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From Dining Table to $700M Exit · EU-Startups Podcast

• 0:00
  Speaker 0: You are now listening to the EU startups podcast.
• 0:13
  Speaker 1: Hello, and welcome to this episode of these stars podcast.
• 0:16
  Speaker 1: as always I'm your host Dave San Garcia.
• 0:18
  Speaker 1: The newsletter here at you start ups today.
• 0:21
  Speaker 1: I chatted with Joss white.
• 0:22
  Speaker 1: He's a general partner in the co-founder Of the very well known VC firm notion capital on ocean capitals based in London spin around since two thousand nine And according to what i've seen has over one billion dollars in funds under management and a portfolio of over two hundred companies.
• 0:41
  Speaker 1: So it's relevant, extremely relevant and extremely ever present not just in the funding landscape but in newsrooms like ours where we constantly see research analysis and investments from therein.
• 0:54
  Speaker 1: Joss and I were able to chat about the history of Notion Capital on his own personal journey versus an entrepreneur then investor how he sees current investors' shaping, how he sees current founders' shaping and the contrasts in comparisons between American companies and founders versus European company's founders.
• 1:15
  Speaker 1: It is not to mention of course the impact on AI and future investing.
• 1:21
  Speaker 1: Hi.
• 1:22
  Speaker 1: Yeah, it's
• 1:32
  Speaker 0: good to be here.
• 1:33
  Speaker 0: I'm looking forward today.
• 1:34
  Speaker 0: conversation.
• 1:35
  Speaker 1: Yes, yes am i?
• 1:36
  Speaker 1: It's actually been a while since we've had somebody on the investor side Somebody on the VC side.
• 1:41
  Speaker 1: of course there are so many great entrepreneur stories and they always kind of give way To such wonderful color.
• 1:47
  Speaker 1: but uh...it's always important I think to see The other side Of the coin And talk to those On the money-side Talked to Those kind of you know Backing these all interesting entrepreneurs across Europe.
• 1:59
  Speaker 0: Yes, I kind of see myself as being a little bit on both sides.
• 2:07
  Speaker 0: I'm a recovering entrepreneur and i think...I've now been an investor for almost the same amount time that was spending starting and building businesses.
• 2:18
  Speaker 0: so it's got to get symmetry into my career
• 2:23
  Speaker 1: Great.
• 2:24
  Speaker 1: Well, before we get into that your career because it is interesting I've got some notes i want to get in on.
• 2:30
  Speaker 1: let's just hear from who you are what do and why.
• 2:33
  Speaker 1: people listening this podcast episode should care?
• 2:36
  Speaker 0: Yeah sounds great.
• 2:37
  Speaker 0: so yeah my name is Joss White.
• 2:40
  Speaker 0: I'm a general partner at Notion Capital.
• 2:43
  Speaker 0: I am one of the founders at Notions.
• 2:47
  Speaker 0: We started The Firm back in two thousand nine.
• 2:51
  Speaker 0: So, Notion has been around for about sixteen years.
• 2:57
  Speaker 0: But just stepping back from that a little bit as I said... ...I'm kind of an entrepreneur turned investor so.. ..I started out in tech in the early nineteen nineties and got into it by accident.
• 3:10
  Speaker 0: And my career is kind of cracked with the evolution on internet!
• 3:18
  Speaker 0: buying and selling secondhand IBM equipment, which is not a good business to be in.
• 3:24
  Speaker 0: And barely qualifies as tech.
• 3:26
  Speaker 0: but it gave us customers started asking us for networking products particularly from this company called Cisco.
• 3:36
  Speaker 0: This was the early nineties.
• 3:37
  Speaker 0: we could see shift happening from big IBM systems towards networking of this thing call The Internet selling a lot of the products that were kind of building out The internet and so we turn the whole company on its head And we became a Cisco distributor, and then-and We were very early into that market in the nineties.
• 3:58
  Speaker 0: So That was my first experience with a really high growth market being at the right place At the right time.
• 4:07
  Speaker 0: I Then co founded one of the very first Internet providers In the UK which is called STAR in nineteen ninety five And we set up Star to try and help businesses get setup with the internet, provide some kind of hand-holding because unlike today it was very complicated.
