The story behind ‘Built in Europe’

Ignore the noise, European tech is thriving and it is thriving today.

Today, alongside more than 100 of Europe’s finest entrepreneurs we launched Built in Europe. This is a campaign to celebrate these founders and the many, many others like them spread across every corner of our continent.

They aren’t looking for inspiration elsewhere or copying others’ playbooks. They aren’t waiting for conditions to change. They just got on with it and built world-changing companies. Right here, right now.

• Revolut serves more than 70 million customers in 40 countries around the world

• Wayve’s cars have autonomously driven through 500 cities worldwide, and counting 

• Lovable helps a new generation of builders bring their ideas to life

• The Exploration Company builds space vehicles for humanity

• ElevenLabs powers 4.8 million voice agents in 70 languages

• Synthesia transforms how 90% of the Fortune 100 create video 

• Proxima Fusion is building the world’s first commercial fusion power plant

• Mistral AI is a global leader in foundational AI models

• Alan provides prevention insurance to more than 1 million customers worldwide

• BeautyPie gives hundreds of thousands of customers access to luxury beauty for less

• Voi has taken more than 8 million riders on more than 300 million journeys

• Quantum Systems’ drone technology, battle-proven in Ukraine since 2022

• HIVED has delivered 9 million parcels across the UK with zero emissions

• Lassie insures 1 million paws across Europe

This is not to say that everything is perfect. Of course there are plenty of ways to accelerate the speed and scale of innovation across the European startup ecosystem. And we support everyone working hard to push for these changes and continue improving the conditions for entrepreneurs on the ground. 

But we don’t think those efforts should overshadow or distract from the fact that founders in Europe aren’t waiting for perfection – they are building businesses, huge businesses, global leaders in their categories, today. 

At the heart of my job is traveling around Europe, meeting with founders from our portfolio and beyond. Every day that I do that I feel the excitement and energy–of course from the big names that have already proven their idea works but from all the others: founders with huge ambition who are just getting started. Yet, when we look at the headlines and the focus, so much of it is negative. We hope the Built in Europe campaign will help shift the conversation from potential to proof.

This position may not be as popular as a long opinion piece or LinkedIn post on all the ways Europe is lagging behind other countries, but it is what we believe. The entire team at Balderton will continue to be unapologetic cheerleaders for European tech, and we think this is well deserved, now more than ever.

If you agree, please help us celebrate the incredible founders doing the hard work in Europe today. And encourage more people to build, or join, a tech startup www.builtineurope.com.