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> What's REALLY much more important though if you want to be a part of the AI race and I've posted for years here with @euaccofficial is to make Europe a reall

by deaux 1y ago

> What's REALLY much more important though if you want to be a part of the AI race and I've posted for years here with @euaccofficial is to make Europe a really extremely attractive place to start and run an AI business. Remove regulatory obstructions and give tax discounts for startups. Let them build a business first that can compete worldwide and once they make enough money (let's say $100M/y), then slowly start adding regulation. When you talk to most EU business owners, even in tech, the limiting factor isn't regulations. This being the #1 reason is such a tired trope. Ironically, China has in some ways a bigger regulatory burden when it comes to software, as there if the government doesn't approve the business is dead in the water. I doubt that Klarna would've gotten off the ground there, for one, I could see them being shut down much earlier there. In the EU only now very slowly are some governments even starting to talk about some weak measures around their business model. But I've never, not once in my life, heard "Chinese software companies can't get off the ground due to the regulatory burden". The same people who clamor about the EU regulations are the ones who hate on the EU for their protectionist measures against US tech. Yet another bout of irony here - China's software industry has flourished exactly thanks to 10 times stronger protectionist measures against US tech. So has Korea's, and their protectionism has never even been anywhere on the China level, more inbetween EU and China. No, if there's anything that would help, it's much more tech protectionism in the EU. Pieter Levels is at the end of the day an influencer, not a serious founder.