• 4:23
  Speaker 0: To connect your network on the Internet and figure out what you're going do that how I can have a business.
• 4:30
  Speaker 0: so we tried really provides additional services in support for our customers.
• 4:38
  Speaker 0: Then I co founded a business called Message Labs.
• 4:42
  Speaker 0: in two thousand message apps we set up to really scale-up technology that would develop within our ISP, within Star which was an antivirus system that we built into the cloud.
• 4:56
  Speaker 0: So this was two thousand.
• 4:58
  Speaker 0: so just at a time when threats over the Internet and malware had worked out how they piggyback on the internet and piggy back on email?
• 5:07
  Speaker 0: Suddenly viruses in other types of malware became much more serious problem because I could piggyback on the internet and they could spread to many more people much, faster.
• 5:20
  Speaker 0: We felt why not move this system into a cloud?
• 5:22
  Speaker 0: so you just redirect your traffic to one of our data centers?
• 5:26
  Speaker 0: And we would scrub it in pass-it-ons who didn't have to worry about at local level... ...and we were there first.
• 5:33
  Speaker 0: company did do that bit like a water company.
• 5:35
  Speaker 0: You hope filters are waters.
• 5:37
  Speaker 0: by the time he turned on your tap, your water has been filtered.
• 5:41
  Speaker 0: That's what we were doing with internet traffic.
• 5:43
  Speaker 0: We're kind of sheltering it at a high level and, um...we are pretty early into that
• 5:49
  Speaker 0: market.".
• 5:50
  Speaker 0: The term SHAS didn't even exist in two thousands but around about two-thousand three is the term SAS immersion.
• 5:58
  Speaker 0: We were charging our customers per user per month for like alive service And then we realized that we fitted very neatly to the SAS category net In fact, of the SaaS market.
• 6:12
  Speaker 0: In two thousand and two, I moved to
• 6:14
  Speaker 0: U.S.,
• 6:14
  Speaker 0: to run our US operation.
• 6:16
  Speaker 0: so that was a great experience for me.
• 6:18
  Speaker 0: taking in European tech company into the u.s.-market we expanded message apps pretty successfully around the world.
• 6:26
  Speaker 0: We got to two thousand eight.
• 6:28
  Speaker 0: we had about one hundred fifty million dollars of annualized revenue with third largest sales business in the world behind Salesforce and WebEx.
• 6:37
  Speaker 0: at this time We were gearing up for a big IPO.
• 6:41
  Speaker 0: I'm getting very excited about that, but unfortunately it was two thousand and eight and the markets of financial crisis happened... The market went into meltdown.
• 6:53
  Speaker 0: we never quite made the IPO But actually ended up selling to Symantec who make their Norton antivirus product this is might have heard off And they built their whole SaaS business.
• 7:07
  Speaker 0: So that was a great experience.
• 7:08
  Speaker 0: We sold the business for about seven hundred million dollars, but it's pretty large exit from their first generation SaaS companies and we were pretty thrilled by all of this.
• 7:21
  Speaker 0: That is my entrepreneurial journey up to notion.
• 7:24
  Speaker 0: so I co-founded each business with my brother Ben who accumulated about one billion dollar value in total.
• 7:36
  Speaker 0: So, that was really an amazing experience of getting into markets early and building businesses.
• 7:43
  Speaker 0: Lots of ups-and-downs with lots learning but... And then in two thousand nine.
• 7:48
  Speaker 0: me and three other guys said we were all in the kind of early founding team at MesaJabs.
• 7:54
  Speaker 0: We felt it has a lot of similarities to today.
• 7:57
  Speaker 0: But we thought that we are beginning of the SaaS super cycle In Two Thousand Nine.
• 8:02
  Speaker 0: like AWS had just come to market, it was more and more easy.
• 8:07
  Speaker 0: It's easier to build a SaaS product starting here at the tipping
• 8:10
  Speaker 0: point.".
• 8:11
  Speaker 0: We were one of our few teams that had really built and scouted SaaS business out of Europe.
• 8:17
  Speaker 0: but we thought why don't you set up a VC just to focus on the emerging SaaS looper cycle?
