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> Europe also suffers from a brain drain to the US (and Canada to a smaller proportion). Many of Europe's best and brightest software engineers have already emi

by DrNuke 5y ago

> Europe also suffers from a brain drain to the US (and Canada to a smaller proportion). Many of Europe's best and brightest software engineers have already emigrated to the US, leaving behind the less productive ones. Of course not, it is just mind numbing regulation coupled with systematic risk aversion. Many SV startups would never have gained traction starting over from Europe, neither financially nor for large-scale deployment authorisation.

adventured 5y ago
> it is just mind numbing regulation coupled with systematic risk aversion. It's also exceptionally difficult and time consuming to rapidly scale through the EU with its many local economies/languages/cultures, versus the giant and quasi homogenous US market. And you get Canada pretty much as a freebie with the US market. That's $24.x trillion in economy in just two markets (nearly 50% larger than the EU). By the time you slog your way through a bunch of the EU markets, you'll find that a US venture capital funded competitor is already several times larger and turning its attention to your home market/s (putting you on the defensive, while they've locked up the lucrative US market and can pummel you endlessly with the financial resevoir that comes with that). If you're in a smaller nation in the EU, the ideal is to go right after the US market first as a springboard (assuming the product/service is globally useful and will benefit from grabbing the US market). That's especially true if you're early and have an opportunity to lead the US market.
- DrNuke 5y ago
  Yes, thank you very much, that’s the most sensible tip from a business / commercial perspective I also share locally when asked for advice: plan for the anglosphere natively. Not that there are no success stories from Europe as well, they are just much rarer and too much too often much smaller and deeply fatigued by years spent fighting fragmentation. It must be said that large scale, extreme/first-of-a-kind tests are simply not possible over here: not in the energy sector, not with autonomous AI deployment, not using any sort of active biochemicals/pharma, not as hostile moves in the fintech or the information sectors. This simply makes innovation much slower and pretty bureaucratic, but we cannot say there is no innovation at all, it generally being funded in the end under one of the numerous EU grants.
da39a3ee 5y ago
why does Europe not value engineers? Because the environment in the USA has created tech companies where engineers can achieve more?
- DrNuke 5y ago
  Much longer history, higher fragmentation and the constant need to avoid wars after the fall of the Roman empire made humanities/politics/commerce prevail dramatically upon science/tech/innovation. Edit: you can see a living example of this at work again with the increasing feud between the EU and the UK after the Brexit (even before that but, you know, it was aptly defused from within).
- yobbo 5y ago
  Aside from games, European companies founded by tech entrepreneurs are extremely rare, and are only really appearing in the last decade. Most of Europe's engineers work in large corporations that were created ages ago, and subsisted on government procurement of infrastructure, defence, or as subcontractors/staffing agencies to industry. And government spending in Europe has also been much tighter than USA. Most "new" media/tech companies are founded as "spin-offs" from older media companies/publishers/telcos/banks. The engineering in Europe's early web efforts was considered as important as copy-machine technicians. This is changing, but the attitude is still deeply ingrained: people are either decision makers or "technicians".

by DrNuke 5y ago

adventured 5y ago

> it is just mind numbing regulation coupled with systematic risk aversion. It's also exceptionally difficult and time consuming to rapidly scale through the EU with its many local economies/languages/cultures, versus the giant and quasi homogenous US market. And you get Canada pretty much as a freebie with the US market. That's $24.x trillion in economy in just two markets (nearly 50% larger than the EU). By the time you slog your way through a bunch of the EU markets, you'll find that a US venture capital funded competitor is already several times larger and turning its attention to your home market/s (putting you on the defensive, while they've locked up the lucrative US market and can pummel you endlessly with the financial resevoir that comes with that). If you're in a smaller nation in the EU, the ideal is to go right after the US market first as a springboard (assuming the product/service is globally useful and will benefit from grabbing the US market). That's especially true if you're early and have an opportunity to lead the US market.

DrNuke 5y ago
Yes, thank you very much, that’s the most sensible tip from a business / commercial perspective I also share locally when asked for advice: plan for the anglosphere natively. Not that there are no success stories from Europe as well, they are just much rarer and too much too often much smaller and deeply fatigued by years spent fighting fragmentation. It must be said that large scale, extreme/first-of-a-kind tests are simply not possible over here: not in the energy sector, not with autonomous AI deployment, not using any sort of active biochemicals/pharma, not as hostile moves in the fintech or the information sectors. This simply makes innovation much slower and pretty bureaucratic, but we cannot say there is no innovation at all, it generally being funded in the end under one of the numerous EU grants.

da39a3ee 5y ago

why does Europe not value engineers? Because the environment in the USA has created tech companies where engineers can achieve more?

DrNuke 5y ago
Much longer history, higher fragmentation and the constant need to avoid wars after the fall of the Roman empire made humanities/politics/commerce prevail dramatically upon science/tech/innovation. Edit: you can see a living example of this at work again with the increasing feud between the EU and the UK after the Brexit (even before that but, you know, it was aptly defused from within).
yobbo 5y ago
Aside from games, European companies founded by tech entrepreneurs are extremely rare, and are only really appearing in the last decade. Most of Europe's engineers work in large corporations that were created ages ago, and subsisted on government procurement of infrastructure, defence, or as subcontractors/staffing agencies to industry. And government spending in Europe has also been much tighter than USA. Most "new" media/tech companies are founded as "spin-offs" from older media companies/publishers/telcos/banks. The engineering in Europe's early web efforts was considered as important as copy-machine technicians. This is changing, but the attitude is still deeply ingrained: people are either decision makers or "technicians".