvig Ventures
(01:15) US vs. Europe in Wealth Creation US dominates wealth & compounders due to internet hyperscalers. Europe: strong talent, growing startups, but weaker late-stage funding & exits. Pension fund restrictions and lack of capital allocation are core structural issues.
(12:10) AI Race & Europe’s Challenge US likely to win again; Europe risks falling far behind. Strategic gaps: compute, energy costs, slow policy response.
(13:05) M&A Boom H1 2025: ~$100bn in deals (+155% YoY), led by Google–Wiz ($32bn). Hot areas: AI code gen, security, vertical apps. Europe well-placed in application-layer M&A and AI-enabled services. Exits recycle capital → critical for VC ecosystem health.
(21:21) Defence Tech Awakening Porsche & Deutsche Telekom launching €500m fund; Lakestar raising €250m. Cultural shift in Germany: mainstream corporates backing defence/dual-use. Small monetarily, but signals a tide change.
(31:21) Energy & Batteries Breakthroughs: lithium recycling (97%), sodium-ion at $10/kWh, EU gigafactories planned. Europe must cut energy costs (4x US levels). Nuclear, deregulation, and better storage key for AI competitiveness.
(35:06) AI Corner GPT-5: Faster, unified model, free to ChatGPT’s 700M users. Incremental but strong in coding. Perplexity vs. Chrome: DOJ may force Chrome divestiture; Perplexity rumored buyer (PR stunt?). Economics: OpenAI at $500bn valuation despite $5bn losses; Anthropic ARR exploding ($1bn → $5bn in 7 months).
(42:15) Chips & Geopolitics US restricting Nvidia chips to China; Trump proposes tariffed exports. Europe’s Chips Act stuck with outdated tech; Intel project canceled. Urgent need for “Chips 2.0” and partnerships with TSMC/Nvidia/ASML.
(48:03) Closing Notes Italy’s record H1 (€655m raised). Europe’s momentum building across defence, energy, and venture.
Upside #52 - More Chips Please - Be More German - No Easy A?
09 Aug 2025
01:08:36
Upside #52 The weekly podcast for all things European venture, startups and investing. Each week we look behind the headlines for the real news affecting our ecosystem.
VC Hosts: Mads, Andrew & Dan
This week: Seed-to-Series A: harder or hype? Germany’s €100B Deutschlandfonds UK interest rate cut OECD’s corporate investment warning EU Chips Act 2.0 - 1.0 #fail AI Corner – GPT-5, Anthropic’s advances, open-source wars Deal of the Week
00:50 – Series A: Out of Reach? Really? US: Avg. 2.5 years to Series A, down to 11% graduation rate. UK/Europe: ~18 months, higher graduation rates, but smaller rounds. AI reshaping funding pace; bridge rounds at record levels. Overhang from 2021–22 funding glut being flushed out. Carta data shows improving graduation rates. Labels distort. Under-capitalisation as a European challenge.
07:59 – Germany’s €100B Deutschlandfonds - Be More German Fund to secure strategic sectors: defence, energy, raw materials. Leverages €10B public → target €100B private. Germany’s growth stagnation since 2019 needs reversal.
18:35 – UK Autumn Budget Of Misery Likely tax rises despite Labour’s pledges - risk making UK unattractive for VC & startups. Millionaire exodus, low PE carried interest returns signal concern.
22:09 – UK Interest Rate Cut Says What? BOE cuts from 4.25% → 4% despite sticky inflation (3.6% → rising to 4%). Growth fears outweigh inflation fight – signals economic fragility. Will lower rates make VC relatively more attractive?
23:29 – OECD: Weak Corporate Investment Is Bad News Investment still 20% below pre-GFC trends; physical asset investment lagging. Productivity stagnation since 2008. Corporates prioritising dividends over long-term growth.
40:11 – EU Chips Act 2.0 - Can We, Should We? Act 1 mega fail: Missed 20% market share goal; may hit only 5% by 2030. Intel exit, focus on low-end chips, global oversupply, poor US trade terms. Need to attract TSMC/Samsung for cutting-edge fabs. Europe must avoid “please everyone” industrial policy. Chip demand will keep growing; still time to compete.
50:35 – Mega AI Corner GPT-5 “soon” Anthropic’s Claude 4.1 leading in reliability. OpenAI launches first open-source model since GPT-2. Mega-rounds: OpenAI $8B, Mistral $10B, Perplexity raising. Open vs. closed source. IP & “decomposition” debate:
1:04:04 – Deal of the Week Clay – $100M at $3.1B; widely used contact intelligence tool. n8n – Valuation surges past €2B amid investor frenzy. Voltrac – Spanish autonomous electric tractor; 70% fewer parts, strong ROI. AI in politics: Sweden’s PM admits using ChatGPT for second opinions.
Recorded 7 August 2025
🎙️ Upside #51 - Project Eurhope - SaaS Is Sexy Again - The EU US Trade Reality
02 Aug 2025
01:08:25
Upside is for anyone interested in the European tech and startup ecosystem. We discuss the real stories that live behind the headlines.
Recorded: Friday August 1st 2025 Hosts: VCs - Mads, Lomax, and Dan
00:50 – Big Tech Earnings Blowouts Massive Meta and MS uplift. Massive efficiency gains via AI, despite headcount cuts. Microsoft: $13B AI cloud run rate. Growth driven by CoPilot and Azure.
11:20 – Fundamentally Flawed Figures Inflation sticky around 2.9%. Rates stuck. Why equity markets remain bullish despite macro pressure. AI productivity gains seen as the buffer against high rates. Not the dot-com?
17:42 – Europe’s No Mag7 The sobering gap, but optimism for emerging EU-based players. Nurture “green shoots” of European innovation.
18:34 – Markets - Figma IPO – Is SaaS Back? Massive Day 1 pop: from \$20B to \$65B market cap. 91% gross margin, 132% NDR, strong enterprise traction. Optimism for SaaS exits and public market appetite.
26:27 – Markets - Anthropic vs. Figma – AI Valuations in Context Anthropic at \$170B valuation (\~30x revenue).Contrasted with Figma’s 60x multiple. SaaS more stable; AI still in sandbox.
27:23 – Markets - Return of Risk Appetite: Firefly & Space IPOs Firefly targeting a $5B IPO despite revenue.
29:26 – Liberation Day 2.0 – Trump’s Trade Deal with the EU** EU commits to $750B in US energy, $600B in US manufacturing investment. Concern over EU sovereignty and realism of enforcement.
37:54 – Implications for European Startups Software firms largely unaffected. Hardware or hybrid firms need to rethink supply chains.Consumer hardware most at risk from tariffs.
40:17 – Geopolitical Signalling and the Long Game EU’s long-term strategy will shift towards self-reliance and defence. Upside for local tech ecosystems.
41:23 – AI Corner – Latest Deals & Developments. Anthropic: From $1B to $6B ARR in months. $5B raise underway. Alibaba: Launches Claude Code competitor for 1/60th the cost. Cognigy (Germany): Acquired for $1B by NICE (CX automation). n8n: Open source automation tool now valued at \$1.5B. OpenAI Study Mode: Personalised learning agents; education disruption incoming.
47:26 – Is Germany Becoming Europe’s AI Leader? Germany, France, and the UK all seeing strong AI momentum. European AI isn’t centralised – strength lies in distributed hubs.
50:01 – Why Billion-Dollar Exits Are No Longer a Big Deal Cognigy, Oxford Ionics → seen as “modest” compared to US mega-deals. Yet: exits like these power Europe’s VC ecosystem - billion-dollar exits still matter.
51:00 – Project Europe – What Europe Needs Harry Stebbings’ “Project Europe”: €200k per startup, under-25 founders.6 companies in batch one: drones, brain-computer interfaces, cybersecurity, robotics. Focused on deep tech and hard problems – not consumer fluff. A bet on Europe’s technical edge and early-stage ecosystem.
56:30 – Challenges Ahead for Project Europe Accelerators attract top-tier founders? Signalling risk? Success will require time, patient capital, and structural support.
63:57 – Stopping the Brain Drain EU founders often register in the US, but real drain is sub-10%. IPO path must be restored in EU. Public markets offer cheaper capital vs. growth equity.
65:30 – Deal(s) of the Week CyberArk acquired by Palo Alto Networks for $25B Project Q (Germany) raises €7.5M for battlefield software. One to watch.
Upside #50 - Can Stablecoins Save The Dollar? UK vs US AI Strategies & The Red or Blue Pill?
26 Jul 2025
01:02:26
Upside - for the real stories behind the headlines affecting European Venture.
In this week's episode:
AI in Public Services - OpenAI and the UK govt sign deal
The US vs UK AI plans - how do they compare?
Stablecoins - what are they really and why are they not in the UK?
Deepmind wins the IMO maths competition - so what?
Deal of the Week
01:50 – AI in UK Government and Public Services UK government signs an MOU with OpenAI to explore AI in public services. Introduction of “Humphrey,” a ChatGPT-powered assistant for civil servants.
03:21 – Will AI in Public Services Work? NHS could be a testbed for AI adoption, potentially with citizen opt-ins for faster treatments using AI technologies.
05:26 – UK AI Plan and Public Sector Productivity UK’s AI Opportunities Plan. Potential AI use cases: fraud prevention and efficiency in administrative tasks.
08:24 – Challenges in Government AI Implementation
09:27 – AI in NHS & Healthcare Debate on AI’s role in healthcare
11:46 – UK Sovereignty & AI Partnerships Concerns about reliance on US AI companies (OpenAI, Anthropic).
13:03 – Is Reliance on US AI a Problem? Discussion on whether the UK should build its own foundational AI models.
16:31 – National AI Strategies Debate on the UK government’s responsibility to invest heavily in domestic AI. Comparison to the UK aerospace industry and state-backed R&D.
19:26 – Comparing US and UK AI Plans Overview of both strategies: US: Innovation, leadership, and global dominance. UK: Sovereignty, public sector benefits, and homegrown champions.
22:24 – Key Differences Between US and UK AI Approaches
27:47 – What Should the UK Do Differently? Invest in national AI infrastructure. Mandate “buy UK first” for AI solutions.
33:31 – AI in Large Organizations Norway’s sovereign wealth fund sees 20% efficiency gains using AI (Claude).
36:01 – Transition to Stablecoins What they are and why they matter.
41:02 – Dollar Dominance via Stablecoins Stablecoins as a strategic tool to extend USD dominance.
48:25 – Future of Stablecoins How stablecoins will reshape DeFi, cross-border transactions, and payments.
52:27 – AI Excels at Mathematics Google DeepMind and OpenAI achieve gold-level performance at the IMO (International Mathematical Olympiad). Significance: AI is moving from computation to creative problem-solving and advanced reasoning.