• 8:24
  Speaker 0: where would have an unfair advantage in the market?
• 8:27
  Speaker 0: because if we'd built and scoured a big SaaS company into markets so VCs, certainly in the European market with that real entrepreneurial pedigree.
• 8:38
  Speaker 0: That real operator mindset really had a direct experience of the market.
• 8:43
  Speaker 0: they were investing it and... It was more common in US but less common back in Europe because there hadn't been enough big exits.
• 8:54
  Speaker 0: so there hasn't be enough recycling for successful founders who then decided to invest money or set up funds.
• 9:02
  Speaker 0: That has started to happen more and more in something that's really strengthened the European ecosystem, which is been great to see.
• 9:09
  Speaker 0: But we were one of early entrepreneur-led operating led BCs in Europe.
• 9:17
  Speaker 0: And that was a kind of thesis behind Notion Capital.
• 9:22
  Speaker 0: We've stayed pretty true with that thesis.
• 9:26
  Speaker 0: We added FinTech pretty early on as an obvious adjacent market.
• 9:29
  Speaker 0: but apart from We've really just been focused on sales and fintech at the kind of seed in a series A stage.
• 9:36
  Speaker 0: And we'd be very focused, with always had a very operator mindset.
• 9:40
  Speaker 0: Um...we're being very committed to value add.
• 9:42
  Speaker 0: so we built our platform team to productise out our value add make resources available to our portfolio.
• 9:50
  Speaker 0: So we build that up At lot time an energy investment into that.
• 9:55
  Speaker 0: um..and we feel now are pretty well established funds within the European market.
• 10:04
  Speaker 0: We've made investments in companies like currency cloud, like Muse, Adel, GoCardless and then more recently like Aikido, Ismbar, ULife UpFest, companies like that.
• 10:19
  Speaker 0: so we have had a good amount of success.
• 10:23
  Speaker 0: but just... More recently at last two or three years we realized that the market was starting to really shift underneath our feet.
• 10:35
  Speaker 0: And so, you know... We've been solidly and successfully investing behind the South Supercycle.
• 10:42
  Speaker 0: it was starting feel quite busy in quite saturated more difficult who identify real outliers towards the end?
• 10:50
  Speaker 0: So I think that usually tells me there's a market is ripe for disruption I think with the emergence of Gen AI, when ChatGBT was released and Generative AI has really emerged into the market or sort of you know... Emerged.
• 11:12
  Speaker 0: We need a faster description than that but catapulted itself in to the market.
• 11:19
  Speaker 0: It feels like we're now very much at the beginning of our new super cycle A bit like where we were In two thousand and nine, you know with SAS.
• 11:29
  Speaker 0: the cloud was a platform or SAS.
• 11:32
  Speaker 0: And now it feels like their foundation models are AI is the platform for whole new generation of companies.
• 11:39
  Speaker 0: We're at the beginning of our whole new super cycle which I think will be faster and larger more disruptive than any super cycle that we've seen before.
• 11:48
  Speaker 0: With very excited about that themes within AI that we're now investing behind, which I think carry on from our commitment to kind of investing in business tech or enterprise tech.
• 12:05
  Speaker 0: One of which is services as software.
• 12:06
  Speaker 0: so how AI can automate full workflows and start to really displace labor and actually do the work itself disrupting things like legal accounting or advertising and consulting.
• 12:23
  Speaker 0: Offer can now learn from a connect to physical environments into hardware and more kind of vertically integrated models.
• 12:30
  Speaker 0: And so we've invested in like manufacturing companies, drone companies autonomous boats sensors infrastructure anyway that we wouldn't have done prior to the movement.
• 12:40
  Speaker 0: So where were very excited about how our market has expanded?
• 12:45
  Speaker 0: How are they mark opportunity as increased?
• 12:47
  Speaker 0: and you know I'm very excited.
• 12:51
  Speaker 0: Amazing forwards.
• 12:55
  Speaker 1: You could interview yourself, I think you just about covered every question i had there in one way or another.
• 13:01
  Speaker 1: but uh sorry...I guess we're going to retrace and maybe get into a bit more detail of the lot different things that you've mentioned there.
