欧洲科技创业方兴未艾

    马丁•瓦萨夫斯基是欧洲顶尖的科技创业家之一。最近，他接受《财富》杂志（Fortune）专访，畅谈了英国和欧洲的科技创业趋势以及他对Facebook、戴维•卡梅伦的初创企业计划、美国风险资本和其他科技业务的解读。瓦萨夫斯基创立了西班牙第二大电信公司Jazztel和已经被法国电信（France Telecom）收购的Ya.com。目前，他担任自己创立的公司 FON的首席执行官。FON的投资者包括谷歌（Google）、英国电信（BT）、Index Ventures、Atomico和红杉资本（Sequioa）.

马丁，科技创业在欧洲有多活跃？有哪些亮点和挑战？很多欧洲科技初创企业都在沿着Skype的足迹向全球扩张，包括Spotify、Rovio、Hailo、Fon、Oanda等等。

    传统上，欧洲年轻人会选择在政府或企业找一份可以干一辈子的工作。欧洲危机改变了这一切。因为各国政府债台高筑，企业薪酬缩水。目前欧洲科技创业最火的三个城市是伦敦、柏林和斯德哥尔摩，但在整个欧洲都能看到这样的创业活动。

    挑战是欧洲不像美国那样有沙山路（Sand Hill Road，美国风投行业的代名词——译注）。我们需要有相当数量的风投公司，构建一个更加强劲的创业生态系统。有些美国风投公司正在向伦敦进发，比如Accel等公司。但我们需要更多像Index、Atomico这样的本土基金为初创企业提供融资。

事实上，美国一流风投公司似乎更多地进入了以色列，而不是英国和欧洲。

    没错，我们需要吸引更多的这这样的公司来关注这里的机会。以色列的科技创业活动非常活跃，但欧洲的创业活动也在升温，同样需要资本和初创经验。

    欧洲科技创业发展面临的第二大挑战是文化。欧洲人必须接受这一点，科技创业界的成功来自于不断地尝试和犯错。欧洲人热衷于不会失败的完美计划。谷歌、Facebook、亚马逊（Amazon）和苹果（Apple）可不是这样诞生的。

你在欧洲看到了什么样的初创企业？

    科技企业远远超出社交媒体应用软件企业，特别是在欧洲。欧洲盛产工程师，而不是市场营销师。看看现在的德国，经济形势相当不错，失业率相对较低，大多数人都依赖优质工程技术（涉及领域广泛，远不止汽车）保住了饭碗。德国人均工程师数量远远超过美国，而且看得出来。

    很多欧洲初创企业的技术非常深奥，要求投资者学识渊博。看看聚集在牛津大学（Oxford）和剑桥大学（Cambridge）周边的科技初创公司，有些公司正在解决的一些问题即便是受过良好教育的人也需要花上几个小时的时间才能弄懂他们的科技计划。比如创新的给药系统、新型显示技术和芯片设计，都是些消费者看不到的公司，但他们推动的很多产品对于当代生活非常重要。

是不是有很多超级天使在帮助这些公司？在硅谷，我们有几十个超级天使给超过50家初创企业提供融资。

    本周我参加了戴维•卡梅伦倡议的、由唐宁街10号组织的超级天使峰会。看到那么多欧洲超级天使给人留下了深刻印象。我很高兴能成为其中的一员。欧洲也有一些成功的案例，比如Skype或者我在西班牙创立的Jazztel和Ya.com，这些公司把财富分配给了员工，一旦他们卖出股票期权，这些员工就成了天使投资人。

    不好的一面是在英国和欧洲设立初创企业面临着几项挑战：

    1. 第一个问题是如何征税。在欧洲，很多税是通过雇佣环节征收的。这对大企业没什么，但依赖大企业和天使支持的初创企业也要承担同样的社会费用。结果就不如为美国初创企业提供融资，确保在企业风险最高的时期大部分资金都能流入企业本身。欧洲的天使投资人可能要损失1/3的融资，用于为早期试错阶段的雇佣缴纳社会费用。相比之下，美国由天使投资人支持的企业将留有更多资金用于企业自身的发展。

    Martin Varsavsky is one of Europe's leading technology entrepreneurs. He recently spoke to Fortune about startup trends in the UK and Europe, his take on Facebook (FB), David Cameron's startup initiative, US venture capital and other tech business. Varsavsky started Jazztel, Spain's second-largest telecom firm and Ya.com, now a division of France Telecom. He is currently the CEO of FON, a company which he founded. Investors include Google (GOOG), BT, Index Ventures, Atomico, and Sequioa.

Martin, how vibrant is the startup tech scene in Europe? Where are the bright spots and what are the challenges? Quite a number of European tech startups are expanding globally including Spotify, Rovio, Hailo, Fon, Oanda and others, following in the footsteps of Skype.

    Young people in Europe have traditionally opted for lifetime government or corporate jobs. The European crisis, however, is changing all that. Governments are maxed out in debt and corporate payrolls are shrinking. The three hottest startup cities in Europe right now are London, Berlin and Stockholm but there is startup activity all over the map.

    The challenge is that there is no Sand Hill Road in Europe. We need to have a critical mass of venture firms to build a more robust startup ecosystem. Some American venture firms are coming to London, firms such as Accel but we need more homegrown funds such as Index and Atomico in Europe to finance startups.

In fact, it seems that more top US venture firms have a presence in Israel than in the UK and Europe.

    Yes, we need to attract more of them to the opportunities here. Israel has a very vibrant startup scene, but things are also heating up in Europe and can use capital and startup expertise.

    The second challenge in growing the startup ecosystem in Europe is cultural. Europeans must accept that success in the tech startup world comes through trial and error. Europeans prefer great plans that don't fail. But that is not how Google, Facebook, Amazon, Apple were born.

What kinds of startups do you see in Europe?

    There is a lot more to tech than social media apps and especially in Europe. Europe is a continent of engineers more than marketeers. Look at Germany now, a pretty successful economy with relatively low unemployment, mostly sustained on high quality engineering in fields that go way beyond cars. Germany has many more engineers per capita than USA, and it shows.

    Many of startups in Europe are deep-technology based and require an extremely knowledgeable investor base. If you look at the technology clusters around Oxford and Cambridge universities you will see startups that are working on issues that take hours before a well-educated person can understand the technology plan. Examples include: innovative delivery systems for medications, new display technologies, chip design, companies that consumers do not see but that enable many products that are essential for modern life.

Are there many superangels who help get these companies going? In silicon valley we have dozens of people who fund 50+ startups.

    This week I was at the Superangel summit organized by 10 Downing Street at the initiative of David Cameron. It was impressive to see that there are quite a few European superangels and I was happy to be part of the group. There are European success stories, such as Skype or the companies that I built, Jazztel and Ya.com in Spain in which wealth is distributed among employees and once they sell their stock options employees become angel investors.

    On the negative side there are several challenges to starting a company in the UK and Europe:

    1. The first issue how taxes are collected. In Europe a lot of taxes are collected via employment. This is fine for large corporate but social charges for large corporates and angel backed ventures are the same. As a result it is better to fund a startup in USA because most of the money goes into the venture at its most risky time. Instead an angel investment in Europe may lose about a third of its funds in social charges for jobs that are part of this trial and error effort. USA angel backed ventures have more runway.