55:47 – Implications of AI in Math & Science AI’s ability to solve complex math problems signals breakthroughs in R&D and engineering.
58:14 – Philosophical Questions on AI Reasoning Debate on whether AI’s reasoning is “synthetic” or genuinely creative. AI’s utility matters more than its internal mechanics.
59:33 – Deal of the Week
Keywords: AI, public services, OpenAI, UK government, healthcare, stablecoins, financial system, mathematics, funding, trade deals.
Upside #49 - The United States of Europe
19 Jul 2025
00:56:28
UPSIDE - For the week's *real news* behind the headlines affecting European venture.
If curious about startups, investing, venture capital, innovation, AI, and all things going on in and around Europe - that's what this weekly roundup is all about.
04:02 – Shout out for EU Inc and The 28th Regime Legal fragmentation in Europe increases friction and costs for pre-seed and seed funding. Comparison to US (Delaware + SAFE) vs. Europe’s notary-heavy systems. Potential savings of €350–500M annually by reducing legal overhead. ESOP (employee share options) complexity highlighted as a major barrier.
09:55 – The United States of Europe EU Inc. could be a “small first step” toward a unified European market post-Brexit. Lobbying from notaries and national interests creates significant resistance. Watered down is as good as not at all.
15:14 – AI Corner: Huge AI news this week Mira Murati’s new startup raises $2B from A16Z, Nvidia, AMD. China’s Moonshot AI (Kimi 2) - 1T parameter open-source LLM outperforming Anthropic’s Opus 4 on coding tasks. Europe is trailing the US and China in foundational AI, but vertical AI and apps offer big opportunities.
25:28 – The Application Layer Boom Lovable Raised $200M at $1.8B valuation** with 75M ARR in 8 months. AI application companies like Tandem Health and Legora are scaling rapidly.
31:51 – Apple Rumoured to Acquire Mistral? $15B acquisition? Would be the largest European AI exit, but raises sovereignty concerns in France.
36:12 – UK Government Reforms Rachel Reeves’ speeches: Streamlined reporting, pushing pension funds into riskier assets, and supporting LSE listings - symbolic or game-changing?
42:21 – Crypto Week in the US Bitcoin hits $120K as three major US crypto acts debated: Clarity Act, Genius Act, Anti-CBDC Act. Europe already has MiCA regulations but lacks a cohesive narrative. But should we have our own Crypto week?
48:19 – European VC at 10-Year Low 2025 projections: $10B VC capital raised. Solutions: Unlock pension capital, simplify retail VC access, and recycle returns from big exits like Mistral.
54:28 – Deal of the Week: Numan Men’s D2C health startup: Raised $57M (30M equity + 27M debt). Pivoted to GLP-1-based weight-loss products, doubling revenue to $90M in 2024.
56:16 – Closing Thoughts.
Upside #48 - Defence The Only Game In Town? Are We Peak LLM? WFH Killing Me Softly...
12 Jul 2025
01:01:53
Upside for the real news behind the headlines affecting European Venture.
This week: Is defence the only game in town? Any moral lines? Has Germany nailed its return to growth? OpenAI at peak LLM? Search engine wars are back! Does WFH kill culture, a tariff check in (already out of date!), EU fines and big tech - will we get the good sh*t?
00:00 – Welcome & Rundown
Dan, Mads & Lomax set the scene: Europe’s defence startup boom, OpenAI’s new browser play, WFH vs. culture, Trump’s ever-shifting tariffs, UK H1 VC stats, and Big Tech vs. EU regulators.
04:21 – Euro uplift
€6.5b in June FundingEurope’s tech raises hit €6.5 billion across 323 deals; UK led with 30% (€1.95B) but dipped 18% MoM, while Germany surged past the UK on deep-tech, quantum, energy robotics & aerospace.
05:40 – Defence vs. Resilience vs.
Dual-UseWhat’s the difference? Defence = pure military; resilience = protecting society (cyber-security→critical infrastructure); dual-use = tech with both civilian & military applications.
07:41 – German Market on Fire
DAX +22% YTD: Industrials up 30% (Rheinmetall, Airbus), Financials +16% on easing rates, Tech +14% via AI plays (SAP) & EV chip leader Infineon - autos and pharma lags.
08:46 – Founder Caution in Defence
Budgets may double to €1 trillion, but only ~5–10% goes to R&D, procurement is slow, buyers are few & timelines clash - “proceed with caution” is the advice.
10:56 – Defence Moral Debate
Is it OK to back companies making weapons? Europe’s “sleepy time under US umbrella” ends do we agree protecting citizens and way of life is a moral imperative?
17:03 – OpenAI’s Browser Bet
With 3b Chrome users feeding Google $200 B/yr in search ad profit, OpenAI’s upcoming “AI browser” could unlock ad revenue ($1B ’26; $25B ’29) by capturing click & intent data.
19:16 – Search Engine Wars Are Back AGAIN
Beyond ChatGPT: Grok 4 (hooked to X), Perplexity’s Comet, and generative SEO shake up distribution—from keyword tags to “GEO” (Generative Engine Optimisation).
31:28 – Does WFH Kill Culture?
Values ≠ behaviours: true culture is “expected actions.” Zoom can’t replace serendipity, mentoring & rapid knowledge-share that happen when teams sit shoulder-to-shoulder.
40:59 – Trump’s Tariff Tracker
“90 deals in 90 days” fizzled - only UK, Vietnam & China. EU deadline pushed to August; Brazil hit with 50%; US aiming for $300b in tariff revenue.
48:39 – UK H1 VC Snapshot
£8 B raised (AI startups 30%), beats Germany & France combined; 188 unicorns (71 private) worth £230b; Oxford/Cambridge/Cardiff each hit £1b.
56:57 – Will Europe get the good stuff if we keep fining and controlling?
EU vs. Big Tech. Apple appeals €500m App-Store fine; Google races to comply with the DMA (10% global-revenue penalty); EU’s proposed chat back-door sparks mass-surveillance concerns.
58:28 – Deal of the Week:
Eutelsat €1.35 B RaiseFrance & UK gov’ts back a pan-European LEO+GEO satellite operator to rival Starlink - €1.35 B shows Europe’s push for sovereign space resilience.
1:00:43 – Parting Bytes
Andrew’s rooting for “pet-emotion AI” (Purosense AI’s seed round); Mads eyes Nvidia’s Q2 (ASML report on July 16); Lomax plans LP visits - and everyone’s beach-office-envious!
Your AI Intern With Root Access - Masa Goes Massive - Europe's Midlife Crisis
31 Jan 2026
01:05:12
00:59 — Saudi surprises, NEOM shrinks, Vision 2030 = Europe takes notes. 02:58 — Europe: zero vibes, zero mission. 03:55 — War bonds?! Saudi winter games postponed. Reality intrudes.
🤖 AI Corner
07:32 — Clawdbot → Moltbot now OpenClaw?! AI intern… with admin rights. 09:19 — Early wins: negotiates car deals, plans diets, orders Tesco shops. 10:38 — Early fear: unconstrained agents + inbox access = mild terror. 12:22 — It wakes itself up and takes action. Cool. Also horrifying. 13:17 — Security stories emerge. Nobody gives it their bank login (yet).
18:01 — Moonshot drops “Swarm” models: 100 agents, one brain. 19:34 — Parallel thinking = faster, not cheaper. Tokens go brrrr. 20:55 — Open source as geopolitical side-eye.
📊 Earnings Season
21:40 — ASML prints money: AI capex not slowing, China still ~20%. 23:05 — Memory beats logic: HBM crunch, chipmakers fully booked. 25:38 — Meta vs Microsoft: ads + AI good, capex + slowing Azure bad. 26:44 — Tesla: sales, “physical AI” story saves the stock. 30:22 — Klarna –30%: credit nerves. Everyone shrugs.
🇪🇺 Europe, Again
32:19 — “United States of Europe?” Telegraph panics. Reality unimpressed. 35:15 — Europe only moves when scared enough. Not there yet. 39:35 — Integration: go wide, go deep, or argue forever. 43:05 — Starmer in China: finance, vibes, low expectations. 43:21 — EU–India deal > UK deals. Market size still matters.
🪖 Defence
45:49 — Europe rearms: drones, satellites, ISR, startups rejoice. 51:21 — US spends ~$900bn; Europe debates what it actually needs. 53:09 — Bull case: Ukraine = Europe’s defence tech lab.
📱 Society
54:23 — Social media bans for kids: messy science, real concern. 56:47 — US sues, EU regulates. Meta lawyers busy. 59:21 — Design-choice lawsuits = tobacco vibes.
🧾 Deals
1:01:34 — UK plans to train 10m people in AI. Ambitious. Necessary. 1:03:12 — Deal of the Week: Sword Health buys Kaia for $285m. 1:04:24 — Synthesia hits ~$4bn. Regret levels spike. 1:04:45 — Wrap. Brains emptied. See you next week.
Upside #47 - Will AI Kill The Internet? IPO's Up? Can Doctors Beat AI?
05 Jul 2025
01:05:32
🎙️ Upside #EP— IPOs, AI vs Doctors, London’s Trouble & The Internet’s Future
⏱️ 02:30 – Figma’s IPO & European Stakes
Filing in NYC after failed Adobe acquisition
$800M+ revenue, 91% margins, 132% NDR
$5B Index Ventures payday
Why this matters for Euro tech
⏱️ 08:50 – London’s IPO Disaster
Worst first half in nearly 30 years: only $160M raised
AstraZeneca flirting with a US listing
Can London come back?
25+ years of decline traced to pension reform post-Maxwell scandal
⏱️ 14:10 – UK vs US Markets: Staggering Comparison
US market cap: $60T vs UK: $3T
Tech in FTSE 100: only 1%
Apple alone = FTSE 100
Institutional apathy + structural rot
⏱️ 18:00 – Pension Power & Mansion House Debate
UK pension funds hold just 5% in UK equities
£40B in annual tax breaks not translating into local investment
Need for regulatory overhaul to unlock capital
⏱️ 22:00 – Fixing the Public Markets
Public markets *should* be the exit path
Without them, the entire private capital waterfall stalls
Stagnation in public exits affects tax receipts, job creation, and the UK ecosystem
⏱️ 25:45 – European Equities Surge
Biggest outperformance vs US stocks on record
€46B inflows in 2025 vs €66B outflows in 2024
Germany wakes up: €500B in infrastructure & defence spend
Sustainable or a short-term Trump-driven rotation?
⏱️ 32:00 – UK Budget Black Hole
£5B budget gap after Labour’s U-turn
Highest tax burden since WWII
Social care + NHS = nearly 50% of budget
Stuck between tax pledges, borrowing risks, and spending pressures
⏱️ 41:00 – UK Future - 3-Paths
Stasis: stealth taxes, zero reforms
Further decline: shrinking influence
Recovery: bold reforms in pensions, NHS tech, and civil service productivity
What road will we take?
