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As technology upends industries and lifestyles at breakneck pace, the Old Continent is not producing any of the online giants like Google, eBay or Facebook. Its best and brightest prefer to emigrate to Silicon Valley, or sell their ideas on to U.S. firms before they have a chance to establish themselves.
The European Union's top executives in Brussels are trying to rectify that with a long-term plan of reforms and incentives but face an uphill battle. The 28-nation bloc is, above all, lacking in the risk-taking culture and financial networks needed to grow Internet startups into globally dominant companies.
Europe's relatively cautious attitude to investment stands out as one of the biggest hurdles—and among the most difficult to change. Investors in Europe want to see that a young company can generate revenue from the start. Europe's many high-technology companies are focused on manufactured goods that can be sold right away to generate revenue—industrial equipment, energy turbines, high-speed trains, medical devices, and nuclear energy.
By contrast, Internet companies often have little to no revenue at the beginning. Twitter and Facebook, for example, first focused on building up their user numbers. Only once they were established as global forces did they put more attention to making money, through advertising and other strategies.
This difference in mentality stands out as one of the key reasons that Europe has fewer venture capital firms and less investment in startups than the U.S. or Asia.Over the past five years, U.S. venture capitalists spent $167 billion on new business ideas compared with some $20 billion by their European counterparts, according to the National Venture Capital Association.
http://phys.org/news/2015-09-europe-isnt-googles-facebooks.html
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday September 23 2015, @05:50AM
Industrial equipment, energy turbines, high-speed trains, medical devices, and nuclear energy didn't help either.
(Score: 4, Insightful) by hemocyanin on Wednesday September 23 2015, @06:03AM
Show me what facebook looks like without electricity. Oh -- nothing -- it's an ephemeral entertainment wrapper over a marketing product which is what? Nothing but bullshit.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday September 23 2015, @08:58AM
As every dung beetle will tell you, bullshit is very valuable. :-)
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday September 23 2015, @05:36PM
(Score: 2) by Hyperturtle on Wednesday September 23 2015, @06:34PM
wasn't it billy crystal in City Slickers or something that gave up his daily grind routine after he realized he spent his life trying to sell intangible objects that were invisible? He was in the business of selling marketing; advertising segments over the radio or something.
I agree that such a career produces nothing of direct worth, and I can't believe that people I know that once refused to fill out a warranty card because of being afraid to get on some list and receive a catalog now provide way more details to get a free download they may not use more than once...
Nothing but bullshit, but it comes at a cost. I wish there were more people like that character, who wake up and go do something else. (then again, he didn't go on to make material objects -- he just got to know himself and nature, which I suppose is almost to the level that modern faceboook marketing would know about him if the character were portrayed today.)