• 13:08
  Speaker 1: um starting with which I guess..you know like as we start at the beginning The idea is co-founded by your brother.
• 13:15
  Speaker 1: There's this element of family that seems to play in there And I read it out That you spoke of your father that at the dining room table when you were growing up, there's a lot of talk about entrepreneurship and a lot to talk how it could be done with your brother or father.
• 13:30
  Speaker 1: So I want hear a little bit on how this shaped early-on because seems like something was there as kid And is kind of pattern that you see emerge in entrepreneurs that starts very early.
• 13:41
  Speaker 1: eventually if they find success move into investing.
• 13:47
  Speaker 0: Yeah, yeah.
• 13:47
  Speaker 0: I mean it was really...I don't think we realized that at the time.
• 13:51
  Speaker 0: We just thought It was normal.
• 13:54
  Speaker 0: you know That's what everybody did but my dad Was a real entrepreneur so he had lots of different types Of businesses with various levels of success.
• 14:08
  Speaker 0: But He had sports apparel company, had a wigs' company.
• 14:15
  Speaker 0: Had a jewelry company at the Hudson Spice's Company and it was constantly in different types of markets.
• 14:22
  Speaker 0: but I think that thing that i really take away from is just hugely energetic and passionate about every market.
• 14:33
  Speaker 0: he was in an opportunity to upset their status quo.
• 14:38
  Speaker 0: you know always believe big companies were sleepy Big companies were lazy big companies.
• 14:44
  Speaker 0: We're not really doing very much and you could always You could always Really make a dent in their market share just by being Creative or by being innovative of just having some fresh Thinking.
• 14:58
  Speaker 0: so, you know he was always very much like challenging the status quo.
• 15:02
  Speaker 0: It didn't.
• 15:05
  Speaker 0: it didn't go to University And so I didn't have that kind conventional path.
• 15:12
  Speaker 0: go to university and then joining, you know a large firm.
• 15:16
  Speaker 0: And sort of learning about large firms are learning about the specific industry or professional service that professionals services type of career.
• 15:24
  Speaker 0: um...and so was always looking at opportunities in the market?
• 15:30
  Speaker 0: How can I make money and how can i disrupt and agitate and really offer something different to what's out there rather than just a large corporate and so we always were very energized by that, like very enthused about it.
• 15:51
  Speaker 0: It felt very romantic to us.
• 15:55
  Speaker 0: I don't know Robin Hood type of thing.
• 15:59
  Speaker 0: entrepreneurs are out there trying to compete with these large companies.
• 16:06
  Speaker 0: in doing that they have offer something much better because the larger company has had many advantages.
• 16:11
  Speaker 0: And it just felt like that's what you do, and I don't think there was ever any doubt in our minds.
• 16:18
  Speaker 0: That the journey we wanted to take all led with conversations about Dad and his inspiration for us.
• 16:29
  Speaker 0: None of us did very well at school either.
• 16:32
  Speaker 0: My sister who is also a founder and entrepreneur of Lifestyle Management Services Company.
• 16:39
  Speaker 0: And so I think if you don't do well at school, like A it means that your a bit of rebel which i think you need to be successful entrepreneur.
• 16:48
  Speaker 0: Challenge things and not necessarily follow rules.
• 16:51
  Speaker 0: but B You really have much choice.
• 16:54
  Speaker 0: If you went too well in school then no one is going to employ you.
• 16:58
  Speaker 0: So just set something
• 17:02
  Speaker 1: up for yourself.
• 17:03
  Speaker 1: Okay Well you seem to also fall into this path of variety When it comes to the different businesses you began, The different entrepreneurship paths You took and eventually that leading you into VC Into funding makes a lot of sense.
• 17:17
  Speaker 1: I think at least from where i stand.
• 17:19
  Speaker 1: And uh...you said this in your intro about how you felt That was important.
• 17:24
  Speaker 1: Uh..that had this unfair advantage know, about being having this entrepreneurial background of all you kind of bring into funding.
• 17:31
  Speaker 1: So I'm curious to hear whether that's an essential aspect for a good investor.
• 17:36
  Speaker 1: or can one come in investing from different paths and just have as much value?
• 17:42
  Speaker 0: Yeah...I think it is really great question!