⏱️ 46:30 – EU AI Act: Incoming Train Wreck?
Set for August rollout, but 44 major firms ask for pause
Missed code-of-practice deadline - What do we do?
Healthcare, finance, and SaaS startups at risk
GDPR 2.0 on steroids?
⏱️ 52:45 – Can We Save the Open Web?
Cloudflare’s bold move to gate AI scraping
API-first monetisation and licensing models emerging
⏱️ 57:45 – AI vs Doctors
Microsoft benchmark: AI got 80% of diagnoses right vs doctors’ 20%
The end for doctors?
Regulation, infrastructure, and explainability still big hurdles
⏱️ 01:05:00 – Deal of the Week: Portal Biotech
$35M Series A led by Earlybird + NATO Innovation Fund
Protein sequencing tech spun out of University of Groningen
Hopes to be “the Illumina of proteins”
A deeptech win for Europe
Upside #46 - Is Big Tech Britain On Track? Bubble or Boom?
28 Jun 2025
00:53:12
🎙️ Episode Highlights
00:00 – Market Pulse: We’re So Back Baby! US IPOs are red-hot (CoreWeave, Circle), S&P nearly at ATH, and Q2 GDP forecasts hit 3.5%. The resurgence in AI and crypto-led optimism despite fiscal clouds.
03:00 – Bubble or Boom? Are we heading into bubble territory? US deficits are ballooning, but M&A tailwinds and LP liquidity look promising.
05:00 – The Sentiment Effect Economic psychology: consumer sentiment drives GDP. Europe’s problem? It talks itself down. The US? Belief + boldness.
06:50 – Big Tech Bets on Britain Amazon pledges £40B UK investment (data centres, fulfilment, even a film studio). British Business Bank expands to £25B. Visma chooses London IPO over Nasdaq—confidence win?
14:00 – UK’s 10-Year Industrial Push Gov’t targets AI, defence, creative, and energy—aiming to slash grid connection delays. Electricity costs still a major drag. Can policy execution catch up to rhetoric?
18:00 – The UK’s Economic Reality Check High inflation + stagnant growth = stagflation-lite. £66B in working-age benefits forecast by 2029. Labour’s internal revolt blocks real reform.
27:00 – Tariff Tensions Mount Trump trade wars return: EU braces for July 9 deadline. Retaliation looms. Could German auto exports be the pressure point?
32:00 – AI in the Wild Apple eyes Perplexity. DocuSign sues scrappy 2-day clone. Seed-strapped startups exit for millions without VC - Paradigm shift or PR hype?
37:00 – Copyright Battles Begin Meta & Anthropic win round one using “transformative use” defence. The big legal fight (OpenAI vs NYT) still looms.
41:00 – Robotaxi Rollout? Tesla demos driverless fleet in Austin - damp squib? Still lagging Waymo. Real progress or just share-price theatre?
43:00 – Europe’s Bay Area Dream Can Europe become Silicon Valley? Should we can we? It’s not about funding - it’s confidence, imagination, and embracing failure.
51:00 – Optimism Please! Q2 earnings optimism and promising chip efficiency breakthroughs. Markets strong, founders bold, and Europe's moment (maybe) coming.
Upside - The *real* stories affecting European Venture.
This week Mads, Lomax and I discuss: AI cybercrime, UK govt investing in tech/AI, cheap energy (nuclear isn't), Tesla’s RoboFail, 996 and founder work-life balance, AI growth but is the revenue good? and the shock flip between private vs. public markets.
01:24 – Cyber-Security: Rising Threats 43 % of UK businesses hit by cyber-crime last year; avg. of 2,000 attacks/week in Q1 2025.
02:07 – AI-Enabled Attacks & Geopolitical Impact AI tools lower the barrier for sophisticated attacks by state-sponsored or rogue actors - new front in modern warfare by economic disruption.
04:12 – Kinetic vs. Cyber Warfare The mix of traditional (kinetic) and cyber fronts.
07:20 – Government Spending Review: Big Picture Rachel Reeves’s 3-year spending framework amid a weak UK economy: £120bn on infrastructure; £43bn for science & innovation; £2bn AI Action Plan.
16:50 – Energy Landscape & Nuclear The UK’s high industrial energy costs (6× US); sovereignty & intermittency issues; nuclear offers clean baseload and sovereignty but at what cost?
19:21 – Fusion & Long-Term Energy Tech Recent fusion advances (Tokamak West’s 22 min plasma) and Proxima Fusion’s €130 m Series A, but 20 yr horizon remains.
25:51 – Tesla’s Robotaxi Roll-Out Tesla’s delayed Austin launch (moved from June 12→22); cost comparison vs. Waymo.
28:34 – Europe’s AV Landscape: The Brexit Dividend Wayve’s UK partnerships (Nissan, Uber, spring 2026 trial at L4 autonomy) versus EU’s slower L2/3 regs.
32:26 – Founder Work Ethic Debate Heated talk around “996” & extreme hustle: Lomax quotes Paul Graham on youth vs. age advantages.
37:00 – AI Revenue Growth & Sustainability LLM businesses doubling revenue every 2 months; examples: Anysphere’s $500m ARR, Lovable’s €61m ARR; concerns around gross margins, churn & long-term profitability.
46:14 – Private vs. Public Market Performance First time in 25 yrs that private markets underperform public across 1/3/5/10 yr horizons (State Street report): “Magnificent 7” driving public returns. A shake-out & opportunity ahead as private seeks its illiquidity premium.
52:00 – Notable Deals
Multiverse (ES) – €189m Series B for LLM compression tech (95 % size reduction)
Oxford Ionics → IonQ – $1bn+ acquisition of UK trapped-ion quantum spin-out
55:47 – Closing & Condolences Dan sends thoughts to those affected by the Air India crash, and wraps up with thanks and next-week teasers.
Upside #43 - EU Rate Advantage, Naughty Lawyers, AI Copy…right? A UK Defence Reviewer Says What?
07 Jun 2025
00:49:48
Hosts: Dan Bowyer, Lomax Ward, Mads Jensen.
The real news behind the headlines affecting European Venture.
ECB interest rate cuts, IPO market divergence, AI copyright tension, UK Strategic Defence Review, and the NHS starts liquid biopsies.
00:58 – ECB Rate Cuts: So what for Europe and Startups? 8 rate cuts in 12 months signals easing. EU’s sub-2% inflation vs. US’s higher inflation + deficit (~7% of GDP).Fiscal strength = leverage for defence and energy investment.
04:34 – Capital Flows & Sentiment Will a weaker euro drive more capital to riskier assets?
05:27 – Contrasting the US Volatility vs. EU Stability Volatility in the US makes EU relatively attractive, but low EU growth remains a concern. Lower rates long-term can push capital into startups and infrastructure.
07:21 – IPO Markets: A Tale of Two Cities US IPO market is booming (+80%), UK (-80%). 143 US IPOs vs. 5 UK IPOs YTD. $13B raised in US vs. ummm £75M in UK?!
09:11 – Why is the UK IPO Scene Lagging? US market cap ~17x that of UK; daily trading 50x more.
12:35 – Pisces Liquidity Schemes: Public vs. Private Market Debate Pisces—a new semi-liquid scheme for startup equity. Private markets aren’t built for public-style trading. Carta tried—failed.
15:11 – Systemic Decline of London’s Public Market From ~1/3 the size of S&P 500 in 2007 to 1/17 today. Staggering numbers.
21:49 – UK Defence Review: Investment & Opportunity New £87B plan over 10 years. Will it benefit startups? Still heavily physical (~80%), but £400M earmarked for innovation.
28:24 – Sovereign Tech & Europe's Defence Role Is £400M enough? Contextualised vs. Anduril’s $2.5B raise.
37:08 – AI Infrastructure in Europe Links defence with economic growth. EU's €20B AI Superfactory plans underway; Germany’s first data cluster. Huge challenge: power costs & permitting.
40:19 – NHS Liquid Biopsies: Tech Meets Real-World Healthcare NHS rolling out liquid biopsy for lung/breast cancer patients. Huge potential.
45:54 – The Case for Healthcare Tech Efficiency NHS productivity is down despite 14% spending increase since 2019.
46:12 – Deals of the Week MUBI: UK-based streaming platform raises $100M from Sequoia. Beckley Psytech & Atai merger: A pivotal moment for psychedelics + mental health. Grammarly: $1B non-dilutive raise led by General Catalyst; Ukrainian roots, US-led round.
Until next week fine people...
Upside #42 - Worlds Biggest Trade + EU Scale-err-up Strategy + The Jony & Sam Love-in
31 May 2025
00:45:21
Trade Wars, Tariffs, and Tech Shifts – The Big Picture Shaping European Startups
With Dan Bowyer, Mads Jensen & Lomax Ward
00:00 – Intro: The Need to Talk Tariffs
Dan kicks off the episode with a reminder: No groans, we need to talk tariffs.
Taco tariffs, international trade deals, and looming US-EU trade tensions.
00:29 – Federal Judges, EU-US Trade, and Startup Impacts
The EU-US trade deal cajoled activity: what does it mean for investors, startups, and Europe?
00:59 – Lomax’s Context: The Behemoth US-EU Trade Relationship
Why has there never been a formal trade deal? Regulatory misalignments and subsidy wars (Airbus-Boeing).
Harmonisation of standards as a critical issue—hardware startups especially at risk.
02:12 – Regulatory Divergence and Why It Matters
EU’s precautionary principle vs. US’s risk-based model.
Trade deals aren't just tariffs—harmonising standards can unlock growth.
03:50 – Hardware Startups & the Tariff Threat
10% of EU startups are hardware—“they will struggle if tariffs hit 50%.”
04:28 – The China & Russia Factor in Trade Rebalancing
Trump’s chaotic policies, stock markets up despite tariff shocks.
06:01 – Inflation, Deficits, and Market Volatility
Residual tariffs could push US inflation by .5-1%.
“Congress looking to add $3-4 trillion over 10 years.”
The importance of EU sophistication in trade negotiations
08:55 – Direct vs. Indirect Impact on Startups
Tariffs affect hardware directly; inflation and interest rates indirectly.
Interest rates impact M&A, liquidity, DPI, and venture capital flows.
11:27 – Markets’ Schism: Bond Traders vs. Equity Investors
Bond traders panic over risk; equity investors bet on AI’s promise.
12:09 – Trump’s Amplifier Effect: Deregulation vs. Chaos
The paradox of Trump’s anti-regulation stance fuelling optimism vs. destabilisation.
13:42 – EU’s Startup & Scale-Up Strategy: Will It Work?