thefz 1y ago
> The same people who clamor about the EU regulations are the ones who hate on the EU for their protectionist measures against US tech Bingo, my friend. And good old american exceptionalism taught since the first days of school.
whimsicalism 1y ago
> When you talk to most EU business owners, even in tech, the limiting factor isn't regulations. This being the #1 reason is such a tired trope. Okay, what is the limiting factor? Because when I talk to EU business owners (admittedly, very few) - they point to lack of big EU capital markets, which is directly downstream of the policy environment. And when I talk to top EU human capital, they all point to the lack of competitive wages. There's a real difficulty in allocating capital to talented humans. And, at least in Southern Europe, the income tax schedule is so aggressive it's hard to justify continuing working in many of these countries if you are highly talented. Like, if you can tell me what the induced operator norm from l_2 -> l_2 is - probably you should come to the US and work at a biglab and make bank. What can you do in Portugal, Italy, Spain, etc.?? > Pieter Levels is at the end of the day an influencer, not a serious founder. Sure, agreed. I think it is a complete misreading to point to protectionism as the reason for Chinese success, but having a big unified domestic market for consumers along with massive saving rates and capital controls probably does help.
- KaiserPro 1y ago
  Money. Why work in the "europoor" countries when you can go to america and earn megabucks.
  - miohtama 1y ago
    That's capital markets and the lack of capital markets is because of not having business friendly environment. Consumer protections strong, pro business not so much. Companies like Spotify go to the US to IPO.
    - berkes 1y ago
      > Consumer protections strong, pro business not so much. That's not the reason the EU has no unified capital market. The reason is that member states are reluctant to hand over control and power to EU. Just look at e.g. Eurobonds and the shitshow around that. Especially the rise of populist anti-EU parties all over, are causing this. Ironically, the parties that "freedom lovers" like Musk are funding and pushing, are the ones causing the EU to not function as a single capital market and "not having a business friendly environment".
    - deaux 1y ago
      Are you saying that the other 199 non-US countries in the world all have a business unfriendly environment, since every one of them besides China has practically the same amount of software VC funding compared to the US? All of these purported EU-specific reasons completely ignore that things are the same elsewhere. It's the US that is the outlier.
- actionfromafar 1y ago
  One fairly large factor is that even though English is much more common today, you just can't operate (depending on the product of course) in many countries without having customer support, documentation etc in the local language.
- deaux 1y ago
  > I think it is a complete misreading to point to protectionism as the reason for Chinese success, but having a big unified domestic market for consumers along with massive saving rates and capital controls probably does help. Capital controls are protectionist measures, but anyway, no. > Okay, what is the limiting factor? Let's look at which countries have a significant local software industry compared to population size. - China - US - Korea - You can argue for Japan and India but that's already starting to stretch. - Yup, effectively no where else. Even in an "out of the way" place like Myanmar everyone uses Meta, with a nice little genocide to show for it. Sure, in Vietnam they use Zalo, and other places have a few other local players. But most of the famous US tech apps are dominant. Is the EU the outlier here? No. Everywhere else US tech dominates. Meta, Netflix, Apple, Google, Uber, Spotify, Microsoft, Match Group, Paypal, Amazon, and on and on. They don't just dominate the EU, they dominate the world. Except for the countries I named above, where at least some of the markets that US big tech competes in, instead have bigger local players. And even there, guess what? Their market share is almost 1:1 linearly correlated to the degree of protectionism in those countries, all the way from China, then Korea, then India/Japan, and then everywhere else! Who woulda thought! Why does Korea have much less US tech dominance than, say, Germany? Despite German companies theoretically having a big advantage: the German public is 100x more privacy conscious than the Korean one, and much less trusting of US companies. I can tell you that it's not less regulations; Korea's GDPR is much more onerous than the EU's and so are investment regulations. On every single regulatory aspect, German software startups have it easier. But they were never protected. US tech was allowed to waltz in, dump their products - that's what they did, it's hilarious how now China "dumping" EVs and solar is suddenly an issue when it's exactly the strategy that US tech continues to this day; the AI companies are doing it right now! And the Korean companies were protected. Both by the rules burden, that local companies had to deal with too, along with intentional protectionism. When it comes to solar and EVs, we all understand that a foreign country dumping their goods kills local industry. It's the exact same with software. But then half of HN has millions on the bank exactly thanks to the above - this is where all those fat SV salaries have come from - so I do get the lack of desire to understand it.
clickety_clack 1y ago
It’s probably the people who didn’t start a business in the EU that you want to talk to. Like, I’m European, but I started my company in the US because everything is so much easier here.
- lukan 1y ago
  What would you want to see changed to consider coming back?
  - clickety_clack 1y ago
    When I got here, I realized that things are so much better here that the only thing that could get me back to Europe is a decision not to renew my visa.
- sofixa 1y ago
  > but I started my company in the US because everything is so much easier here Which part is easier? That you have 50 different states with slightly varying laws to consider (e.g. Californian Data protection)? That you have a byzantine system of "benefits" to choose and manage? And compared to where? Germany or Estonia or Sweden or Spain? The complexities will vary wildly depending on the country (kind of like in the US, where lots of companies pick the state to base themselves in based on the combination of favourable laws and precedents and taxes).
  - whimsicalism 1y ago
    "That you have 50 different states with slightly varying laws to consider (e.g. Californian Data protection)?" there are certain sentences you can just tell would never be written by an American lol
    - o11c 1y ago
      Americans are definitely aware of it in some areas, e.g. any sort of licensing.
    - 1y ago
pier25 1y ago
> When you talk to most EU business owners, even in tech, the limiting factor isn't regulations. I have a tech startup in Estonia and I agree. To me the biggest limiting factor is lack of funding.
- berkes 1y ago
  The root cause of that is the lack of a true Capital Market union. In the US, you can get VC across state borders and VC can invest in any US company regardless of their location. Not in the EU. Investing in an Estonian startup from, say, the Netherlands is near impossible. And even if managed, now that NL investor has to repeat the entire process for Poland, Spain, Malta and other countries. EU Made Simple explains this very well https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1RqYws1JAuI https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1RqYws1JAuI
  - deaux 1y ago
    > Investing in an Estonian startup from, say, the Netherlands is near impossible If anything this would be due to Dutch regulations rather than Estonian ones. So that would be more of a problem for setting up VCs in the EU rather than attracting capital in general, as the same would apply to the rest of the world. Is it easier for a US or Singapore VC to invest in an Japanese startup vs an Estonian startup? As far as I know the answer is a "no", but I'm happy to be proven wrong.
    - berkes 1y ago
      This is because there's no unified capital market. A texas VC can invest in a startup in Chicago and a startup in Florida can raise money from NY and so on. > If anything this would be due to Dutch regulations rather than Estonian ones Yes, because there's no unified capital market. You describe an effect not the cause. With 27 member states, if such regulations are bi-directional, you'd need 351 of such "regulations". If one way, you'd need 702. In the US with 51 states, there aren't a total of 1,275 "regulation contracts" between all states, there's one, and it's federal.
      - 1y ago
greg_V 1y ago
Tbh, a lot of EU protectionism vs. US tech seems not to keep the competition out. In fact, with the amount of free press US startups get and the size of their coffers, they can simply roll over the local competition in EU markets most of the time. What it's terribly good at is adding burdens that the US giants don't face early on, slowing down the early growth between 28 fragmented markets. I don't know specifically about how China works, but the question is proving product-market fit, and for that, you need a lot of users fast. In the EU, it's a different battle country to country as the media environment, the markets, the regulation etc. are all fractured.