• 17:45
  Speaker 0: And the questions get asked a lot.... I don't think by any means if you had company building like entrepreneurial experience would be successful Investor.
• 17:58
  Speaker 0: so I think there's lots of, you know investors come in all shapes and sizes.
• 18:04
  Speaker 0: You know they come from different types of backgrounds And we have investors that comes from a finance background like big finance work for one other with the large sort of Big platform finance companies like a Bill Gurley was was an example of that.
• 18:28
  Speaker 0: Successful investors have come from journalists or more marketing backgrounds, like Mike Moritz is a journalist and writer I think you get successful investors who've built a platform or build media company to drive their brand and connectivity in the network.
• 18:49
  Speaker 0: they're able to elevate themselves And so you get lots of different types of investors.
• 19:00
  Speaker 0: I think the important thing is that A, You've got to stand out and probably the best way to stand at some leverage your own advantages or your own kind of talents?
• 19:12
  Speaker 0: And B, you've gotta find a way To add value...to be a good partner for the businesses that you invest in.
• 19:20
  Speaker 0: So for me I've been an entrepreneur.
• 19:26
  Speaker 0: In the market, and investing in or very much a related market.
• 19:30
  Speaker 0: so i'm going to tap into that as much as i can And i think it helps me.
• 19:36
  Speaker 0: you know i can draw on my own kind of business building experience i can do on mine.
• 19:40
  Speaker 0: You know the mistakes did.
• 19:41
  Speaker 0: i made The challenges that i had.
• 19:43
  Speaker 0: you have another context for That.
• 19:45
  Speaker 0: i think really helped also build Empathy are really get on the same wavelength is a founder because I've been where they are.
• 19:54
  Speaker 0: I really, really understand that kind of side-of the table and hopefully over the years you usually learn more from mistakes than things we do well.
• 20:07
  Speaker 0: We certainly made my fair share of mistake so i have just a lot context to draw from.
• 20:15
  Speaker 0: So it helps me in way partner with founders But I think there's so many different ways to do it, but you definitely need to stand out in a crowded market.
• 20:28
  Speaker 0: You need to have an edge and you need to be seen as additive to the founder or company in some way.
• 20:35
  Speaker 0: And So i'm just using the advantages that I've got.
• 20:39
  Speaker 0: There are lots of different dimensions, lots of various ways investors can
• 20:46
  Speaker 1: Right, and then the other side of that is the founders.
• 20:49
  Speaker 1: I mean you said notions around since two thousand nine So i'm curious to hear if there's been kind from successful Founders the profiles.
• 20:58
  Speaker 1: have You seen an evolution?
• 21:00
  Speaker 1: Since Then?
• 21:01
  Speaker 1: or Have Kind Of The Successful Traits Let's Say Been established in stone since two thousand nine to now.
• 21:08
  Speaker 1: I mean, as you mentioned we have an AI wave and so many founders And some of the entrepreneurs and So many businesses that have such a heavy reliance on AI.
• 21:17
  Speaker 1: is That does that play into?
• 21:19
  Speaker 1: The strengths and weaknesses that you've seen?
• 21:23
  Speaker 0: Yeah, it absolutely does.
• 21:26
  Speaker 0: We are seeing The sizes and shapes for teams They were investing has changed pretty materially.
• 21:37
  Speaker 0: So we have a cloud challenger top one hundred lists that we publish every year, which is like what the top-one hundred seed stage or before seed stage companies and it's very data driven approach in terms of selecting the best companies Just like the team sizes in the cloud challenge at top one hundred has gone from, I think it two years is going to be like twenty eight down.
• 22:10
  Speaker 0: The average team size now as I think ten.
• 22:12
  Speaker 0: so there's less than half and we're definitely seeing that team sizes change generally with smaller teams but also see higher quality or high level people within those things.
• 22:29
  Speaker 0: you might have a small team But you might be paying them more and You're going to be leveraging AI Leveraging the leveraging technology much much smaller than that was a case before.
• 22:43
  Speaker 0: I think your good example of that is, you know.
• 22:46
  Speaker 0: You see more and more within companies The role like a product builder or tech builders.