€10B blended fund, blue carpet initiative for talent, regulatory simplification.
17:23 – The Slow Pace of EU Policy: 2026-27 Timelines
Lomax: “28th regime sounds like a Robert Harris novel—big thanks to Andreas Klinger for pushing it.”
19:50 – Employee Stock Options: Europe’s Broken System
The need for harmonisation—“It’s key to unlocking talent.”
21:49 – Big Tech Announcements: AI’s Velocity
Google I/O, Microsoft Build, Nvidia’s blowout quarter.
AI’s exponential growth—“50x increase in token processing in a year.”
27:30 – The Application Layer: Opportunities and Disruptions
AI’s impact on startup building: velocity of product cycles, risk of obsolescence.
Dan: “Will SaaS die as AI tools empower in-house builds?”
36:54 – OpenAI + Johnny Ive: Hardware, Form Factors, and Speculation
A $6.5B stock deal, secretive hardware project—pendant? Phone? Glasses? A new paradigm?
“I hope it’s not a pendant!”
39:10 – The Race for the Next Form Factor
Apple’s stagnation; OpenAI’s ambition to dethrone them.
41:10 – Wrap-Up: EU Urgency, Munich’s Tech Momentum, and the Week Ahead
Munich as a growing hub: TSMC, Apple, Quantum Systems.
Lomax: “Bright Flag’s $425M exit is a big deal for the European ecosystem.”
Upside Special - The Inside Track Of European Venture in 2025
25 May 2025
00:35:00
The real stories behind the headlines affecting European Venture.
This week Mads, Lomax, Andrew and I are all out and about at various conferences and events speaking with European LPs and GPs about our ecosystem - themes and trends for 2025 and beyond, how we grow, how we go toe-to-toe. The pitfalls, the breaks and beyond.
00:00 Introducing Dragons with Andrew Scott 07:40 Lomax goes toe-to-toe with Silicon Valley 13:05 Jone from First Pick and her Lithuanian adventures 15:15 Francesco from SiliconValley Ventures on 2025 deep tech opportunities 16:36 Oz from QNB and his one big ask 17:12 Charlotte from Integra - what to look for in emerging managers 19:50 Mike Sigal breaks down the European capital challenge 24:20 Dan from Repeat on renewed LP positivity 25:22 Antonio from Maze on Trump crushing Impact - or is he? 26:35 Mads with EU Inc founders Andreas and Philip - Why Europe why now
Upside Special - Poker Power For Founders & Investors
17 May 2025
00:27:44
🎙️ Upside: Special Edition with Jo Living — Poker, Pressure & Performance in Business, Startups and Investing
Host: Dan Bowyer Guest: Jo Living, Founder of ACES High
Jo Living joins Dan to explore the high-stakes parallels between poker and the business world. From her upbringing around cards to founding a FemTech startup and launching ACES High, Jo unpacks how poker has helped her navigate negotiations, raise capital, build teams—and teach others to perform under pressure.
01:07 – Jo’s Career Journey From investment banking to FemTech founder to poker circuit regular, Jo traces the experiences that led to ACES High.
03:29 – The Trigger Moment A trip to Morocco, winning a poker tournament while pregnant, and launching informal poker nights back home.
05:19 – Skills Poker Builds for Business Jo outlines the key transferable skills: deep listening, risk management, performance under pressure, and reading the room.
05:59 – Poker & Gender Imbalance Despite the male-dominated scene, Jo shares how the environment is evolving and why inclusivity—not 50/50 parity—is the goal.
07:44 – Lessons for Startup Teams Jo compares limited data in poker and startups, bankroll/runway management, and the importance of making high-quality decisions consistently.
09:49 – Playing the Long Game Resilience, persistence, and strategic decision-making.
10:29 – Aura Fertility & Negotiating as a Founder Jo shares how she raised £600k for her FemTech startup and used poker instincts to navigate valuation and investor conversations.
13:55 – Negotiation Mistakes: The "All-In" Fallacy Jo unpacks why some founders or investors go "all in"—and what they’re really signaling about negotiation ability and ego.
14:37 – Executive Presence & Investor Psychology Playing not just the cards, but the perceptions. Jo explains how table presence mirrors founder confidence in boardrooms.
15:10 – Poker Misconceptions Debunking myths: poker isn’t all bluffing. Jo explains the difference between bluff-based games and Texas Hold'em.
16:20 – Why Texas Hold’em is a Business Masterclass Community cards mean shared data, emphasising logic, negotiation, and risk evaluation—not deception.
17:22 – Should All Founders Learn Poker? Jo makes a strong case for poker as a self-awareness tool—revealing how we handle stress, risk, and conflict.
20:56 – Biggest Founder Lesson from Poker Avoiding "tilt" after a setback and how to bounce back with focus and discipline.
21:45 – Bankroll Strategy & Knowing Your Levers Jo explains why you need "enough chips to do damage"—and how that applies to leverage in business negotiation.
23:16 – Poker as a Hiring Tool? Jo suggests poker simulations may outperform psychometric tests in surfacing resilience, strategy, and interpersonal savvy.
24:56 – Duplicate Bridge & Gamified Hiring A thought-provoking take on creating controlled poker challenges to assess talent and founder potential.
26:07 – Poker is Not Just for the Bros Jo highlights how beginner women often outperform overconfident players through disciplined, strategic play.
27:15 – Final Thoughts: A Tool for Strategic Insight Poker as a lens for understanding investment decisions, founder mindset, and long-term success.
Upside #41 - Publics Meets Privates – What It Means for Venture
10 May 2025
01:01:52
Upside: Public Meets Private – What It Means for Venture
In this episode of Upside, Dan is joined by Lomax from Outsized, Andrew from 7%, and Mads from SuperSeed to explore how public markets intersect with private markets—and why it matters for VCs and founders alike.
Key Topics Covered:
[00:01] Welcome & Intros:
Dan welcomes guests and sets the scene for a deep dive into public vs. private markets.
[02:00] Ørsted’s Offshore Wind Cancellation:
Mads unpacks the Hornsea phase four cancellation.
Energy security, interest rates, and the geopolitical chessboard.
[07:20] The UK’s Future of Compute:
Lomax highlights Albion VC’s report on UK deep tech and compute.
What went wrong with Graphcore and what’s next for quantum players like Riverlane and Quantum Motion.
[10:45] Healthcare IT & NHS Modernisation:
Andrew revisits the NHS’s tech failures and weighs the new £21B upgrade plan.
The case for agile, smaller tech firms in public procurement.
Dan covers DoorDash’s acquisition of Deliveroo and what it says about European tech exits.
EIF’s barometer survey: what’s top of mind for VCs and PE in Europe right now.
[18:38] UK-EU Youth Mobility & Trade Talks:
Mads outlines the potential for a youth mobility deal post-Brexit.
Lomax emphasizes the enduring importance of EU-UK trade vs. US-UK hype.
[20:55] Public Markets’ Role in VC:
Dan kicks off a new segment: why public markets matter even if you're a private investor.
Surprising stats on IPO sizes, US investor involvement, and cross-border exits.
[29:17] Lightspeed’s RIA Move Explained:
Lomax explains why Lightspeed and other big VCs are becoming RIAs.
What it means for fund structures, founders, and the evolving investment landscape.
[50:20] Secondaries Deep Dive:
The group discusses the booming role of secondaries in venture.
Liquidity, DPI, and how VCs are adapting to a world of longer-hold private assets.
[59:37] AI Corner:
Mads updates on Google’s new AI milestone overtaking Anthropic’s Claude 3.7.
OpenAI’s nonprofit drama and its funding round headaches.
[1:01:30] Deal of the Week:
Spotlight on two European drone unicorns: TechEver (Portugal) and Quantum Systems (Germany).
The rise of defence-tech in Europe and implications for global security.
[1:06:10] Marrakesh & EU VC Meetups:
Dragon Chasers VC retreat in Marrakesh—paragliding and power networking.
EU VC crew gathering in London to strengthen European venture ties.
If you're a founder, investor, or just passionate about startups and venture capital, Upside is your go-to source for deep dives into the trends shaping Europe’s tech scene.
Upside #40 - Pension Cash *Will* Unlock UK VC - But when, how & so what?
03 May 2025
01:02:09
🎙️ Upside #40 Podcast — For The Real Stories Behind The European Venture Headlines
If you're into startups, VC investing, European Venture, or anything startup-ecosystem and business - this podcast is for you.
Host: Dan Bowyer (SuperSeed) Guests: Lomax (Outsized), Mads (SuperSeed), Chris Elphick (BVCA)
00:00 — Introduction Dan welcomes listeners to Upside, introducing co-hosts Lomax and Mads. Special guest Chris Elphick, Head of Venture Capital at the British Venture Capital Association (BVCA), joins to unpack the European venture scene.
🏛️ BVCA, Government, and the Venture Landscape
00:41 — Chris Elphick: Inside the BVCA Chris shares BVCA’s role as the voice of UK VC, its upcoming conference, and engagement with government and industry leaders like Peter Kyle (UK Secretary of State for Science, Innovation and Technology).
01:30 — AI, MPs, and Government Tools Discussion on the use of AI in government, freedom of information requests, and whether MPs should be criticised or encouraged for experimenting with tools like ChatGPT.
⚙️ Politics, Elections & Economic Backdrop
05:00 — UK Local Elections & Reform’s Rise Chris and the team unpack local election results, the rise of Reform UK, and parallels with Trump-era political trends.
06:50 — US-China Trade War & Global Impact Mads breaks down the effect of US-China tariffs on global trade, the likelihood of recession, and inflationary pressures.
✈️ Aerospace & European Tech Ecosystem
10:00 — Heart Aerospace Moves to the US The team explores why Swedish startup Heart Aerospace is relocating to LA, touching on the US-Europe funding gap and the challenges of raising large growth rounds in Europe.
13:00 — UK VC Fundraising Trends Chris shares new BVCA data: venture fundraising doubled from £2.3B (2023) to £4B (2024), with notable increases in US LP participation, but highlights the persistent absence of UK pension capital.
💰 Pension Reform & the Scale-Up Gap
25:00 — EIS, VCT, & British Business Bank Programmes Explaining the importance of Enterprise Investment Scheme (EIS), Venture Capital Trusts (VCT), and the British Business Bank in seeding UK funds.
35:00 — Mansion House Compact & Pensions Deep dive into the push to unlock UK pension capital for VC:
Charge cap changes
LTAFs (Long-Term Asset Funds) are here
The Nova initiative (inspired by France’s Tibi scheme)
56:00 — Who’s Doing Pension Release Well? Discussion of successful pension-backed VC models in Sweden, the Netherlands, France (Tibi), and lessons for the UK.
