The European VC (EUVC)
This Week in European Tech with Dan, Mads & Lomax
AI Summary
The panel dissects Europe’s tech landscape, starting with Bending Spoons’ aggressive roll‑up strategy and the broader valuation reset driven by debt‑fuelled M&A and Italy’s PE‑VC hybrid model. They debate Brexit’s lingering economic fallout, the erosion of German automotive dominance, and China’s shift from importing to replicating tech, linking these macro trends to Europe’s structural challenges such as low pension‑fund VC allocation and stagnant welfare‑state policies. The conversation then pivots to the AI frontier, evaluating the Google‑OpenAI “Code Red,” Anthropic’s IPO ambitions, and the emerging robotics wave as the next pick‑and‑shovel opportunity. Throughout, the hosts argue that fixing European tech requires coordinated reforms in R&D, immigration, procurement, and capital markets, while acknowledging that optimism remains conditional.
Episode Description
Welcome back to another episode of Upside at the EUVC Podcast, where Dan Bowyer, Mads Jensen of SuperSeed, Lomax Ward of Outsized Ventures, and Andrew Scott of 7percent Ventures to break down the real stories behind the headlines shaping European tech and venture.
From Bending Spoons’ audacious European rollup strategy, to Brexit’s economic hangover, to the existential challenges facing Volkswagen, to Google vs. OpenAI’s new “Code Red”, and finally whether Europe has had its long-overdue shock moment — this episode goes wide, fast, and deep.
This is Upside, where the takes are sharp, the macro is messy, and the optimism is… conditional.
What’s covered:
02:00 The valuation reset, debt-fuelled M&A, and the Italian PE–VC hybrid model
04:00 Arbitrage: firing US teams, rehiring elite Italian engineers
06:00 Do rollups really work? Tech debt, distribution, and execution risk
07:00 Brexit revisited: GDP losses, trade collapse, and political reality
08:00 The myth of “you can’t know the counterfactual” — and why you actually can
10:00 Will the UK rejoin the customs union? And would Europe even take us back?
12:00 Europe’s manufacturing crisis: Porsche, Volkswagen, BYD and the end of German exceptionalism
15:00 China’s shift: stop importing, start replicating
17:00 Welfare-state complacency and the European stagnation problem
20:00 The bitter truth about Europe’s carbon “success story”
22:00 How to actually fix European tech: R&D, immigration, procurement, capital markets
24:00 Why 0.02% pension allocation to VC is Europe’s biggest structural handicap
26:00 Should we “Farage-pill” Europe into a tech-first agenda?
33:00 Distribution vs. loyalty: why consumers don’t care about brand
36:00 Who wins the cost base war: Google, Amazon, Meta, or OpenAI?
38:00 Anthropic’s IPO plans and what they signal about the private capital cycle
42:00 Deals of the Week: Black Forest Labs, ICEYE, Expedition Growth Capital
44:00 Robotics is the next AI wave — and the picks-and-shovels startups emerging now
Show Notes
Welcome back to another episode of Upside at the EUVC Podcast, where Dan Bowyer, Mads Jensen of SuperSeed, Lomax Ward of Outsized Ventures, and Andrew Scott of 7percent Ventures to break down the real stories behind the headlines shaping European tech and venture.
From Bending Spoons’ audacious European rollup strategy, to Brexit’s economic hangover, to the existential challenges facing Volkswagen, to Google vs. OpenAI’s new “Code Red”, and finally whether Europe has had its long-overdue shock moment — this episode goes wide, fast, and deep.
This is Upside, where the takes are sharp, the macro is messy, and the optimism is… conditional.
What’s covered:
-
02:00 The valuation reset, debt-fuelled M&A, and the Italian PE–VC hybrid model
-
04:00 Arbitrage: firing US teams, rehiring elite Italian engineers
-
06:00 Do rollups really work? Tech debt, distribution, and execution risk
-
07:00 Brexit revisited: GDP losses, trade collapse, and political reality
-
08:00 The myth of “you can’t know the counterfactual” — and why you actually can
-
10:00 Will the UK rejoin the customs union? And would Europe even take us back?
-
12:00 Europe’s manufacturing crisis: Porsche, Volkswagen, BYD and the end of German exceptionalism
-
15:00 China’s shift: stop importing, start replicating
-
17:00 Welfare-state complacency and the European stagnation problem
-
20:00 The bitter truth about Europe’s carbon “success story”
-
22:00 How to actually fix European tech: R&D, immigration, procurement, capital markets
-
24:00 Why 0.02% pension allocation to VC is Europe’s biggest structural handicap
-
26:00 Should we “Farage-pill” Europe into a tech-first agenda?
-
33:00 Distribution vs. loyalty: why consumers don’t care about brand
-
36:00 Who wins the cost base war: Google, Amazon, Meta, or OpenAI?
-
38:00 Anthropic’s IPO plans and what they signal about the private capital cycle
-
42:00 Deals of the Week: Black Forest Labs, ICEYE, Expedition Growth Capital
-
44:00 Robotics is the next AI wave — and the picks-and-shovels startups emerging now
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