• 22:53
  Speaker 0: so instead of having specific roles across in our product management and software engineering testing in QA, and all those to the front end design.
• 23:08
  Speaker 0: All these different types of things now increasingly seeing their role like a product builder who is responsible for each different part of building out that products on the way they're able to do it because I can start to leverage AI and leverage agents too make them more than around contributor rather than just specializing in one part of the process.
• 23:34
  Speaker 0: So that's happening, kind of pretty accelerated fashion I think and you're seeing similar things within other functions as well
• 23:45
  Speaker 1: okay?
• 23:46
  Speaker 1: And there is an extra element to table here also your experience on the US because from what i read You spent around fourteen fifteen years in the U S building The American side message lax.
• 23:59
  Speaker 1: Now, I'm curious then to hear because that's become such a big point.
• 24:03
  Speaker 1: Such a big narrative here and the worst thing at you startups how there are so many European founders That talk about building in Europe and wanting to stay in Europe.
• 24:11
  Speaker 1: more of conflict between Expanding to the US taking us money staying in Europe.
• 24:17
  Speaker 1: i'm curious To Hear How You See The Whole Challenge Between American Founders American Companies Versus European Founders In European Companies.
• 24:28
  Speaker 0: Yeah, I think that Europe has all of the ingredients to be really successful.
• 24:39
  Speaker 0: Sometimes it lacks the kind of density for those ingredients to come together at the same time and then they're market in terms everything else, there can be some more complexity to that.
• 25:04
  Speaker 0: But I think in terms of talent... In terms of university education, talent ideas, capability all those things.
• 25:18
  Speaker 0: and then you need really start a successful company with the supporting resources for legal framework the right kind of advisors, the right investors.
• 25:33
  Speaker 0: I think all of the ingredients are there in Europe.
• 25:36
  Speaker 0: Sometimes we don't do a good enough job at bringing them altogether.
• 25:41
  Speaker 0: they can be more fragmented than
• 25:45
  Speaker 0: U.S.,
• 25:45
  Speaker 0: and the market could be a bit more fragmental.
• 25:47
  Speaker 0: then US so trying to invest into their ecosystems within Europe but also creating uniformity in the regulatory framework, legal framework.
• 26:01
  Speaker 0: The employment law or tax system... Things like that within Europe would be really beneficial as well.
• 26:09
  Speaker 0: I think Europe's got a lot going for it and is particularly good in terms of creating talent coming up with ideas whereas I'm thinking the US tend to be very good at not just scaling Ideas partly because they're very good at scaling but also the capital tends to be later stage Scaling type of capital and then the market lends itself to more scale.
• 26:35
  Speaker 0: this because it is one huge Market, not only that But it's a uniform market in terms of.
• 26:42
  Speaker 0: you know The same language in the scent currency.
• 26:45
  Speaker 0: You know or within the same overall kind of framework.
• 26:47
  Speaker 0: And so I think that that Is really the big difference?
• 26:53
  Speaker 0: In some ways, we're closing the gap.
• 26:55
  Speaker 0: But I think there are frustrations in Europe about some of that fragmentation or friction between different European markets to hold us back.
• 27:07
  Speaker 1: So then what's your opinion on things like the twenty-eighth regime?
• 27:10
  Speaker 1: You know EU ink these kind of proposals.
• 27:12
  Speaker 1: they were picking up steam now...I have to understand them.
• 27:14
  Speaker 1: you support that.
• 27:17
  Speaker 0: Yeah i think EU ink is a great idea And yeah, I one hundred percent support that and it seems like such an obvious thing.
• 27:30
  Speaker 0: It shouldn't have taken us so long to figure out but you know we've got a take the wins.
• 27:36
  Speaker 0: But i think there needs To be more of That.
• 27:38
  Speaker 0: More business friendly more entrepreneur Friendly?
• 27:43
  Speaker 0: Just more consistency in The way that We apply regulation taxes and just the way that we support businesses.
• 27:55
  Speaker 0: It's such a low hanging fruit, I think in some ways... We don't make life any easier for ourselves you know?
• 28:07
  Speaker 0: And EU Inc is one piece of it!
• 28:16
  Speaker 0: political leaders working more effectively with business leaders to create, to create more initiatives like that.