🤖 AI Corner & Deal of the Week
58:00 — AI: Changing the Game Mads highlights that ~30% of Microsoft and Google code is now AI-generated; Cursor hits 1B lines/day.
59:00 — Defence & Geopolitics Lomax points to a Series A defence deal led by Index Ventures. Mads reviews the U.S.-Ukraine minerals deal as geopolitical chess.
Doh Davos, Data Centre Downsides, No To Delaware, Dead SaaS & Defence IPOs
24 Jan 2026
00:48:42
01:35–10:24 — UK data centres: blocked… but a way through
A £1bn London-area data-centre project gets halted after a planning/EIA mess-up → delays of 9–12+ months, potentially worse.
The twist: data centres are being upgraded to “nationally significant infrastructure,” enabling central-government fast-track (DCO route) instead of local NIMBY planning.
Still: EIAs + judicial reviews can keep slowing everything down. Core complaint: the system keeps “deciding whether to build” after we’ve already decided we must.
10:24–20:01 — Davos: in a fractured world, can middle powers go solo?
Big takeaway: the old global order isn’t coming back. Middle powers doing bilateral deals risk being picked off one-by-one. The only viable strategy is bigger blocs + coordination.
On AI/robotics: Europe shouldn’t obsess over winning foundation models; the opportunity is physical AI (robotics, manufacturing, automation) layered onto Europe’s engineering base—if politics and fragmentation don’t smother it.
20:01–22:22 — AI vs jobs: don’t overkill the headline
Entry-level postings are down since early 2023, but the consensus here is: macro + rates explain most of it. AI will reshuffle work (especially junior/clerical tasks), but mass unemployment isn’t the base case.
22:22–27:46 — EU Inc / “28th regime”: real momentum and real resistance
EU Inc aims to make a pan-EU startup entity that’s fast/cheap to set up (48 hours, no minimum capital), plus simpler ESOPs (ideally tax deferred until liquidity).
The fight now: Regulation vs Directive
Regulation = uniform + immediate, but needs unanimity
Directive = easier, but invites delay + fragmentation
Expect pushback framed around labour standards and “race-to-the-bottom” fears.
27:46–34:51 — Has China already won AI?
Reframe “winning”: it’s not god-like AI dominance; it’s economic + military power with AI as a lever. Models converge fast, advantages erode, and the “months not years” gap matters.
Europe’s real risk is strategic irrelevance unless it scales power: capital markets, energy, defence capacity, and political cohesion (with a nod to the UK needing to be onside).
34:51–39:30 — US science funding “collapse”: brutal in pockets, not total
Big cuts and cancellations are real—especially in politically sensitive areas—but most US R&D is private sector, and defence-linked R&D keeps growing. Europe is trying to attract researchers, but this doesn’t yet look like a permanent talent migration.
39:30–43:13 — SaaS: dead? no? trapped?
SaaS faces a fork:
Mature into a cash machine (cut bloat, optimise margins), or
Become a “system of context” by embedding AI/agents deeply
Why the pain: ZIRP-era bloat + expensive orgs + incentive traps. Bright spot: incumbents with distribution are already monetising AI add-ons at meaningful ARR.
43:13–45:47 — Defence IPO era: the Overton window moved
A blockbuster European defence IPO becomes the poster child for a broader trend: defence re-rated, ESG lines shifting, and a growing pipeline as European defence budgets rise for the next decade.
45:47–47:02 — Quick hits
Billion-scale European fund raise gets a shout-out. More big AI deals bubbling. New fund launch focused on robotics/manufacturing, positioned as aligned with what Europe needs next.
Upside #39 - Lab Grown Meat Back On? Euro-Funds Swim In Cash & Why Anti-Trust Wins
26 Apr 2025
00:31:55
🎙️ Upside Podcast: The Real Stories Behind The Headlines Affecting European Venture
Hosts: Dan Bowyer (SuperSeed), Andrew J Scott (7Percent), Mads Jensen (SuperSeed)
🔥 Episode Highlights
This week, Dan, Andrew, and Mads tackle the latest trends shaping Europe’s startup and tech ecosystem, including:
Cash Inflows into Europe: Massive cash movements into European funds – but how meaningful is this trend? Could instability in the US be Europe's gain?
Drone Regulations and the Future of Delivery: With new UK drone regulations expected by 2026, Andrew explores whether drone grocery delivery is realistic – and where it makes the most sense.
Wayve’s Breakthrough in Japan: Mads shares insights on Wayve’s strategic entry into Japan with Nissan, how it's setting a global stage for autonomous driving, and why Europe must compete.
Tesla’s Shifting Focus: Dan highlights Tesla’s Q1 struggles, Musk stepping back from DOGE, and what that could mean for Tesla’s full self-driving ambitions.
Early Stage VC Trends: Key findings from Dealroom’s Q1 report: healthtech dominance, foreign capital influx, and the evolving pre-seed landscape.
Is Europe’s Surge in Investment Patriotism or Pragmatism? The team debates whether Europe's increasing inflows are a flash in the pan or a sign of a long-term shift.
🥩 FoodTech & Future Farming
Lab-Grown Meat Breakthroughs: Exciting developments from the University of Tokyo, Meatly, Miriam Eats, and 3DBT are pushing lab-grown meat closer to supermarket shelves. The panel discusses why cost remains the main hurdle and why agriculture as we know it could radically change within 20–30 years.
Space-Grown Food: Space agencies are exploring cultivated food in low-gravity environments. Can startups tap into this cosmic opportunity?
🔍 OpenAI's Big Moves & Antitrust Drama
OpenAI Eyeing Google’s Chrome? The DOJ’s antitrust actions could force Google to sell Chrome – and OpenAI is reportedly interested. Is this good for competition, or are regulators overreaching?
The Future of Foundational Models: Should OpenAI stay focused on core models or build an AI-driven app store? The team unpacks what’s next for AI’s leading players.
🏥 Deal of the Week
Skin Analytics' £15M Raise: Dan spotlights Skin Analytics' Series B success to advance AI-driven skin cancer diagnostics — a meaningful healthtech leap for the UK.
🛠️ Policy & Regulation Corner
Deregulation Win: Mads celebrates new EU legislation easing sustainability reporting requirements — expected to save businesses €4–6 billion in administrative burden.
🌟 Bonus: Cool Startups & What's Next
Niobolt's Ultra-Fast Charging Tech: Andrew showcases a Cambridge spinout promising EV battery charging in under 6 minutes — a game-changer if it scales.
Thanks for listening to Upside – where we make sense of the chaos behind Europe's venture scene.
👉 Subscribe, rate, and share if you enjoy the show!
Upside #38 - Turkish Tech, Tough Love & Trends for '25
19 Apr 2025
00:58:37
🎙 Upside: The Real Stories Behind European Venture
Hosts: Dan (SuperSeed), Lomax (Outsized), Andrew (7%), Guest: Dilek Dayinlarli (Scalex Ventures)
⏪ In This Episode
This week on Upside, the gang is joined by the brilliant Dilek Dayinlarli, founder and managing partner at Scalex Ventures. Together, they unpack the latest headlines, industry trends, and ecosystem insights — with a deep dive into the fast-emerging Turkish tech scene.
🔥 What We Cover
⚡ Rapid-fire News Roundup
Murati raises $2B at $10B valuation — with talent from OpenAI and the Albanian PM cheering her on
Synthesia hits $100M ARR and partners with Adobe — a UK generative AI success story
Controversy as EIF refuses to back weapons/defence startups, even as Europe ramps defence spending
ASML's Q1: Strong results but order volumes down — signs of tariff jitters?
Figma confidentially files for IPO, bucking the trend
Hugging Face acquires a French humanoid robotics startup
Dollar drops: good for European stocks, not so good for US VC-backed markups
UK's bid for a piece of the $500B Stargate AI data centre project
New Finnish startup hub Maria 01 scaling up to 70K sq ft — the Paris Station F playbook
📈 Reports & Market Trends
Dealroom x HSBC Q1 Report: UK startups raised $4.2B in Q1 2024 - led by healthtech, with outsized deals like Isomorphic ($600M) and Vediva ($400M)
Concerns over UK IPO pipeline - will LSE stage a comeback?
The "founder flywheel" is spinning: UK seeing post-exit talent build new ventures
Big players still dominate fundraising: EIF, British Business Bank, British Patient Capital lead LP activity
💬 Big Conversations
Liquidity crisis in European VC: money going in, but exits not keeping pace
Why mid-sized exits matter more than ever
Capital efficiency in emerging markets vs. “go big or go home” mentality
Can European VCs stomach the high-stakes bets their founders need?
Secondary markets & the art of managing the “middle third” of your portfolio
🌍 Spotlight on Turkey Dilek brings us into the fast-growing Turkish tech ecosystem:
From $10M invested in 2012 to $2.6B+ in 2023
Gaming, fintech, defence tech, and B2B software leading the charge
Massive spillover effects: Peak Games and Getir have spawned 100+ startups
Entry valuations 60% lower than the US, and capital efficiency is key
Series B gap remains a challenge — but momentum is building
Turkey’s global diaspora plays a crucial role in scaling internationally
🏆 Deals of the Week
Dilek: Incident.io raises $62M Series B — another evolution in incident management
Lomax: Strava acquires Runna, a top 3 UK fitness app — a quick win, or premature exit?
Upside #37 – Q1 2025 in Review + Tariffs & European Venture + Heads Down & Build
12 Apr 2025
00:47:47
🎙️ Featuring: Dan (SuperSeed VC) Lomax (Outsized) Andrew (7%)
00:30 – Klarna’s IPO Pulled & BNPL Under Pressure Lomax reflects on Klarna pulling its IPO, amid turbulent markets and declining peers like Affirm. Is the buy-now-pay-later model starting to creak under macro pressure?
02:15 – Wave AI x Nissan: A Mega Auto Deal from Cambridge A highlight for the UK: Wave AI’s $1.2B-backed AV tech lands a landmark partnership with Nissan for post-2027 production.
03:30 – Shopify's CEO Goes AI-First Dan and Andrew react to a leaked Shopify memo urging teams to prove a task can’t be done by AI before requesting headcount.
05:05 – AI Futures Project: Black Mirror Vibes A fascinating, speculative look at global AI scenarios via ai-2027.com — think Asimov meets geopolitics.
06:45 – Tariff Talk: Trump, Trust & Europe’s Wake-Up Call Dan shares his eight theories on Trump's new tariff push, what it means for global trust, and Europe’s potential silver linings — including brain drain reversals and safe haven appeal.
10:45 – What Founders Should (and Shouldn’t) Do Lomax: “Head down and build” remains the advice — though hardware startups at Series A/B should evaluate manufacturing strategy. Dan and Andrew agree: short-term panic isn’t the play.
