EU-Startups Podcast

EU-Startups Podcast

By Thomas OhrBusinessEntrepreneurshipTechnologyInvesting
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EU-Startups Podcast episodes

  • Meet the Canva of AI Content
    Fraser Bell, CEO of Wondercraft

    Key Points:

    • How Fraser’s transition into the CEO role came about, and what his first conversations with the outgoing co-founder looked like
    • What’s different about leading a startup you didn’t found, and how to respect the original vision while making it your own
    • Who’s using Wondercraft today - creators, small businesses or enterprises - and how adoption compares with expectations
    • How Wondercraft attracted backers like Steven Bartlett and ElevenLabs, and what their involvement brings beyond capital
    • Why customers would still choose Wondercraft if major AI model providers launched a competing product
    • AI slop and the challenge of AI generated content
      • 29 min
    • Inside Europe's Bet on Drones
      Károly Ludvigh, CEO and co-founder of ABZ Innovation

      Key Points

      • Why existing agricultural drones on the market fell short on reliability, and why ABZ decided to build its own hardware from the ground up
      • How technology is transforming the day-to-day work of farmers, even in a sector that looks traditional from the outside
      • Building for customers who prioritise reliability over exciting technology, and the engineering lessons that come with it
      • How the war in Ukraine has reshaped Europe's drone industry: manufacturing capacity, investment, and the shift toward local production
      • ABZ's stance on dual-use and defence applications versus staying focused on agricultural and civilian industrial use cases
      • Scaling across 40+ countries with divergent UAV regulations, and a look at what drones may routinely do in agriculture within five to ten years
        • 29 min
      • Why Europe is Ahead on Impact
        Jack Mardack, co-founder of Oyster

        Key points:

        • Why impact should be treated as a design problem built into a business model from day one, rather than a values commitment bolted on later
        • The difference between impact by intention and impact by design — and how founders and investors can tell the difference
        • What it takes to prove impact with evidence, and why investors should fund proof rather than claims
        • What replaces the ESG scorecard as the scorecard era comes to an end
        • A ten-year vision for the European workforce if talent, capital, and opportunity finally connect across borders
          • 41 min
        • How European BioTech is Changing Cancer Care
          Roundtable episode

          Key points:

          • Bridging the gap between scientific breakthroughs and real-world cancer care remains one of Europe's biggest challenges
          • Sustainable, microalgae-based biomanufacturing could become a serious alternative for producing antibodies and other biologics
          • Moving cell therapy from highly personalised treatments to scalable, "off-the-shelf" solutions is key to reaching far more patients
          • AI and generative chemistry open up RNA as a drug target that traditional discovery has struggled to reach
            • Europe excels at world-class research, but scaling BioTech companies still faces friction in funding, infrastructure, and ecosystem support
          • Practical lessons from founders on turning research into a company - and how Women TechEU creates impact well beyond the grant itself

            • Funded by the European Union. Views and opinions expressed are however those of the author(s) only and do not necessarily reflect those of the European Union or the European Innovation Council and SMEs Executive Agency (EISMEA). Neither the European Union nor the granting authority can be held responsible for them.

            The Women TechEU scheme is an EU-funded project supporting women leading deep tech startup companies from Europe. As part of the consortium team implementing the programme, our mission is to foster inclusive innovation by supporting women-led startups, including under-represented deep tech sectors and European regions. We believe that diversity drives innovation, and we are here to provide women in deep tech with more opportunities, resources, and support in order to build market-shaping companies at global level.

            Between 2026-2028, the current project consortium will run a continuous open call with 4 cut-off dates. Following a rigorous evaluation process, 160 total beneficiaries will be selected. Each beneficiary will receive €75k grants (non-dilutive finance), as well as a tailored package of mentorship, training, expert guidance, matchmaking and networking opportunities, and support in bridging the gap to other EIC funding and support schemes.

            36 min
          • The Glasses Helping the Blind See
            Cornel Amariei, CEO and founder of .lumen

            Key Points:

            • How the .lumen glasses actually work: 3D environment perception, human-centered path planning, and in-house mapping and semantic surface understanding
            • The guide dog comparison - where the glasses match its benefits today, where the analogy ends, and why .lumen aims to complement canes and dogs rather than replace them
            • What blind users taught the team that engineers alone could never have discovered, and how organisations for the visually impaired are responding to the product
            • The road to commercial availability: what still stands between today and a pair anyone can buy and use in everyday life
              • 42 min
            • Where Podcasting Meets Venture Capital
              Paul Bonnet, General Partner at 20VC

              Key Points

              • The media-first model of 20VC is a real advantage for deal sourcing and building founder relationships.
              • Keeping a small core team is a deliberate choice: it preserves conviction, keeps decision-making fast, and keeps the firm close to founders.
              • As venture firms become publishers and investors break their own news, independent journalists and traditional tech publications still play a role - but it's a changing one.
              • European founders who say the continent lacks funding should look closely at what capital is actually available at each stage and position themselves accordingly.
                • 41 min
              • Building a Defence Against Drones
                SDTH Winner (3 Month Challenge) Vaikesh Manimaran, Maelstrom

                Key Points:

                • Real-time defensive systems force hard trade-offs between speed, accuracy, cost, and reliability - there's no perfect solution, only chosen compromises
                • Working directly with operators and defence experts surfaces problems and constraints that pure lab development would never reveal
                • If the prize funding is being used to accelerate MAELSTROM's development beyond the hackathon prototype
                  • 15 min
                • Controlling Robots with Your Brain
                  Singapore Defence Tech Hackathon Winner (48hr Challenge) Wayne Lin, NeuroMech

                  Key Points:

                  • Hands-free control of unmanned ground vehicles could change how operators manage systems in situations where their hands and attention are needed elsewhere
                  • Brain-computer interfaces are notoriously difficult to make reliable, and rapid prototyping under hackathon pressure exposes those weaknesses fast
                  • A working prototype is only the first step — the real question is whether a hackathon project can become a viable company
                  • Prize funding is being used to push NeuroMech beyond a demo and toward a serious product
                    • 14 min
                  • Inside the New DefenceTech Race
                    Gary Ang, Professor of Practice, Defence Innovation & Applications

                    Key points:

                    • Defence technology often struggles to move from R&D into real-world use for reasons that span procurement, culture and organisational incentives - not just technical maturity
                    • Genuine dual-use value means a technology works credibly across both civilian and defence markets, not just carrying the label
                      • Europe's rising focus on defence innovation and Singapore's long-standing, integrated approach to technology, government and industry create strong opportunities for collaboration
                    • European DefenceTech founders should see Singapore as a partner, a market and a gateway to the wider Asian region - each role comes with different expectations
                    • Universities are becoming central to defence innovation, and turning research into venture-backed companies requires deliberate investment in talent, capital access and international scaling paths
                      • 23 min
                    • What Europe Can Learn from Asia
                      Helmut Schönenberger, co-founder & CEO, UnternehmerTUM

                      Key points:

                      • Turning strong academic research into companies that actually scale requires more than world-class science - it takes a deliberately built university venture ecosystem
                      • Munich and Singapore support founders and commercialise deep tech in notably different ways, and each has lessons to offer the other
                      • Singapore's model of connecting universities, government, investors and industry offers practices European ecosystems could adopt
                      • Europe's strengths in engineering, industrial technology and long-term research are assets that Asian innovation hubs can learn from - the exchange runs both ways
                      • Helping European DeepTech companies expand into Asia is a concrete role universities and innovation centres should own, from talent bridges to market access
                        • 15 min

                      About EU-Startups Podcast

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                      The official Podcast of EU-Startups.com - the leading online magazine about startups in Europe.

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