Microsoft Invents New Matter, Tariffs Loom & Draghi Gets Angry
Abundance Agenda links for Week 8 of 2025
Welcome to this week's edition of The Abundance Agenda Weekly! Each week, we curate the most important news, trends, and breakthroughs that matter for Europe's economic acceleration. Let's dive in:
🚀 Innovation & Industry
🔗 A New Form of Matter? – Microsoft have invented a new form of matter in order to make Quantum Computing work at scale. It makes one wonder how Europe can compete when the US has trillion dollar companies with massive R&D labs spending decades and billions on primary research. Our university network is probably our best equivalent here. Interesting to note that this part of the US Government's "Utility-Scale Quantum Computing" program run by DARPA. Another win for the Entrepreneurial State!
🔗 AI Investments – US startups attracted $209 billion in venture capital funding in 2024. Almost half of this ($100bn) went into AI startups! In comparison, €14.6 billion was invested in AI startups in the EU. This was about a quarter of the total (€56bn)
🔗 Bankers in Space – In an attempt to play catch up to SpaceX, Airbus have hired Goldman Sachs to advise them on how to make their next move. Eric Berger's analysis for Ars Technica is titled "Europe has the worst imaginable idea to counter SpaceX’s launch dominance", but I also have a lot of love for the reddit user who said "That's a weird way to go about it. I thought that they would hire engineers."
🔗 R&D FAQ. This is an incredible overview on US Government Funding for R&D, answering questions like “What’s the ROI for government R&D?” and “Can private sector research substitute for government research?”
🔗 Battery school. Advocacy group Transport Environment released a report with some sensible-sounding calls for more robust knowledge transfer when EU companies partner with Chinese battery firms. From the FT:
“In December, Stellantis said it would build a €4.1bn lithium battery factory in Spain with China’s CATL, the world’s largest battery maker. According to the Spanish government, the project had received almost €300mn in state aid. But no conditions on technology or skills transfer were set.”
🔗 Industrial Masterplan. The Clean Industrial Deal, due to be published on Wednesday is pitched as The EU’s masterplan for competing in industrial manufacturing, it looks set to cover lots of good foundational industrial policy, but also risks containing protectionist and subsidising measures. Euractiv says:
The plan identifies six factors called "business drivers": cheap energy, lead markets, financing, circularity and access to materials, global markets and skills […] The plan also pledges to make a “preference” for European firms a “structural feature” of the bloc’s procurement market in “strategic sectors”. […] It also sets a date for a strategy to bail out the EU's ailing auto sector – 5 March – and a steel plan for an unspecified date in March.
🔗 Startups using AI. The New York Times shares tales of many fast growing Silicon Valley startups who are growing users and revenue, but not headcount, as they use AI to do more with less.
Stories of “tiny team” success have now become a meme, with techies excitedly sharing lists that show how Anysphere, a start-up that makes the coding software Cursor, hit $100 million in annual recurring revenue in less than two years with just 20 employees, and how ElevenLabs, an A.I. voice start-up, did the same with around 50 workers.
🏛️ Politics & Policy
🔗 Draghi is Angry – The former ECB President tore into European politicians and leaders for their inaction:
"You say no to public debt. You say no to the single market. You say no to create a capital market union. You can't say no to everything...You ask me what's best to do…I don’t know, but do something"
🔗 The Tariff Man Looms. Trump’s tarrif threats are now turning to the EU. He’s floating 25% on cars. Brussels has already signalled a willingness to drop our import tax from the current 10%, closer to what the US taxes ours (2.5%). The positioning before the dance.
🔗 Abundant homes. Progress Ireland looks at the evidence for allowing small homes (“granny flats”) in private gardens without planning permission, a change just coming into effect in Irish law.
🔗 Savings & Investment Union. The European Commission has launched a Call for Evidence on the Savings and Investments Union, which "aims to connect savings to the most productive investment, with a focus on the Union’s strategic objectives including innovation, decarbonisation, digital technologies and defence". Feedback open until March 3rd
🔗 Connected Baltics. Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania have finally disconnected from the Russian electricity grid and are now part of the European grid.
That’s it for the first weekly edition of The Abundance Agenda! If you enjoyed this, share it with a friend or colleague, and let’s keep pushing for a more innovative, prosperous and abundant Europe.