14:45 – Hardware & Biotech: Sector-Specific Risk How US-origin requirements, reshoring costs, and future pharma tariffs could force hard decisions on supply chains and capex.
17:45 – Market Reactions, Investment Shifts & “VC Panic” From "RIP Good Times"-style memos to portfolio rebalancing — VCs are reacting in varied (and sometimes dramatic) ways.
22:15 – Report Review: State of Venture (CB Insights Q1 2025)
Global VC hit $121B — highest since Q2 2022
AI dominated with $40B for OpenAI alone
CVC activity dropped sharply, particularly in Europe & Asia
UK VC funding hit a 5-year low; Nordics and France on the rise
Fewer deals, bigger rounds, and a record 12 $1B+ M&A deals
27:15 – AI Bubble or Boom? Dan & Lomax debate how long the mega-investments in gen AI can last. Andrew points to foundational tech (chips, infra, cyber) as the safer long-term bets.
32:30 – The Data Center Power Squeeze Power scarcity is slowing new data center builds — particularly in Europe. Efficiency, not just scale, may be the next AI gold rush.
34:30 – Report Review: UK AI Sector (Tech Nation)
2,300 AI startups worth $230B
$1B raised in Q1 2025
76% of CEOs report positive impact
Growth capital & talent cited as top challenges
Policy still biased toward risk-aversion, not growth
38:45 – “The UK Thinks Small” Lomax reads Barney Hussey-Yeo’s powerful critique of UK scale-up culture — a call for bigger ambition, smarter regulation, and less fear.
41:45 – What Needs to Change? Andrew: “We don’t need more government-run funds — we need to unwind bad policies.” Immigration, pensions, and tax reforms are the real levers for growth.
44:15 – Deals of the Week 🚀
Polamist: European maritime defense tech
Green Jets: $7M electric jet engine raise
Jensen AI: Open-source distributed AI infra
Isomorphic Labs: $600M mega-raise led by US capital
46:45 – Final Thoughts Despite the gloom around tariffs, IPO slowdowns, and policy inertia, Q1 shows Europe's tech scene still has major moves to make — especially if founders stay focused and regulators get out of the way.
The shifting sands of geopolitics, defence tech, and AI — and what it all means for European startups, investors, and the broader ecosystem. From Germany’s defence splurge to Trump’s tariff theatrics and the commoditisation of LLMs, this one spans continents and controversies.
🧵 Topics Covered
Liberation Day (US): What does Trump’s tariff agenda mean for European startups? Is it just noise, or should we be worried about supply chain shock and retaliatory regulation?
European Defence Tech Boom: Germany’s lifted debt ceiling, tanks from Volkswagen, and defence ETFs surging 70-170%. Is this the economic unlock Europe’s been waiting for? Will the flood of money fuel true innovation, or just line the pockets of the usual suspects?
The Dual-Use Dilemma: AI startups becoming “peace tech” and the sudden defence pivot — are we heading for a repeat of the blockchain hype cycle? What does real opportunity look like in this space?
The AI Opportunity – or Not? Inspired by Nicolas Colin’s Drift Signal piece, the gang debates: Can Europe play a Japan-in-the-‘80s role in the AI era by winning at the application layer? Or is that wishful thinking?
Pension Power in VC: UK’s Mansion House Compact and the potential influx of pension capital into venture. Will it finally trickle down to true innovation?
TikTok Shop & Bezos’ Moves: What’s Amazon doing cozying up to Trump? Is TikTok’s forced sale the ultimate VC party round?
📊 Data Points
0.007%: UK pension allocation to VC
5%: Targeted allocation by 2030 under the Mansion House Compact
25,000 parts: Average number in a modern car — a tariff tangle waiting to happen
Up to 170%: Growth in defence ETF performance
400M: Capital raised by ISAR for its (exploding) rocket launch
30 AI avatars: H&M replaces human models in new campaign
50%+: US consumer share of GDP — explains the political calculus behind tariffs
📝 Show Notes Extras
📖 Recommended Read: Nicolas Colin's “Who Will Be the Japan of the AI Era?” on Drift Signal
📈 Theororm’s Report: Resilience sector is up 30% in Europe while overall VC is down 45%
🧠 Trivia: The UK launched a satellite into orbit before the EU ever did… back in 1971. RIP Black Arrow.
🎙️ Upside: The Real Stories Behind The Headlines Affecting European Venture
Hosts:
Dan (SuperSeed VC)
Lomax (Outsized)
Andrew (7%) (Mads is away enjoying cherry blossoms in Japan 🌸)
Upside #35 - Spring Non-Statement, Project EurHope, Power of Brand
29 Mar 2025
01:00:23
🎙️ Upside: The Real Stories Behind European Venture
🎧 In This Episode
Join Dan, Lomax, and Mads, with special guest Alex Macdonald (founder of Sequel and investor), for an opinion-packed episode exploring:
🔦 Project Europe: Can It Save European Founders?
Alex shares his insider take as an LP in Project Europe — why he committed in 11 minutes, what makes it different, and how it's supporting founders before they become credentialed.
A passionate discussion around access, age, credentials, and whether early-stage capital is the bottleneck (spoiler: it isn’t).
Addressing the diversity backlash: Is it fair or misguided?
The million-euro question: How do we keep the next Revolut or Stripe in Europe?
💊 23andMe’s Collapse: The Business Model That Wasn’t
What went wrong with one of the most high-potential datasets in history?
Can health tech ever monetize patient data responsibly — and is “collecting data” a real strategy?
🧬 Data, DNA & Deletion Regret
Dan and Alex reflect on being early 23andMe users, deleting their data, and what happens when personal info is hacked.
Plus: A warning for startups assuming data is always monetisable.
📉 Spring Statement Reactions: A Missed Moment for Growth?
Rachel Reeves delivers... not much.
The group unpacks why cutting towards breakeven might not be the answer, and why we need fiscal stimulus, not fiddling.
Why “holding patterns” in policy could hurt more than they help.
🤖 AI Corner: DeepSeek vs. Gemini vs. Reve
OpenAI’s rumoured $40B raise (led by SoftBank)
DeepSeek’s new V3: small model, big results
Gemini finally feels usable — is Google back in the race?
Reve: The MidJourney killer?
Plus: The growing copyright vs. innovation battle in training data.
🚨 Startup Scandals & Fraud Watch
Builder.ai’s CEO steps down amid audit concerns
11X under fire: Churn, fake logos, inflated ARR — or just messy scaling?
Where’s the line between "founder storytelling" and straight-up Theranos?
Dan dubs it: “The Orange Jumpsuit List” (aka Forbes 30 Under 30)
🇺🇸 US Brand Damage: Does It Matter in Europe?
From Trump to Tesla, has America’s “brand” hit long-term trouble?
Emotional vs. structural consequences
What defence tech buyers and governments are really worried about
Should Europe decouple — and can it?
💥 Deal of the Week
Marvel Fusion (Germany) raises €112M Series B/C for nuclear fusion tech
A rare bright spot for European deep tech growth capital
📌 Highlights
“Europe doesn't lack founders. It lacks belief.” — Alex Macdonald
“23andMe had 15 million people's DNA and still couldn’t build a business.” — Lomax
“Rachel Reeves is doing the startup equivalent of multiple shallow layoffs.” — Dan
“Failure is a feature, not a bug. Let a thousand flowers bloom.” — Mads
“Consumers might forget. Governments won’t.” — Lomax on US brand damage
“Where is the money? Still a good question.” — All
02:04 – Europe’s Biggest Company Is… SAP? 03:25 – 23andMe Files for Bankruptcy 07:33 – Project Europe Deep Dive 25:08 – Spring Statement Reactions 34:29 – AI Corner - deep seek, Gemini and Reve 42:15 – Startup Scandals 48:52 – Brand Damage 58:52 – Deal of the Week
Upside #34 - Filthy Food, AI Jesus, 7pm Bryan and Startup Spies.
22 Mar 2025
00:48:45
Hosts: Dan, Lomax (Outsized), Andrew J Scott (7%), Mads (SuperSeed VC) Runtime: ~48 minutes Topic: Markets, M&A, AI mayhem, longevity hype, startup espionage — and a little bit of Bryan Johnson's bedtime routine.
🔍 This Week on Upside:
We’re going full spectrum this week: markets moving, EVs charging faster than ever, biblical-level AI revelations, Google splashing the cash, and even MI5 making a guest appearance (kind of). The crew breaks down what’s really happening in European tech and beyond.
💸 Markets Corner
Klarna Files for IPO – Targeting $15B valuation, down from $45B in 2021 but still a major move for European fintech.
CoreWeave’s Massive Leap – From $16M to $1.9B revenue in 2 years and acquiring Weights & Biases for $1.7B. IPO incoming.
Google x Wiz – Google’s record $23B acquisition of Israeli cybersecurity firm Wiz. Massive exit, but will the FTC let it slide?
⚡ EV Watch
BYD’s Battery Breakthrough – 5-minute charge for 470km? Game-changing for the industry. Tesla and Mercedes scrambling to keep up.
Tesla Recall Woes – Cybertrucks recalled due to panels potentially peeling off mid-highway. Not ideal.
🍽️ Food, Forever?
Bryan Johnson’s “Foodome” Vision – Sequencing the American diet like the human genome. Lofty or legit?
ZOE’s churn problem – Are personalized nutrition startups sticky enough?
UPF, Sugar Taxes, and Regulation – The gang debates whether real change comes from startups… or governments.
🧠 AI Corner
AI Jesus Speaks (a.k.a. Jensen Huang) – Nvidia’s GTC: new chips (Blackwell Ultra, Vera Rubin, Feynman) and bullish takes on reasoning + agentic AI.
Stargate vs. AIP – OpenAI’s mega-scale GPU buildout vs. Elon Musk’s counterplay with Microsoft, UAE, and BlackRock.
Europe Reacts – Macron’s €100B+ bet on sovereign AI and the case for Mistral leading Europe’s AI frontier.
🇪🇺 Europe in Focus
Data centers are consuming up to 30% of Ireland’s electricity
European VCs (hello Index Ventures 👋) are behind some of the biggest tech exits ever
Does Europe need its own AI stack? The guys debate strategic autonomy vs. commoditized smarts
🔐 Startup Espionage Files
Rippling vs. Deel, Flexport vs. FreightMate – Dirty tactics, source code theft, and lawsuits flying.
Dan's MI5 Story – An underground bunker, bugs from the CCP, and a face-to-face with British intelligence.
Lessons from the frontlines – Where does know-how end and IP theft begin? What happens when founders cross lines?
Why “7PM Bryan” is the biggest threat to longevity
Can Europe’s emerging “longevity clinic” wave go mainstream?