by deaux 1y ago

thefz 1y ago

> The same people who clamor about the EU regulations are the ones who hate on the EU for their protectionist measures against US tech Bingo, my friend. And good old american exceptionalism taught since the first days of school.

whimsicalism 1y ago

> When you talk to most EU business owners, even in tech, the limiting factor isn't regulations. This being the #1 reason is such a tired trope. Okay, what is the limiting factor? Because when I talk to EU business owners (admittedly, very few) - they point to lack of big EU capital markets, which is directly downstream of the policy environment. And when I talk to top EU human capital, they all point to the lack of competitive wages. There's a real difficulty in allocating capital to talented humans. And, at least in Southern Europe, the income tax schedule is so aggressive it's hard to justify continuing working in many of these countries if you are highly talented. Like, if you can tell me what the induced operator norm from l_2 -> l_2 is - probably you should come to the US and work at a biglab and make bank. What can you do in Portugal, Italy, Spain, etc.?? > Pieter Levels is at the end of the day an influencer, not a serious founder. Sure, agreed. I think it is a complete misreading to point to protectionism as the reason for Chinese success, but having a big unified domestic market for consumers along with massive saving rates and capital controls probably does help.

KaiserPro 1y ago
Money. Why work in the "europoor" countries when you can go to america and earn megabucks.
- miohtama 1y ago
  That's capital markets and the lack of capital markets is because of not having business friendly environment. Consumer protections strong, pro business not so much. Companies like Spotify go to the US to IPO.
  - berkes 1y ago
    > Consumer protections strong, pro business not so much. That's not the reason the EU has no unified capital market. The reason is that member states are reluctant to hand over control and power to EU. Just look at e.g. Eurobonds and the shitshow around that. Especially the rise of populist anti-EU parties all over, are causing this. Ironically, the parties that "freedom lovers" like Musk are funding and pushing, are the ones causing the EU to not function as a single capital market and "not having a business friendly environment".
  - deaux 1y ago
    Are you saying that the other 199 non-US countries in the world all have a business unfriendly environment, since every one of them besides China has practically the same amount of software VC funding compared to the US? All of these purported EU-specific reasons completely ignore that things are the same elsewhere. It's the US that is the outlier.
actionfromafar 1y ago
One fairly large factor is that even though English is much more common today, you just can't operate (depending on the product of course) in many countries without having customer support, documentation etc in the local language.
deaux 1y ago
> I think it is a complete misreading to point to protectionism as the reason for Chinese success, but having a big unified domestic market for consumers along with massive saving rates and capital controls probably does help. Capital controls are protectionist measures, but anyway, no. > Okay, what is the limiting factor? Let's look at which countries have a significant local software industry compared to population size. - China - US - Korea - You can argue for Japan and India but that's already starting to stretch. - Yup, effectively no where else. Even in an "out of the way" place like Myanmar everyone uses Meta, with a nice little genocide to show for it. Sure, in Vietnam they use Zalo, and other places have a few other local players. But most of the famous US tech apps are dominant. Is the EU the outlier here? No. Everywhere else US tech dominates. Meta, Netflix, Apple, Google, Uber, Spotify, Microsoft, Match Group, Paypal, Amazon, and on and on. They don't just dominate the EU, they dominate the world. Except for the countries I named above, where at least some of the markets that US big tech competes in, instead have bigger local players. And even there, guess what? Their market share is almost 1:1 linearly correlated to the degree of protectionism in those countries, all the way from China, then Korea, then India/Japan, and then everywhere else! Who woulda thought! Why does Korea have much less US tech dominance than, say, Germany? Despite German companies theoretically having a big advantage: the German public is 100x more privacy conscious than the Korean one, and much less trusting of US companies. I can tell you that it's not less regulations; Korea's GDPR is much more onerous than the EU's and so are investment regulations. On every single regulatory aspect, German software startups have it easier. But they were never protected. US tech was allowed to waltz in, dump their products - that's what they did, it's hilarious how now China "dumping" EVs and solar is suddenly an issue when it's exactly the strategy that US tech continues to this day; the AI companies are doing it right now! And the Korean companies were protected. Both by the rules burden, that local companies had to deal with too, along with intentional protectionism. When it comes to solar and EVs, we all understand that a foreign country dumping their goods kills local industry. It's the exact same with software. But then half of HN has millions on the bank exactly thanks to the above - this is where all those fat SV salaries have come from - so I do get the lack of desire to understand it.

