Revolut

Saul Klein: Europe Is Quietly Building the New Silicon Valley

Aug 19, 2026 · 57:23

Saul Klein, Phoenix Court co-founder, argues that Europe—London especially—is quietly becoming the world's next Silicon Valley, calling the UK the third-biggest innovation economy after the US and China. He recounts building LoveFilm from Netflix-like DVD rental into a £100M+ revenue business via partnerships with Tesco, ITV, and Odeon, and joining Skype as it grew 400,000 users a day through network effects. Klein says founders should not blindly go to the US, capital is a commodity, and most of the world's 20,000 VCs add little beyond money; only 28 have backed 11+ companies to $100M revenue at seed. He details Phoenix Court's structure: a company, carry for every employee, and a foundation as 30% shareholder; he names London, Paris, Berlin, Stockholm, and Amsterdam as leading hubs.

Inside Mercury's Founding Story | Co-Founder & CEO Immad Akhund

Jun 9, 2026 · 50:11

Immad Akhund, co-founder and CEO of Mercury, explains how the startup bank captured one in three U.S. startups by launching with product-market fit from day one—a million-dollar deposit arrived within four days from a stranger—and why legacy banks never stood a chance due to their focus on loans, expensive branch structures, and IT rather than engineering teams. Mercury raised $200M at a $5.2B valuation without needing the money, driven by 2.5x growth in Q1 2024 from AI-fueled entrepreneurship. Akhund details building trust as a moat, using small teams and Amazon's working-backwards process to launch AI features like Mercury Insights and Mercury Command, which let users run banking tasks inside AI tools. He dropped all one-on-ones after learning from Jensen Huang's 60 direct reports, favors optimistic curiosity, and angel-invests 250K checks in contrarian areas like space and deep tech.

We Ignored Silicon Valley Advice for 3 Years | Nicolas Sharp (Attio)

Apr 30, 2026 · 57:49

Nicolas Sharp, co-founder of Attio, explains why the CRM startup spent 1,000 days building in stealth—a deliberate counter to the 'ship fast' philosophy he learned from a previous venture—and how that architectural investment now powers Attio's AI-native platform. He argues that the half-life of product-market fit has collapsed, forcing companies to simultaneously iterate and scale, and that Attio's high-resolution data pipelines are critical for deploying AI agents. Sharp also details how Attio used manual waitlist onboarding to validate demand, how fundraising expectations have risen dramatically (Attio raised $52M at Series B with accelerating growth), and why Europe is having a breakout moment as an AI hub, citing talent from DeepMind and Palantir as catalysts.

Spotify’s Early Investor Shares His Blueprint for Outlier Founders | PJ Pärson (Northzone)

Oct 26, 2025 · 46:20

PJ Pärson, Northzone partner and early Spotify investor, argues outlier founders combine existential intensity with adaptability to AI disruptions and must hire smarter people. He recounts meeting Daniel Ek in high school and how Northzone insisted Ek become Spotify's CEO, producing Sweden's most valuable company. Pärson breaks AI into infrastructure, application tools, and a coming wave of AI-native businesses, explaining Northzone focuses on complex B2B bets like healthcare AI. He notes European startup hubs now have critical mass—Stockholm hosts 50–60 fast-growing AI companies—but Europe lacks later-stage capital and a deep IPO market. He warns US visa changes could redirect talent to Europe if Europe fixes retention issues.