🎧 Memorable Quotes
“At some point, we’re going to wake up and realise the food system was as damaging as cigarettes.” – Lomax “We should invent our own future, not copy the US.” – Andrew J. Scott “20% of Ireland’s electricity goes to data centres — heading to 30%.” – Lomax “Only the paranoid survive.” – Dan
Upside #33 - UK DOGE, Project Europe, Trump's Real Tariff Tactics
15 Mar 2025
00:42:18
The UK’s Cost-Cutting Drive – DOGE'esque? UK government’s plan to cut civil service costs using AI-driven efficiencies. Public sector pensions estimated between £2.5-5 trillion – is cost-cutting enough? Will AI and startups play a role in optimising government spending?
Project Europe – Can It Keep Talent From Leaving? 20VC’s Harry Stebbings launches Project Europe to fund under-25s with €200K for startups. Inspired by the Peter Thiel Fellowship, but will it stop US firms poaching European talent? Lomax questions if we need more pre-seed funding or if growth capital is the real gap. Mads gives a history lesson on how Europe fell behind the US in venture capital.
AI Corner: Anthropic, Manus, & Google's Larry Page Returns Anthropic scales annualised revenue from $1B to $1.4B in three months. Manus.im emerges as a powerful AI agentic platform (built on Claude 3.7). Larry Page launches Dynatomics, an AI startup focused on manufacturing. Microsoft explores alternatives to OpenAI, testing DeepSeek for Co-Pilot. Mistral shifts focus from LLMs to AI applications (finance, OCR, and tables).
The Market Meltdown – MAG7 Down $2.7 Trillion Nvidia, Tesla, and others take a hit, erasing trillions in market value. Meta is the only MAG7 stock that didn’t drop. Could Trump’s tariff-driven trade wars be purposefully fuelling market volatility? Is this a short-term dip, or are we heading into a full-blown recession?
IPOs & M&A – Are We Finally Back? 63 IPOs in the US this year – up 90% from last year, but uncertainty looms. CoreWeave and Hinge Health file for IPOs, but timing may not be ideal. Figma, once blocked from an Adobe acquisition, now eyes public markets. The AI-powered startup Moveworks exits to ServiceNow for nearly $3B.
Deals of the Week Lomax’s pick: Thorizon (Netherlands) raises €12M for next-gen nuclear reactors. Dan’s pick: Stroll (France) raises €12M for AR-powered neurorehabilitation. Digital therapeutics are making a comeback after a tough few years.
Upside #32 - Tech to kill, tech to heal.
08 Mar 2025
00:47:33
Upside Podcast: Defence, Health Tech & The Future of European Venture
This week on Upside, Dan Bowyer (SuperSeed VC) is joined by Lomax (Outsized) and Peter Ward (Humanity) to dive into two major themes dominating European venture: defence and health tech. With Mads away running up hills in Spain with fellow VCs and LPs, the trio take a no-holds-barred approach to dissecting the latest developments shaping investment, technology, and geopolitics.
1. Welcome & Introductions (00:12)
2. Defence & European Venture (02:22)
The geopolitical impact of US halting aid to Ukraine: What does it mean for European defence startups?
The rise of defence ETFs and their influence on VC investment.
Trump, NATO, and the potential ripple effects on European security.
The growing relevance of Turkey in European defence strategies.
Europe’s defence budgets are growing, but how fast can startups access the market?
The challenge of military procurement and its implications for defence tech startups.
3. Private Capital & Defence Innovation (06:32)
The role of dual-use technology in military applications.
The ethical dilemmas of investing in defence technology.
Drone warfare: The boom in anti-drone and drone swarm tech.
Lomax’s insights on the procurement challenge and opportunities for startups.
Dan’s first-hand experience in Ukraine delivering medical supplies.
4. Trumponomics & European Startups (22:37)
Trump's proposed tariffs on the EU and potential supply chain shocks.
How this could drive inflation, stagflation, and impact fundraising for startups.
The anti-American sentiment in Europe and its impact on consumer and business purchasing decisions.
Opportunities for EU startups to capitalise on this shift.
Will founders move to the US earlier to escape potential trade barriers?
5. The Future of Health Tech in Europe (30:37)
A new breakthrough in immune system research: Could it revolutionise antibiotics?
The rise of AI in drug discovery and early diagnostics.
Humanity’s work with Imperial College London: Predicting disease and biological age with just four blood markers.
Personalized medicine: How it will transform healthcare systems.
The booming investment landscape: $7B invested in health tech in Europe last year vs. $23B in the US.
Neko Health, Function Health, and the billion-dollar Series A from Retro Biosciences.
6. Deals of the Week (44:31)
Alpine Eagle ($10M seed, UK): Drone blocking and attacking tech.
Quintexa ($175M Series F, UK): AI-powered anti-money laundering and fraud detection.
Upside #31 - The Grind is Back
01 Mar 2025
00:53:33
Euro Grind, Google Grind, and Startup Hustle.
As normal we dig behind the headlines to discuss the real stories affecting European venture. With Dan Bowyer, Mads Jensen, Andrew Scott and Karin Nielsen.
The State of European Tech vs. the U.S.
Karin’s reflections on her trip to San Francisco and the stark contrast in optimism between the U.S. and the UK.
The resurgence of hustle culture in the U.S. and what Europe can learn from it.
Funding Gaps & European Venture Trends
Stripe’s annual letter highlights European productivity challenges and regulatory barriers.
The need for European capital market reforms to boost startup funding.
Discussion on whether Europe should adopt a ‘Buy European’ strategy.
AI Advancements & Enterprise Adoption
The launch of Claude 3.7 by Anthropic and GPT-4.5 by OpenAI: Are these models delivering real breakthroughs?
China’s AI strategy and the impact of DeepSeek’s pricing strategy on global AI competition.
The challenges enterprises face in adopting AI, from legacy systems to regulatory concerns.
The Future of Work & The ‘Grind’ Debate
Sergey Brin’s push to bring Googlers back to the office: Should startups embrace remote work or office culture?
The debate over whether European startups work hard enough and whether remote work fosters or hinders hustle.
Insights from Karin on how remote-first startups can thrive with the right culture and tools.
AI’s Impact on Venture Capital
Will AI-driven deal sourcing make VCs obsolete, or will brand and relationships matter more than ever?
The shift towards hyper-personalised outreach and the rise of X (formerly Twitter) as a key VC-founder networking tool.
Why AI-powered investing will still require human intuition to identify outlier founders.
Deal of the Week: Lovable
The meteoric rise of Lovable, Europe’s fastest-growing startup.
From launch to $17M ARR in 18 months: What’s behind its explosive growth?
The future of AI-powered no-code solutions and their impact on SaaS.
Upside #30 - Can Europe win AI, Fusion & Quantum?
22 Feb 2025
00:44:02
In this episode of Upside, hosts Dan and Mads from SuperSeed are joined by Ben Prade, Partner at GP Bullhound. Topics covered:
State of European Venture Capital Geopolitics & VC - the Munich Security Conference, JD Vance, European autonomy in defence and tech, China filling the void
VC Fundraising & LPs AI and defence are hot baby! Shift from US pension to government cash, VCs must engage in ecosystem building, economic policies influencing VC strategies.
The Future of European VC European VC has outperformed the US in IRR (20.8% vs 18.2%) over the last decade. We're nailing AI, Fusion and Quantum.
Quantum: Hype vs Reality Microsoft's Majorana 1 Quantum Chip, cautious optimism, power PR and viable quantum computing by 2030.
Grok 3 Grok 3 is out, speed and benchmarks vs Claude and GPT 4.5.
Fusion France’s CEA West Tokamak reactor sets a new record with 22 minutes of continuous fusion, limitless clean energy, realistic timelines for commercial fusion.
Startup Funding Dynamics - Go big early? Peter Walker’s Carta report: Theory 1: AI reduces startup costs, meaning less = more. Theory 2: AI increases competition, making capital more crucial for scaling. = Seed Strapping
Asteroid Mining Spotlight on Karman Plus, autonomous asteroid mining. Government funding in space.
Can EU Starlink? - The EU’s 25yr Mega Trade Deal - Anthropic's CoWork Kills It!
17 Jan 2026
00:49:04
BBC yeets kids shows onto YouTube, EU does a mega trade deal, Open Cosmos tries to be European-ish Starlink, Meta buys nuclear vibes, UK bins digital IDs (again), Anthropic’s “CoWork”, Grok vs governments, plus Deals of the Week. Basically: geopolitics, space, energy, AI, and British admin disintegration.
(00:34) BBC on YouTube: “iPlayer walked so Netflix could run”
Dan: YouTube is enormous; BBC is adapting for younger audiences (and maybe… survival mode).
Mads: iPlayer was genuinely visionary; regulators stopped BBC going too commercial back then.
Andrew: Stop geo-blocking. Just take my money. (“Not in your region” = crime.)
(02:51) EU–Mercosur trade deal: 25 years, 700M people, farmers furious
Biggest-ever EU trade deal: Brazil, Argentina, Paraguay, Uruguay. (03:30)
Why now: EU wants options beyond US gridlock + China dependence.
(06:07) Open Cosmos: “EU Starlink?” …Not quite, but it’s something
Takeaway: not a consumer Starlink clone; more “secure, sovereign comms” for governments. (07:56–08:32)
(08:32) Meta’s 20-year nuclear power deals: AI runs on electricity (and contracts)
Hyperscalers locking in long-term nuclear PPAs in the US; Europe stuck with slower buildout, planning pain, and NIMBY boss fights.
(10:12) UK drops digital IDs: “25 incompatible IDs is the national strategy”
Mads: Digital ID is foundational (identity + access). Most OECD countries have it; UK is the holdout. (10:45–12:14)
UK backlash feels emotional; we already have loads of IDs that don’t talk to each other.
Cost debate: rollout ~£2bn-ish vs long-term fraud reduction. (13:33–13:48)
(15:35) Anthropic CoWork: “built in 10 days… by Claude Code”
Aikido Security (Ghent) hits unicorn: $60M Series B led by DST. (46:41–47:05)
Parloa (Germany, call centre automation): $350M Series D @ $3B, six months after Series C. (46:41–47:05)
Equal1 (Ireland, UCD spinout): $60M for quantum servers in data centers. (47:20)
Harmattan AI (France, drones): €200M Series B @ €1.4B, Dassault invested; supplying drones incl. UK Army contract mentions. (47:36–48:12)
Upside #29 - Le Summit, Le Chat, Le $100bn
15 Feb 2025
00:37:08
Upside #29 - Le Summit, Le Chat, Le $100bn
LP Blind Spots LP in Asia with 3000 managers but only 3 in Europe—why? European VC viewed as a "blind spot" by many investors in Asia and the US. The need for European investors to bridge the perception gap.
