Upside

Every week we unpack the real stories behind the headlines affecting European venture. 
Hosts: Dan, Lomax and Mads - All European early stage VCs.
02:00 — Why Hormuz matters more than you think. 
04:08 — Europe: affected, not influential. Europe keeps ending up front row for crises it cannot shape.
10:38 — The startup angles: energy, drones, sovereignty
13:29 — “Fast fashion” warfare. Ukraine-style low-cost interceptor drones versus million-dollar missiles. Warfare has entered its brutally efficient Zara phase.
17:29 — Anthropic vs the Pentagon. Anthropic says no to some defence use cases, Washington gets angry, OpenAI pounces, and Claude fans turn the whole thing into a consumer loyalty event.
19:54 — Mads: pick a lane. You cannot call AI the new nuclear weapon and then act shocked when governments treat it like strategic infrastructure.
24:30 — Lomax: moral stance, fine. Pentagon contracts, also fine? Anthropic can absolutely posture as the ethical lab. It just looks awkward while cashing defence-adjacent cheques.
27:49 — AI layoffs… or just layoffs with better branding? Dan calls BS on Block’s “AI-driven” cuts: more likely a classic overhiring hangover dressed up in robot costume.
32:30 — The tech is real, the memo is theatre. Mads agrees AI is delivering genuine productivity gains. That does not mean every layoff deck suddenly becomes visionary.
34:19 — $650bn of AI infra: boom or bubble? Answer from the group: yes.
35:57 — Mads: froth on top, substance underneath. Some of the market is ridiculous. But revenue growth at the top labs is so real that “it’s all a bubble” no longer survives contact with reality.
38:26 — Black Swan memo season. Lomax reviews Lux’s warning to founders: preserve runway, know your infra risk, and do not assume the money tap stays on forever.
45:23 — Real advice needs real trade-offs. Mads’ sharpest point: “raise more if it’s easy” is not advice. The real question is whether founders should spend time fundraising or building.
47:05 — Merz drops the diplomatic niceties. Germany’s chancellor says Europeans are not productive enough, boosts defence, and generally sounds like someone who has seen the spreadsheet.
51:20 — Lomax: kill FCAS. His take on the Franco-German-Spanish fighter programme: too slow, too old, too late. Back the future, not the museum.
56:07 — Defence primes vs insurgents. Should Europe protect legacy giants or let new defence players eat their lunch? The answer gets lively.
1:01:25 — Proxima Fusion: Europe swings big. A rare hopeful note: a European fusion startup is trying to build something properly enormous and properly ambitious.
1:02:12 — Stellarators, briefly. Mads explains fusion like a sane person: tokamaks are more proven but unstable; stellarators are harder to build but may work better long term.

Upside is a weekly review of all of the news affecting European venture, startups and investing. 
VC Hosts: Dan, Mads, Lomax
[03:05] Nvidia Earnings — 14th consecutive beat. Data centre rev up 75% to $62B. Stock basically flat. The market has priced in perfection. Bull case: 16x 2028 earnings, Rubin shipping, China at zero = pure upside. Bear case: custom ASICs climbing, 75% margins under siege. "The question is whether the AI companies can actually monetise it."
[09:11] Ukraine, Four Years On — From aid recipient to defence-tech supplier. Ukrainian startups raised $105M in 2025 — a third of all European early-stage defence capital. European defence budgets heading from ~$300B to ~$600B. Defence tech investment: $100M in 2019 → $1.5B in 2025. The 100:1 drone kill ratio is extraordinary economics. War is maths, and Ukraine is winning it.
[23:30] Anthropic's Safety Meets Reality — Founded to be the safe one. Now dropping guardrails weeks after a $30B raise. Pentagon threatened to brand them a supply chain risk. Lomax: "Call me cynical." Mads: "Existential threats rewire moral calculus. It happened to OpenAI. It happened to Google. Now it's Anthropic's turn." RIP Bletchley Park.
[29:25] Chinese Distillation — 24,000 fake accounts. 16M exchanges. DeepSeek, Moonshot and Minimax caught training on Anthropic's models at industrial scale. National security issue? Obviously. But China has a chokehold on the US defence supply chain, so good luck with that conversation.
[32:00] Anthropic Goes Enterprise — Salesforce, Slack, DocuSign integrations. Partner or Trojan horse? Mads: building enterprise apps is way harder than vibe coding on a Thursday afternoon.
[35:30] SaaSpocalypse or Renaissance? — The market can't decide. Current thesis: SaaS = system of record, AI = system of action. Honest answer? Nobody knows.
[36:20] AI Margins — OpenAI hit 33% gross margin (targeted 46%). Anthropic hit 30% (targeted 40%). Nearly $4B spent on free users. Break-even pushed to 2028-2030. Lomax: "Can you run a giant tech company on 30% gross margin? The multiple doesn't work."
[41:45] European Quantum — Funding hit $1.5B in 2025 (+170% YoY). Strong science layer, governments actually buying from startups. But PsiQuantum alone raised $1B in the US. Mads: "Europe has €16T in pension capital. The deficit is plumbing, not capability."
[52:45] The Doomsday Paper — "What if AI succeeds so hard it triggers a macro crisis?" Mads dismantles it. Jamie Dimon tie-in: maybe SaaS is the new subprime.
[57:35] Deal of the Week — Wayve raising $1.2B at $8.6B. First automotive investor: Nissan.
[58:20] Week Ahead — UK Spring Statement. DeepSeek DBC-4. OpenAI $100B round. Hegseth vs Amodei showdown — Dan's prediction: Anthropic caves.