clickety_clack 1y ago

It’s probably the people who didn’t start a business in the EU that you want to talk to. Like, I’m European, but I started my company in the US because everything is so much easier here.

lukan 1y ago
What would you want to see changed to consider coming back?
- clickety_clack 1y ago
  When I got here, I realized that things are so much better here that the only thing that could get me back to Europe is a decision not to renew my visa.
sofixa 1y ago
> but I started my company in the US because everything is so much easier here Which part is easier? That you have 50 different states with slightly varying laws to consider (e.g. Californian Data protection)? That you have a byzantine system of "benefits" to choose and manage? And compared to where? Germany or Estonia or Sweden or Spain? The complexities will vary wildly depending on the country (kind of like in the US, where lots of companies pick the state to base themselves in based on the combination of favourable laws and precedents and taxes).
- whimsicalism 1y ago
  "That you have 50 different states with slightly varying laws to consider (e.g. Californian Data protection)?" there are certain sentences you can just tell would never be written by an American lol
  - o11c 1y ago
    Americans are definitely aware of it in some areas, e.g. any sort of licensing.
  - 1y ago

pier25 1y ago

> When you talk to most EU business owners, even in tech, the limiting factor isn't regulations. I have a tech startup in Estonia and I agree. To me the biggest limiting factor is lack of funding.

berkes 1y ago
The root cause of that is the lack of a true Capital Market union. In the US, you can get VC across state borders and VC can invest in any US company regardless of their location. Not in the EU. Investing in an Estonian startup from, say, the Netherlands is near impossible. And even if managed, now that NL investor has to repeat the entire process for Poland, Spain, Malta and other countries. EU Made Simple explains this very well https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1RqYws1JAuI https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1RqYws1JAuI
- deaux 1y ago
  > Investing in an Estonian startup from, say, the Netherlands is near impossible If anything this would be due to Dutch regulations rather than Estonian ones. So that would be more of a problem for setting up VCs in the EU rather than attracting capital in general, as the same would apply to the rest of the world. Is it easier for a US or Singapore VC to invest in an Japanese startup vs an Estonian startup? As far as I know the answer is a "no", but I'm happy to be proven wrong.
  - berkes 1y ago
    This is because there's no unified capital market. A texas VC can invest in a startup in Chicago and a startup in Florida can raise money from NY and so on. > If anything this would be due to Dutch regulations rather than Estonian ones Yes, because there's no unified capital market. You describe an effect not the cause. With 27 member states, if such regulations are bi-directional, you'd need 351 of such "regulations". If one way, you'd need 702. In the US with 51 states, there aren't a total of 1,275 "regulation contracts" between all states, there's one, and it's federal.
    - 1y ago

greg_V 1y ago

Tbh, a lot of EU protectionism vs. US tech seems not to keep the competition out. In fact, with the amount of free press US startups get and the size of their coffers, they can simply roll over the local competition in EU markets most of the time. What it's terribly good at is adding burdens that the US giants don't face early on, slowing down the early growth between 28 fragmented markets. I don't know specifically about how China works, but the question is proving product-market fit, and for that, you need a lot of users fast. In the EU, it's a different battle country to country as the media environment, the markets, the regulation etc. are all fractured.