Deep Dive: The France AI Summit Focus on "Inclusive and Sustainable AI." 100 countries in attendance, 61 signed the agreement—but UK and US did not. Discussion around ethics, accessibility, and the role of global AI governance. JD Vance’s speech highlighted US dominance and reluctance to align with EU directives. Debate: Was it the right call for the UK not to sign?
EU’s €50B AI Investment US announced $500B AI initiative; France followed with €109B. Comparison between Macron's AI plan, UK AI strategy, and Bidenomics. The importance of aligning private investment with government funding.
Mistral’s ‘Le Chat’ AI Model French AI company Mistral launched "Le Chat." Designed for speed but criticised for lacking depth and innovation. Open-source AI as Europe's potential advantage in the global AI race.
AI Corner GPT-4.5 expected within weeks, the last non-chain-of-thought model. Grok 3 by XAI (Elon Musk) in development, set to challenge OpenAI’s dominance. Open-source AI progress making Europe a contender in the AI space.
Interest Rates and UK Economic Outlook Bank of England’s 25 bps rate cut—will it impact startups and investments? UK growth forecast halved to 0.75%. Concerns about stagflation, job losses, and productivity decline. Can AI be the key to unlocking efficiency in government services?
AstraZeneca Vaccine Plant Withdrawal UK government cut state aid from £90M to £40M. AstraZeneca chose to invest elsewhere. Ble. A significant loss for Liverpool’s economy and UK biotech sector.
Deal of the Week Tines (Ireland) raises $125M Series C, becoming a unicorn.
Final Thoughts Optimism about UK and European innovation despite economic hurdles. Encouraging bold policy decisions and strategic AI investments. "Let's start doing."
Upside #28 - Inside no.10, Going Nuclear, UK merely a startup incubator? European (lack of) sovereign wealth?
08 Feb 2025
01:01:16
In this episode, Dan, Lomax, and Mads dive into a packed agenda spanning tech earnings, European venture dynamics, government policies on AI and nuclear energy, and the debate over whether Europe—or the UK—could (or should) define its own version of the “American Dream.” Mads shares insights from his recent visit to Number 10 Downing Street to discuss the UK’s AI strategy, and Lomax highlights a series of notable European health tech deals.
Welcome & Introductions • Dan kicks things off with a check-in on what’s happening in Lisbon, London, and beyond. • Lomax is monitoring global political drama (particularly in the U.S. and Europe). • Mads teases big announcements out of Number 10 regarding AI.
Tech Earnings & Market Sentiment • Palantir reports bullish earnings; stock jumps ~24%. • Google’s cloud growth disappoints vs. analyst expectations; capital expenditures on the rise. • AMD and ARM under the spotlight—concerns over data centre growth. • ASML and Spotify highlight strong European tech performance. • January inflows into European stocks reach 25-year highs, briefly outpacing US markets.
Cherry Ventures’ $500M Raise & Europe’s VC Landscape • Cherry Ventures closes its fifth fund, demonstrating how larger European VCs continue to mature. • Discussion on the overall trend: Big name funds attracting more capital, mirroring the U.S. “flight to quality.”
German Elections & Political Shifts • The rise of the far-right AFD (Alternative für Deutschland) in the polls. • Potential implications for tech talent and immigration policy. • Broader context of populism in Europe and the struggle for pro-tech growth policies.
The UK’s Nuclear Push • New moves to accelerate nuclear power plant approvals and the pivot to small, safe reactors. • How nuclear energy ties in with AI (data centres needing massive, stable power sources). • Debate over planning red tape vs. the urgency to bolster UK’s energy security and cut costs.
The Number 10 AI Plan (Mads’ Visit) • Mads shares first-hand insights from meeting with UK government officials, including Keir Starmer. • Adoption of Matt Clifford’s 50-point AI plan and the promise of government as an “early customer.” • The challenge of scaling AI talent in a post-Brexit environment—and how to attract global talent. • Pension reform, government procurement, and the push for overall efficiency gains in the public sector.
Is Europe Just an “Incubator” for the US? • Analysis of new research suggesting fewer startups relocate to the US than expected—but those that do raise 3x more capital. • Role of large European funds in combating early acquisitions and supporting founders to scale. • The example of ARM and its journey from European tech champion to global powerhouse.
Trump’s Proposed US Sovereign Wealth Fund • Contrasting with Norway’s $1.5 trillion Government Pension Fund Global and Singapore’s GIC. • Questions around how a country with high debt (like the US) might run a sovereign wealth fund. • Potential lessons for European nations and the risks of politicising large capital pools.
Deals of the Week • Health Tech Highlights: ◦UK cancer detection startup See the Signs secures seed funding led by Khosla. ◦ IVF funding platform Gaia raises a strong Series A. ◦ Spanish AI imaging startup Cuban nabs a $50M Series A. • ARM & Ampere rumour: possible acquisition to expand ARM from IP licensing into actual chip manufacturing for data centres.
Looking Ahead • Mads: Speaking at local schools on entrepreneurship, then multiple board meetings. • Lomax: Closing an investment in a space-tech company and working on a significant Series B funding. • Dan: Potential trip to Finland to explore a diagnostics startup focusing
Upside #27 - You say to NATO, EU defence up in arms, UK growth rhetoric vs reality, Deepseek deep dive.
01 Feb 2025
01:00:43
Hosts: Dan, Andrew, Mads and Lomax
The Future of Defence in Europe - Show tRump the monnaayyyy - NATO defence spending push: Lithuania and Estonia commit to Trump's 5% target. - Europe's over-reliance on US defence infrastructure – time to build independent capabilities? - Startups and venture capital in defence: The next big opportunity? - Should Europe follow the US model of defence tech innovation? Can it go private?
UK's Wonky Economic Growth Strategy - Rachel Reeves' "turbocharging growth" plan – is it more rhetoric than reality? - The role of the National Wealth Fund and the Office for Investment in boosting UK infrastructure. - The Heathrow third runway debate – long overdue, too far away, or plane misguided? - Unlocking UK pension funds for investment – real impact or just political showmanship? - How the UK can actually foster innovation and become the "next Silicon Valley." Oxford <> Cambridge Arc.
Europe's AI and Investment Updates - Is Quantum back?! - OpenAI launching ChatGPT Gov: What does this mean for government AI adoption? - Apple’s position in the AI race – overlooked but strategically poised? - 11Labs raising $250M at a $3B valuation – Europe's AI voice technology rising. - Quantum computing’s resurgence: Alice & Bob, Quantinuum IPOs, and Europe's role.
The DeepSeek Disruption - The numbers just don't add up - China's DeepSeek AI model making waves – is it a game-changer or just a media frenzy? - Claims of IP infringement vs. technological innovation – how much did they really borrow? The 'distillation' woogabooga - The efficiency leap: What cost $5 billion for OpenAI cost DeepSeek only $5 million? - The geopolitical impact: US-China tech war escalates, export restrictions, and AI as a national security concern. - What this means for European AI: Why wasn’t a European company leading the charge?
The Rise of Political Discontent - Young'uns want us to be like China - 52% of Gen Z in the UK favouring dictatorship – a reflection of frustration or a dangerous trend? - Elon Musk’s AFD rally appearance in Germany – should we be worried? - The broader implications of political shifts on global investment and innovation.
The team close reflecting on the balance of optimism vs. realism in European tech and investment. What they're up to this week and to be more.... Merrricaan!
Thanks for tuning in! See you next week.
06:00 The Role of Startups in Defence 12:00 Pension Reforms and Investment Opportunities 18:10 AI and Innovation in Government Spending 38:24 The Urgency of AI Implementation 46:12 The Implications of DeepSeek's Innovations 57:10 Funding Trends in European AI Startups 01:02:32 Gen Z's Political Sentiments and Future Outlook
Upside #26 - Operator operates, AI workforces launch, More runways = what? Trumps first days and Stargate.
26 Jan 2025
00:51:58
This week Dan, Lomax, and Ferdinand discuss European startup investing, focusing on the impact of AI, job cuts at Meta and what that really means, commercial changes at the head of the UK competition regulator, airport expansions mean what and for whom exactly, plus a meaningful M&A uplift in activity.
How can we not talk about Trump's first few days and knock on policies for our European landscape, the implications of Doge and the Trump Coin grift. They discuss the Stargate AI project which is just massive - if it comes off, and the innovative healthcare startup Neko.
On the show...
OpenAI Launches 'Operator' Operator: First full-control AI agent. The Browser within the browser with full 'agent' control. Accessible only via Pro plan ($200/month). Initially US-based; European launch delayed per OpenAI CEO Sam Altman. Potential to redefine AI agents—parallels drawn with Apple’s strategic moves.
Meta Cuts 5% Workforce (3,600 Jobs) Debate: Necessary efficiency or signs of struggle in boom times? Looks like just an AI push. Or hiding DEI and sustainability push out? The implications for AI-driven workforce restructuring are happening right now.
UK’s CMA Leadership Shakeup New Chair: Doug Gurr (ex-Amazon). Shift from consumer protection to economic growth focus. Goal: Accelerating UK commerce. Red tape cut? Let's see.
Heathrow Expansion Resurfaces Ministers endorse a third runway proposal. Estimated economic boost: £47bn–£143bn by 2060, with 27k new jobs. Controversies around environmental and regional impact.
European M&A Activity Rebounds H1 2024 deal value up 31% YoY (€439 billion). Venture capital-backed M&A sees 46% growth in Q4 2024. Future outlook tied to IPO resurgence and eased regulations.
Trump’s First Days Executive Orders galore, Biden’s rescinded. Threats of tariffs, and owning Canada. Tax breaks for US-built goods. What are the global implications and for the UK and EU economies.
DOGE(Y) Looks bipartisan and who doesn't want more efficiency in govt? Targets $2 trillion savings by 2036 — ambitious or unachievable? And where's Vivek?
Stargate AI Project $500 billion US investment in AI infrastructure/data centres (Texas). Partnering with Microsoft, Nvidia, Oracle, SoftBank, Arm. But exclusively serving OpenAI? No wonder Elon is fizzing.
Company of the Week: Neko the health scanning startup from Daniel Ek. Series B closed another $260mn. Dan thinks the future of healthcare.
00:00 Introduction to European Startup Investing 02:54 Exploring AI Agents and Their Impact 05:59 Meta's Job Cuts and AI Efficiency 08:56 UK Competition Regulator Changes 11:56 Airport Expansion and Economic Growth 14:59 M&A Activity in Europe 18:11 The Influence of Trump's Policies on Europe 29:51 Bipartisan Efforts and Government Efficiency 31:39 Geopolitical Context and Market Confidence 33:42 Doge and Economic Implications 36:16 The Rise of Trump Coin 40:11 Stargate AI Project: A New Era 47:55 Neko's Series B and the Future of Healthcare