AI is helping startups scale at a rapid pace, boosting the entrepreneurial ecosystems of one-time laggards Italy and Belgium

Weekly Business Insights from Top Ten Business Magazines

Extractive summaries and key takeaways from the articles curated from TOP TEN BUSINESS MAGAZINES to promote informed business decision-making | Since September 2017 | Week 342 | March 29-April 4, 2024

Shaping Section | 4

AI is helping startups scale at a rapid pace, boosting the entrepreneurial ecosystems of one-time laggards Italy and Belgium

By Peter Vanham and Nicholas Gordon | Fortune Magazine | April 3, 2024

Extractive Summary of the Article | Listen

If Silicon Valley is the place to be to learn about AI and its Big Tech owners, Brussels is a great place to understand tech policy and, increasingly, how AI is shaping startups and the ways in which they scale.

This week, Microsoft felt the long arm of European tech competition authorities. In what looked like a blast from the past, the world’s largest company by market cap decided to stop bundling its Teams app and its Office software globally. That decision followed its unbundling of the offerings in Europe last year, which headed off an EU antitrust action. But there are other lessons for tech companies to learn in Brussels, and more broadly, in Belgium. 

The Financial Times reported last week that Belgium was among the 10 most represented nations in its ranking of Europe’s 1,000 fastest growing companies for the first time, led by BeInfluence Europe, Logistics Capital Partners, and Techwolf.

In the same ranking, Italy, often seen as an economic laggard and home to many geriatric CEOs, had by far the most fast-growing companies in Europe, beating out the U.K., Germany, and France. Italy’s cohort is led by Bidberry, The Sense Experience Resort, and WECO. 

The surprising dominance of Belgium and Italy defies the assumption that the AI era is a “winner-take-all” business landscape, in which only behemoths like Microsoft, Alphabet and other “Magnificent Seven” tech firms will succeed. Belgian and Italian companies are typically SME-sized, as opposed to the large multinationals often found elsewhere in Europe.

The author asked Jürgen Ingels, founder and funder of several fast-growing Belgian tech companies—payments company Clear2pay, game developer Crazygames—to explain these successes.  He pointed to classic components: a government that gets out of the way and entrepreneurs that create not just one firm but an entire startup ecosystem.  And AI was allowing startups to scale at an unheard-of pace. 

“Business models are changing,” he said. “I see tech companies with 10, 20, 30 people and a high EBITDA automating their back office. It’s not about capital anymore. It’s about creativity. That’s what makes it interesting. You don’t have to be in Silicon Valley anymore.” 

3 key takeaways from the article

1. The Financial Times reported last week that Belgium was among the 10 most represented nations in its ranking of Europe’s 1,000 fastest growing companies for the first time, led by BeInfluence Europe, Logistics Capital Partners, and Techwolf.  In the same ranking, Italy, often seen as an economic laggard and home to many geriatric CEOs, had by far the most fast-growing companies in Europe, beating out the U.K., Germany, and France. 
2. Two factors explain these successes: a government that gets out of the way and entrepreneurs that create not just one firm but an entire startup ecosystem.  And AI is allowing startups to scale at an unheard-of pace. 
3. It’s not about capital anymore. It’s about creativity. That’s what makes it interesting.

Full Article

(Copyright lies with the publisher)

Topics:  Artificial Intelligence, Entrepreneurship, Startups, Europe