When it comes to high tech, Europe is often overlooked.
The U.S. mints most of the world's high-tech startups and pulls in the most venture capital. Asia, meanwhile, dominates consumer electronics and manufacturing and has become a huge market in its own right. Europe has a few giants – SAP and Nokia, for instance – but you don't see the same frentic level of activity. Restrictive university policies regarding tech transfer, a greater emphasis on lifetime employment, and regional competition have hindered the industry. Israel, which geographically is not in Europe, is the recipient of more VC funds than any country that is in Europe. As one Brit told me, Cambridge is one of the best technical universities in the world, and one of the worst when it comes to incubating companies.
Europe also doesn't have the same supply of entrepreneurs, said Bernard Vogel, president of the green investment firm Endeavour Vision.
Additionally, U.S. VCs are often wary about investing overseas. Back in the early '90s, Sven Lingjaerde once told me how he wrote letters to two well-known VCs for them to check out this world wide web thing at CERN, the research agency in Switzerland, in the early '90s. "I don't see how you can make money with [the] Internet," one faxed back. He framed it.
To help get around some of these problems, Lingjaerde and a group of entrepreneurs created Tech Tour a few years ago. Tech Tour combs through a nation, ferrets out the most promising companies, and shows them off to a group pf visiting venture capitalists. It can work. Intel once picked up an Italian company it learned about in a past tour. Vogel helped organize next week's clean tech event.
Next week in Geneva, the organization will hold an event that will be slightly different. Rather than concentrate on one country, it will showcase 25 startups from across Europe and Israel. One company exhibiting will be ReVolt Technologies, a Swiss company specializing in the emerging category of zinc batteries. Other companies will show off ideas for fuel cells, marine power, wind and solar.
The event is sold out but names and other information will emerge, so stay tuned.
