But theres still a long way to go.
Whats one thing that could hold Europe back from competing in the unicorn market?
A lack of ambition.
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Hes now one of Techleap.nls entrepreneurs in residence, providing mentoring for the organizations Rise program cohorts.
If you open one pizza shop, everybody in the room is excited.
Theyre like, wow, thats so great.
You open two pizza shops, and theyre like, youre doing so well.
Were so proud of you.
You open three pizza shops, and theyre like, why are you so fucking greedy?
This isnt a purely Dutch problem either.
So how can we solve this success complex?
The three gentlemen have some ideas.
What this meant was unclear to me, until Christensen put it in very simple terms.
They went abroad, made it big, and have these massive success stories.
Then they came back home, reinvested their money but, more importantly, they also reinvested their knowledge.
This helped reinvigorate the whole ecosystem.
Now were also seeing a second wave of founders doing the same thing.
And the inspiration, of course.
Every time a great technical Dutch company breaks through, its a sign that it can be done.
We should celebrate ambition rather than criticizing it.
Both Wilson and Christensen share the view that a strong academic foundation breeds more innovative companies with huge potential.
I think theres a real specialty in the Netherlands around deeptech, like biotech.
And your love of academia does create pockets of super cool developments.
Theres plenty of cool shit being created in this country.
And second, there are just not enough students enrolling in areas with high unicorn-potential.
As Christensen puts it:
Talent, talent, talent, right?
Its hindering companies growth today, will continue tomorrow, and become even bigger in the future.
So we can never do too much in terms of talent attraction and education.
you better go wherever it suits your business model, he says.
That could be the Nordics, UK, or Germany, depending on your market.
We could still be better at that.
We can still go abroad much, much earlier.
Red tape might be one reason startups dont more readily expand abroad.
While this might sound like a nightmare, Wilson actually sees this as an opportunity.
So I mentioned ChannelEngine, they wanted to run a European business first.
There are different rules and languages in each country, and they just went out and mastered those.
But you dont have to go so far away to make it big, he adds.
Weve seen Polish companies who created a unicorn just in the domestic market.
But also some points we have not touched on, like equity.
Stocks for everyone!
And maybe, considering Europes unicorn growth rate, were doing somewhat great already?
Ugh, Im so Dutch I cant even say it without the question mark.
