Startup Europe — The Sifted Podcast
Get to know the brightest and boldest names in European tech with Sifted’s weekly podcast, hosted by John Thornhill and Freya Pratty. John interviews the founders, operators and investors building Europe’s most exciting startups and Freya, in conversation with Sifted’s expert journalists, pulls back the curtain on the most intriguing companies they’ve been reporting on.
Startup Europe — The Sifted Podcast
Should the EU block the UK from its €5bn superfund?
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The UK is home to the third-highest number of unicorn startups in the world. Does it make sense to lock it out of the EU's new Scaleup Fund?
The €5bn fund, which is yet to deploy a cent of capital, has already been through a hotly contested race to find a manager (Swedish firm EQT came out on top), and now it's caught up in a political tussle over whether the UK — which famously left the bloc back in 2016 — will get a look-in.
This week Sifted reported that France is pushing to block UK participation in the superfund, casting doubt on hopes that British startups could tap into the bloc's flagship late-stage investment vehicle.
On this episode of the podcast, host Freya Pratty is joined by news editor Martin Coulter to unpack France’s move to block the UK, ask whether it was “the MOST French move imaginable” and break down the quota system being discussed by EU officials as a compromise.
Read this week’s reporting here: https://sifted.eu/articles/eu-scaleup-fund-uk-france-blocked-eqt-british-business-bank
https://sifted.eu/articles/eu-scaleup-europe-fund-uk-france-block-reaction
https://sifted.eu/articles/scaleup-e5bn-uk-france
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