• 28:29
  Speaker 0: And I'm hopeful though that can happen.
• 28:31
  Speaker 0: but it feels like either the way that the US potentially has distanced itself further from Europe in some ways under the Trump administration.
• 28:47
  Speaker 0: and then China is you know... adversary of Europe and the UK in a Western world.
• 28:59
  Speaker 0: And if you look at AI, we've conceded quite a lot of strategic advantage to the US in terms of most of the infrastructure, most of foundation models ,most of the chips... Probably ninety percent upwards just all over CapEx investment is.
• 29:23
  Speaker 0: It feels like Europe, we need to take this moment.
• 29:31
  Speaker 0: If you look at the way that AI is both a threat and an opportunity... The world's becoming more and more multi-polar in many ways That we need make sure that AI has a real opportunity for Europe our economies.
• 29:53
  Speaker 0: and if you look at GDP growth in productivity, all of those numbers are not comparing well to the US or Asia.
• 30:02
  Speaker 0: And AI could be an opportunity to really address that.
• 30:08
  Speaker 0: so I can close that gap and start some real renewal within Europe.
• 30:14
  Speaker 0: but it's going.
• 30:14
  Speaker 0: take political leaders and business leaders who work together come together into takes a risk and to be bold if we're able, you know.
• 30:22
  Speaker 0: If were going use this as a wake-up call?
• 30:25
  Speaker 0: And used it for the moment within Europe... To kind of start really drive our economy moving forward in right way.
• 30:35
  Speaker 0: I started building up our regional sovereignty autonomy then now is time so need to mobilise.
• 30:46
  Speaker 0: everyone needs pushing hard
• 30:49
  Speaker 1: Yeah.
• 30:50
  Speaker 1: I think there's a lot of... Well, many people point to regulation as being such a crutch for us in terms of EU-wide and scaling and operating here.
• 31:01
  Speaker 1: but it seems that when we talk about these unicorn founders where does Europe stand globally?
• 31:09
  Speaker 1: What are the challenges?
• 31:10
  Speaker 1: Most some point two lack funding as being the major difficulty for them.
• 31:15
  Speaker 1: And I have tasked them, and then ask somebody who's directly involved when we're talking about funding or investment is that something you agree?
• 31:22
  Speaker 1: I mean i have to imagine since two thousand nine thats improved amount of money flowing in Europe but do think its still a major problem here.
• 31:30
  Speaker 1: there are lack of funding available from startups.
• 31:34
  Speaker 0: Yeah...I mean..i think it has got lot better.
• 31:39
  Speaker 0: If you look at the numbers, I haven't got them in front of me.
• 31:41
  Speaker 0: But if we take it to the numbers for VC investment into Europe year-on-year over the last ten or fifteen years that our numbers have increased at a very healthy rate and so... And their numbers are increasing much faster than the overall economies have grown.
• 32:02
  Speaker 0: So i think tech as an industry in Europe and as a source of investment is growing much, much faster than the overall economy.
• 32:16
  Speaker 0: And it's a real bright spot within European many ways.
• 32:20
  Speaker 0: so I don't think we should lose sight that creating you know its driving economic growth striving employment striving innovation is thriving our overall kind of competitiveness with other economies and ensuring opportunities within tech.
• 32:39
  Speaker 0: But obviously we could still take it much, much further.
• 32:43
  Speaker 0: I think that the early stage funding is available seed stage series A maybe Series B and i think once you're getting into investors writing checks for like a hundred million euros plus.
• 33:06
  Speaker 0: you know, that's a market is much stronger and much deeper within the US.
• 33:10
  Speaker 0: So it means only the very best European companies are able to raise those kind of rounds with multiple hundreds millions?
• 33:20
  Speaker 0: And so if they're not able to do there we don't have a healthy IPO market in Europe.
• 33:25
  Speaker 0: then I think that leads these early exits or mid-level exit maybe wouldn't happen because they can go and raise a growth round more easily.
• 33:37
  Speaker 0: So I think that the money is available, but iIthinkthatthebaris higher.
• 33:43
  Speaker 0: And so it does mean That some of these European success stories don't continue on Don't continue building.