For the week's latest news behind the headlines affecting European Venture, startups and investing.  
Hosts: Dan Bowyer, Lomax Ward Guest: Eyal Malinger — Co-founder, Resurge Growth Partners (venture equity — the gap between VC and PE)
[02:18] Humanoid Robots at China's Spring Festival Gala Four Chinese firms showed off cable-free dancing robots. Eyal's reaction progression: "game over" → "Clone Wars" → "why are there swords near children?" China controls ~90% of humanoid shipments. H1/G1 robots going for $6-10K. Europe has… Neuro Robotics and OverSonic at Series A. Cool.
[05:59] Will Robots Replace Soldiers? Eyal: if you don't need to risk soldiers, you will use them. Lomax: nukes still deter total war, but skirmishes could proliferate. Everyone: yes, we'd have a robot butler. Lomax: depends on the price (he lives in Portugal).
[10:57] Raspberry Pi — Europe's First Meme Stock? Stock pumped after CEO bought shares + Reddit hype around OpenClaw. Trading at ~£600M. Edge AI debate ensues. Lomax: "Isn't this a time to celebrate Europe finally has its own meme stock?"
[14:36] AI Causing a Fuss: Anthropic vs The Pentagon Anthropic doesn't want autonomous kill decisions. Eyal channels Palantir's Alex Karp: "Our adversaries will not pause for theatrical debate." Lomax: Dario wants to have his cake and eat it. Everyone broadly agrees ethics are a luxury when the other side doesn't play by the rules.
[17:19] Peter Steinberger Leaves Europe for OpenAI Created OpenClaw, Europe celebrated for two weeks, then he bounced to San Francisco. Lomax: "I thought things had got better." Dan: who in Europe could've called him? Eyal: if he'd been in London instead of Austria, maybe different story. Cue weekly EU ecosystem lament. Macron pledged €30M for AI. Anthropic just raised $30B. Right.
[24:00] VC AI Toolkits — David Stark Open-Sources His Setup WhatsApp meeting briefs, auto-transcription, deal flow into HubSpot. Lomax calls it "cute." Eyal: most of this is just Zapier with extra steps. Real alpha = agentic AI that sources and approaches founders autonomously. Dan: if everyone has Harmonic, nobody has alpha.
[31:00] Munich Security Conference Recap 62nd edition. Rubio slightly less abrasive than JD Vance (low bar). Merz says the old order is over. Starmer accelerating UK defence spend to 3%. Stark (drones) raised big from Founders Fund — German defence minister uncomfortable with Peter Thiel on the cap table. Sovereignty debates continue. Lomax: "You can't tell Europe to be sovereign then beat them for being sovereign."
[37:56] Health & Bio Good News Compass Pathways nails second Phase 3 trial for synthetic psilocybin treating resistant depression — could be on market by 2027. Savo Health working on non-invasive CGM patches (goodbye arm claws).
[39:56] Deals of the Week
Quantonation — largest European quantum fund ever
Ineffable — $1B seed (!!) at $4B pre-money, led by Sequoia. David Silver (AlphaGo architect) leaves DeepMind
Netflix / Warner Bros M&A — Eyal hopes it signals FTC/DOJ reopening the exit valve for VC and PE
[42:30] Fin. 🎙️

