EUVC

Models are converging. Chinese open source models are catching up. Applications are becoming the moat.

In this episode of This Week in European Tech, Dan Bowyer and Mads Jensen of SuperSeed examine the shifts shaping AI, markets and Europe’s role.

From DeepSeek’s progress to the EU AI Act, the focus is on where the real competitive edge is forming, alongside cyber incidents, the race between frontier labs, and why coding is central to how AI systems improve and are used, before closing on pressure in private credit and what it could mean for SaaS.

Key highlights

• Chinese open-source AI is rapidly closing the gap with US leaders
• The EU is considering revisions to its AI Act, including scope and timeline changes
• Cyber incidents reveal systemic data management failures
• Frontier labs are moving up the stack into applications, with coding central to progress
• Private credit exposure to SaaS could lead to repricing

Timestamps

(00:00) Intro and overview of key topics

(05:45) DeepSeek V4 and model competition

(11:30) EU AI Act discussions

(16:45) Cyber breaches and data governance issues

(21:30) Digital ID systems and Estonia’s model

(26:30) Sergey Brin, DeepMind and AI coding race

(32:00) SpaceX, Cursor and AI distribution strategy

(39:30) Private credit, space sovereignty, predictions and week ahead

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In climate hardware, the capital stack shapes everything. This is according to Jarna Hyvönen, Co-Founder and CEO of Volare.

She joins Andreas Munk Holm and co-host Carmel Rafaeli, Founding Partner at The Table, in this episode of Leaders Shaping a Resilient Planet to break down what it takes to finance and scale industrial climate companies.

Volare is building a circular platform using black soldier flies to turn food industry side streams into protein, oils and fertilisers.

Jarna explains how they structured a mix of equity, debt, mezzanine and grants to fund their first industrial facility, and what it takes to align these instruments in practice.

Key topics

• Multi-instrument funding from day one
• Interdependent capital and fundraising complexity
• The importance of early financial capability
• De-risking through proven systems
• When unit economics become visible at scale

Timestamps

(00:00) Climate tech funding gap
(03:00) From research to industrial scale
(06:00) Inside the mixed capital stack
(10:00) Interdependent financing
(14:00) Financial strategy and CFO role
(18:00) De-risking and innovation
(22:00) Market shift to viability
(26:00) Scaling and unit economics

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Anthropic is moving beyond models and into building full products.

In this episode of This Week in European Tech, Dan Bowyer and Mads Jensen from SuperSeed cover the key forces shaping European tech right now, from political shifts and capital flows to AI competition, small high-output teams and rising compute demand.

Key Highlights

• Hungary’s leadership change and potential EU funding unlocks
• Anthropic expanding beyond models into product and applications
• Mythos vs GPT Cyber and what different benchmarks actually measure
• The rise of very small teams building large businesses with AI
• Compute demand continuing to accelerate across the market

Timestamps

(00:00) Intro
(01:00) Hungary and EU implications
(08:30) Anthropic strategy shift
(13:30) AI model comparison
(20:30) Small teams and AI businesses
(26:30) Compute scarcity
(31:30) Musk’s Terafab
(36:30) Predictions, deals, closing

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Deep tech is not about complexity. It is about compounding R&D that builds defensibility and demands a different approach to investing. This is the lens Sasha Vidiborskiy, Partner at Atomico, applies to backing frontier technologies.

In this episode, Andreas Munk Holm speaks with Sasha, a quantum physicist turned VC investing in complex products and deep tech.

They explore what defines deep tech, how to assess founders, and how Atomico underwrites and invests in technically complex companies, from diligence to timelines and risk.

Key highlights

• Why deep tech is driven by compounding R&D, not complexity

• Why timelines are hard to predict, especially in areas like quantum computing

• What sets great deep tech founders apart

• How Atomico evaluates and underwrites deep tech opportunities

• Why Europe is gaining ground in deep tech

• Why deep tech requires a different investment approach

Timestamps

(00:00) Intro & Sasha’s background
(03:00) From quantum physics to venture capital
(07:30) Quantum computing timelines
(12:00) What defines deep tech
(18:30) Founder traits
(26:00) Evaluating deep tech investments
(34:00) Atomico’s investment framework
(42:00) Europe’s deep tech moment

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Why do most corporate venture arms fail within four years, and what are the three principles that make them last?

In this episode, Andreas Munk Holm and Jeppe Høier speak with Oliver Schmäschke, Managing Partner at T.Capital, the €2.3 billion investment arm of Deutsche Telekom.

Oliver shares practical insights on what actually works in corporate venture capital, built around three core principles that shape how corporates invest, operate and create long-term impact.

Key highlights

• Strategic vs financial investing
• Access and value creation as competitive edge
• Governance and decision-making speed
• Why most CVCs fail
• Hiring and retaining top talent

Timestamps

(00:00) Introduction and guest background

(02:00) Oliver’s journey and T.Capital overview

(04:00) Strategic vs financial investing

(07:00) Core principles of CVC

(12:00) Talent and hiring in CVC

(16:00) Corporate edge vs traditional VCs

(23:00) Structuring a CVC and value creation

(29:00) State of CVC in Europe and closing

For more European VC thought leadership, visit our website.

Learn more about T.Capital here.

Anthropic has overtaken OpenAI in revenue and Europe is emerging as a key AI battleground.

In this episode of This Week in European Tech, Dan Bowyer (SuperSeed) and Lomax Ward (Outsized Ventures) break down a week shaped by AI momentum, capital concentration and macro uncertainty. They cover Anthropic’s rise, its enterprise focus and latest model, and whether current growth can justify the scale of AI investment.

