Only 5% of $22B in VC funding for generative AI went to Europe

filister , 10 months ago

Yes, unfortunately when it comes to digital new technologies, Europe is left in the dust by China and the US. Just check how many billion dollar tech companies there are.

The other problem is also the regulation and the more strict privacy rules here, hence all AI startups in Europe have to work around them.

Unfortunately, the gap between the US and Europe and China would only widen, while Europe would become even more irrelevant on the global scene.

TheGrandNagus , 10 months ago

Then to add on top of this, once an industry gets built up in one place, it usually takes root and grows there a lot, and other places get left behind.

Silicon valley has a lot of tech/software companies, so that’s where people go. By setting up shop there, you get access to a huge pool of talent.

Another area where this is easy to see is in F1. Pretty much all of the teams are based in the UK or do the bulk of their design and engineering there, despite flying flags for other countries.

Why? Is it because Brits are inherently better engineers than others? Is there something in the water that makes them better at F1 engineering? Of course not.

That’s just where all the talent has concentrated, so the teams would be crazy to go elsewhere. They’d be cutting themselves off from a huge talent pool and their employees being able to bounce ideas off of other local people in the industry who aren’t necessarily part of the same team.

If places outside the US/California want to grow their tech sector, they need to put work into making tech hubs that rival silicon valley. And that will be a massive undertaking.

filister , 10 months ago

I think what we are also lacking is EU-wide incentive to develop this sector, including regulations to ease the burden of collecting training data for those models.

And it doesn’t help also that salaries in this area are much lower, so the top talent is in most of the cases lured by a lot higher remuneration packages to migrate and continue their work there.

I think the West is underestimating China and India and they will play a major role in the AI revolution.