What We Got Right and Wrong Last Year In last year’s report, we made some predictions about what 2018 would hold for European tech It would be a bit cheeky of us not to look back at them and see how we did... So, er, how did we do? 2017 Prediction Founders will come to see regulation as a source of potential competitive advantage The ‘move fast and break things’ Cycles, Kry or Babylon in the healthcare mentality has never sat well with heavily market. They are all early examples regulated markets. As founders realise of companies that have embarked they can gain an advantage through upon - and come out on the other regulatory compliance, it will go from side of - lengthy regulatory approval being seen as a perceived handcuff processes to gain an advantage on their to being seen as a potential source of competitors. competitive advantage. Think of Natural We totally got this right! Mark: 1/1 This trend came through hard and fast Netherlands respectively. Perhaps the in 2018 across numerous industries. strongest example of the change in Financial services has long since founder attitudes towards regulation, been an industry where venture- however, has come in the emerging backed companies, such as N26 and micro-mobility market. European Monzo, actively leveraged their fully micro-mobility startups such as VOI and licensed banking status to strengthen Tier have explicitly pointed to their pro- their market positions. In the digital regulation approach as a key source of health space, messaging-centric competitive advantage as they seek applications such as Forward Health to capture the hearts and minds of and Siilo have overcome barriers to European consumers and policymakers become powerful new services in their and to steal a march on US players local health systems in the UK and entering the European markets. 146 In Partnership with & www.thestateofeuropeantech.com