They also explore the coming wave of mega IPOs and what it means for liquidity, alongside JPMorgan CEO Jamie Dimon’s shareholder letter on inflation, interest rates and private credit. The episode closes with climate investing’s shift towards energy security and the move to faster, software-led defence systems.

Key topics

• Anthropic vs OpenAI: revenue growth, enterprise dominance and Europe expansion

• Mega IPO wave: SpaceX, OpenAI, Anthropic and capital market strain

• Jamie Dimon’s warning: inflation, rates and private credit risks

• Climate investing shift: from ESG to energy security and resilience

• Defence transformation: from legacy procurement to agile, software-led warfare

Timestamps

(00:00) Intro and macro setup

(05:00) Anthropic growth, Mythos and AI competition

(12:30) Positioning, ethics and enterprise adoption in AI

(22:00) Jamie Dimon letter: inflation and private credit

(29:00) IPO pipeline and capital constraints

(36:00) Climate and energy security shift

(42:00) Germany defence spend and modern warfare

(46:30) OpenAI moves, predictions and deals

Has crypto quietly crossed the line from hype to real financial infrastructure?

Tune into this episode of the EUVC podcast, hosted by Andreas Munk Holm, as he is joined by Simone Maini, CEO of Elliptic, and Jay Wilson, Partner at AlbionVC, to unpack crypto’s next phase.

They break down the shift from uncertainty to quantifiable risk, how institutions assess on-chain transactions and why supporting infrastructure is now critical to the venture case, alongside stablecoins and global regulatory momentum.

Key highlights:

• The shift from uncertainty to quantifiable risk
• How institutions assess risk in on-chain transactions
• Why infrastructure is critical to the venture case
• Stablecoins enabling faster, cheaper global payments
• Regulatory clarity across Europe, the US, Singapore and the UAE

Timestamps:

(00:00) Crypto meets traditional finance

(01:00) What Elliptic does in digital assets

(02:00) The venture case for crypto

(04:00) Where global crypto activity is shifting

(07:00) Regulation, risk and market maturity

(10:00) Europe, MiCA and the race to lead

(18:00) Founder–investor dynamics in volatile markets

(33:00) Stablecoins and the future of payments

(37:00) AI, agentic transactions and what’s next

(42:00) Final thoughts on crypto’s second act

Explore more on European tech thought leadership at: https://eu.vc

We can’t reach 1.5°C with emissions cuts alone. Carbon removal must scale alongside decarbonisation.

In this episode, Andreas and co-host Carmel Rafaeli, Founding Partner at The Table, sit down with Henrietta Moon, Founder & CEO of Carboculture to unpack what it actually takes to build carbon removal infrastructure.

Carbo Culture is scaling biochar into industrial systems that lock carbon away for centuries — while generating revenue across agriculture, energy, and materials.

We cover:
• How biochar works and why it’s scalable
• Why carbon removal alone isn’t a business
• The shift to regulated carbon markets
• Financing capital-intensive climate infrastructure
• Scaling from innovation to repetition

Timestamps:
(00:00) Intro & funding gap
(02:00) Biochar explained
(03:00) EU regulation
(05:00) Business model
(08:00) Revenue strategy
(17:00) Offtake & demand
(22:00) Project finance
(36:00) Founder journey

Europe wants to lead in AI, defence, and infrastructure. The question is whether it can actually execute.

In this episode of Upside, Dan Bowyer (SuperSeed) and Lomax Ward (Outsized Ventures), joined by Andrew J Scott (7percent Ventures), unpack a week where ambition and reality are starting to diverge.

Mistral raises $830M to build sovereign AI infrastructure. Poolside’s $2B round collapses after losing compute access. And UK defence tech founders are leaving—not for lack of ideas, but for lack of contracts.

Across all of this, one pattern emerges:
Europe isn’t short on capability. It’s short on systems that work.

Key topics:

• Why Europe’s capital problem starts earlier than growth
• Mistral’s infrastructure bet and what it signals
• Poolside, CoreWeave, and the fragility of compute access
• The UK defence tech bottleneck: funding vs procurement
• Palantir, trust, and the case for sovereign software

If you’re building in AI, defence, or deep tech, this is where the constraints actually are.

Timestamps

00:00 Intro and the week’s themes

03:00 News roundup: space, IPOs and market signals

08:00 Mistral’s $830M raise and sovereign AI infrastructure

15:00 Poolside, CoreWeave and compute dependency risk

23:00 Palantir, the NHS and the trust gap

31:00 UK defence tech and founder flight

40:00 Procurement vs capital: where companies stall

42:00 Predictions: local AI vs hyperscalers

50:00 Deals of the week

For decades, Europe built around efficiency — global supply chains, outsourced infrastructure, and distributed value creation. That model is now breaking down.

In this episode, Cameron McLain (Co-Founder & Managing Partner at Giant Ventures) argues that the next era isn’t about startups — it’s about control.

Who owns the infrastructure determines who captures the value.

We discuss why venture is moving from convenience to systems, why “purpose-driven founders” outperform, and what it actually means to build a European stack across energy, manufacturing, and financial rails.

Timestamps
00:00 – Introduction: From impact to sovereignty02:00 – Why purpose-driven founders build enduring companies05:00 – Giant Ventures and the transatlantic perspective07:30 – The shift from efficiency to resilience10:00 – Why infrastructure is the new venture frontier12:00 – What the “European stack” actually means15:00 – Can Europe compete with hyperscalers?18:00 – The role of government: builder vs buyer23:00 – Why energy, manufacturing, and financial rails matter30:00 – AI, labour disruption, and the future of work34:00 – Europe’s biggest bottleneck: exits and capital markets