• 33:52
  Speaker 0: They do take you know A path to an exit instead Which obviously Is not good for Europe and Not Good For The Economy.
• 33:59
  Speaker 0: I Think It's Getting Better But Still A Lot Of Work.
• 34:03
  Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah and still I mean silver rather than topic.
• 34:05
  Speaker 1: was it yesterday.
• 34:06
  Speaker 1: We just saw bending spoons IPO on the Nasdaq.
• 34:10
  Speaker 1: So you know there's another huge European company kind of taking that route.
• 34:14
  Speaker 1: so a I think ever present everyone's minds But with consciousness of time and consciousness of my video editor, who I don't want to take him up his whole day just to edit these podcasts.
• 34:26
  Speaker 1: I'm gonna leave it here on one final question for you And its very general.
• 34:29
  Speaker 1: It's a very open-ended question but i can imagine better person answer than You is kind where do see notions impact within the wider VC ecosystem?
• 34:39
  Speaker 1: Its position?
• 34:41
  Speaker 1: Where does that sit according what left her accomplish?
• 34:45
  Speaker 1: Really, where do you want to see it grow from here?
• 34:50
  Speaker 0: Yeah.
• 34:50
  Speaker 0: I mean we think the opportunity for Notion is bigger than its ever been.
• 34:56
  Speaker 0: so... We were investing behind the SaaS Supercycle for ten or fifteen years and that was a great place to be.
• 35:05
  Speaker 0: but SaaS has well passed its peak And i think now we're investing in the AI Supercycle And I think that's going to be significantly larger.
• 35:18
  Speaker 0: And, i think the opportunities out there are tremendous and so we look at technology as like a means to an end.
• 35:29
  Speaker 0: We just want to invest.
• 35:32
  Speaker 0: where is innovation?
• 35:34
  Speaker 0: Where is it disruption That has gonna drive economic growth.
• 35:39
  Speaker 0: You know when you're investing companies really reshape their industries and really drive economic growth, drive GDP growth because they can win a disproportionate share of the fast-growing market.
• 35:57
  Speaker 0: They could win that for there... You know?
• 35:59
  Speaker 0: For the country, for the region that they're in And then kind outcompete many other companies across the markets.
• 36:07
  Speaker 0: So we see our role in the ecosystem is really investing, and businesses leveraging the latest technology that can move their needle on economic growth.
• 36:22
  Speaker 0: In this way it's a force for good of European economy driving productivity within Europe.
• 36:33
  Speaker 0: Europe should win its fair share of the opportunity for tech, AI and whatever the latest technology is.
• 36:43
  Speaker 0: We want to help companies within Europe do that.
• 36:46
  Speaker 0: so there's never been a better time because we've never had such fast-growing disruptive technologies out there as we have now with AI.
• 36:55
  Speaker 0: So industries are going be turned upside down but they're size of the opportunities has never been greater.
• 37:07
  Speaker 0: example of that is companies spend about five to ten percent of their apex on software.
• 37:13
  Speaker 0: But I think with AI, they're going to start spending twenty-thirty forty percent of the optics on tech and softwares.
• 37:20
  Speaker 0: so you know opportunity for tech is larger than it's ever been.
• 37:27
  Speaker 0: we want make sure we invest in companies ensure Europe can punch above its weight really to drive its economy forwards.
• 37:38
  Speaker 0: I'm
• 37:40
  Speaker 1: sure you will, You don't need my well wishes but I am sure that it's notion is ever present in our newsroom.
• 37:48
  Speaker 1: between funding rounds and analysis research all kinds of things we're constantly surrounded by notions.
• 37:54
  Speaker 1: so...I'm sure i'll continue to be hearing about this.
• 37:58
  Speaker 1: on that note just want thank-you very much for joining me despite are initial complications im glad were able get the episode together.
• 38:05
  Speaker 0: no problem Can you talk to him?
• 38:07
  Speaker 1: Yes.
• 38:07
  Speaker 1: Thank you very much, Joss.
• 38:08
  Speaker 1: Thanks
• 38:09
  Speaker 0: a lot!
• 38:09
  Speaker 0: Okay thank you.
• 38:10
  Speaker 0: Goodbye.