01:52 - Anthropic's Insane $30B Round Started as $10B rumour, became $20B in January, closed at $30B. 
03:21 - The Great Model Migration Sam finally kicked OpenAI off his iPhone homepage. Claude's in. 
08:23 - Claude Code: Mads' Love Letter Mads hasn't looked back since discovering Claude Code's skills and agentic workflows. It's not just better writing anymore—it's a whole different way of working.
09:36 - HBR Report: AI Makes Us Work MORE Generative AI isn't reducing work, it's intensifying it. Turns out when you can do everything yourself, you just... do everything yourself. Constant dopamine hits. 
14:07 - AI as Your Second Opinion Mads fed his DNA and blood work to an LLM. 
19:38 - Alphabet's 100-Year Bond Google just raised £5B more than expected. Priced like government bonds. Too big to fail, baby. 
22:59 - Your Pension is Funding US Hyperscalers €35 trillion in European savings. None of these pension holders know they're financing 100-year bonds for Google. The rules say "minimise volatility," not "maximise returns." Cool cool cool.
26:31 - European Sovereignty: Words → Action? Merz and von der Leyen saying the quiet parts loud. Two-tier EU? 28th regime? Ignoring planning rules? Also Mistral going from $25M to $400M run rate with a full sovereign stack (no US tech).
27:31 - "What Even Is an AI Business?" If you're not using AI for what you're doing... what ARE you doing? Material science? Better use AI. Biotech? Better use AI. 
30:32 - The Only Office Suite Update Was Google European governments spend billions yearly on decades-old Microsoft IP. Open source alternatives exist. Nobody cares.
31:28 - Mistral: Not Dead, Actually Dan had written them off. Turns out they're crushing it with enterprise. Not a chatbot play—it's consultancy + transformation + Anthropic-level models. 
34:50 - The China Manufacturing Model, Reversed German manufacturers using Chinese AI for factories? Probability: nil to zero. Regional fragmentation + massive AI growth = very large companies serving regional markets.
35:42 - Europe Finally Saying It Out Loud Von der Leyen threatening breakaway subset unless countries get on board. Big words from the "protein" European government. Tax attempts always flounder but... momentum feels different?
38:07 - Space: Orbex Down, Data Centres Up? UK's Orbex (low-carbon micro launcher) filed for administration. £49M debt. Government didn't support. Meanwhile: Elon eyeing Google's orbital data centre research. 
40:45 - Billionaires Should Burn Capital McCalip's plea: goad more billionaires into irrational high-variance projects that advance civilisation. "No one cares about your Loro Piana." Build cathedrals. Fund ugly metal. Light up corners of the future.
42:00 - Europe's Launch Problem No European small launcher has reached orbit. Not one. Airbus worked because we collaborated. Launch requires same logic. "We are mid-sized countries pretending we're still empires."
43:15 - Fusion: Europe's Real Shot? Should Europe double down on quantum and fusion instead of chasing AI? Mads: "Fix capital markets union first." Everything circles back.
45:04 - Deal of the Week: Olix 25-year-old British founder James de Combe raised £220M at $1B+ valuation for AI inference chips. Also runs Comind (raised £100M as a teenager). Is this our Elon without the red cap?
46:22 - Upside Closeout "Nothing happens until somebody decides to do something." More entrepreneurs. Less standing in their way. 
Hosted by Dan Bowyer & Mads Jensen Guest: Sam Marchant

Upside captures all of the week's news affecting European Venture.
01:22 — AI models: two flagships drop 20 minutes apart
Anthropic ships Opus 4.6; OpenAI replies with GPT 5.3.
Key tension: best model vs stickiest workflow (tooling + habits = raw benchmarks).
China keeps coming: Kimi K2.5, Qwen3 Max — strong performance at lower cost, plus “swarm”/multi-agent vibes.

07:02 — Recursive AI + security flex
OpenAI: “GPT 5.3 helped build itself” (debugging training pipeline).
Anthropic: claims model found 500+ serious open-source security issues → “bots find bugs better than eyeballs.”

11:06 — Alphabet CapEx shock
Alphabet expected $180B CapEx in 2026 → market flinches despite earnings beat.
Take: hyperscalers signalling capacity constraint and “you ain’t seen nothing yet.”
Debate: monster spend now vs how long monetisation takes (ads, pricing, enterprise budgets).

18:53 — “SaaSpocalypse”
~$300B wiped off software stocks on fear that seat-based SaaS collapses into usage/agent-driven economics.
Claude Code “agentic workflows” spook the market: if models do the work, why pay the tool tax?
Counterpoint: SaaS doesn’t die—it de-rates (from “growth multiple” to “utility multiple”).
Lomax: market likely overcorrecting; enterprise adoption is slow and messy.

26:07 — EU–US tech uncoupling (or… vibes?)
France moves to ban civil servants from Zoom/Teams/WebEx → pushes homegrown “Visio” by 2027.
Germany (Schleswig-Holstein) + Austrian army shifting off Microsoft to open-source alternatives.
Group take: sovereignty goal is real, but government-built software ≠ winning strategy; better to back founders + procurement pathways.

32:44 — Spain vs social media
Pedro Sánchez pushes: CEO accountability, misinformation/hate speech enforcement, under-16 social restriction.
Smart framing: shifts from “free speech” to public health.
Pushback: slippery slope risk → censorship-by-proxy debate.

39:20 — Muskonomics: SpaceX + xAI + “data centres in space”
Core claim gets roasted: physics/energy/cooling/payload/latency all feel brutal.
Bull case (Lomax): if anyone can brute-force iterate at scale, it’s Musk + launch cadence.
Bear case (Mads): narrative may be a financial wrapper to justify merging/funding xAI via SpaceX halo.

51:10 — Anthropic Super Bowl ads + OpenAI shade
Anthropic pokes OpenAI over ads in AI (“we’d never”).
Take: brand landgrab + positioning move; debate whether the ads were funny or cringe.

53:52 — Europe corner: critical minerals reality check
EU auditor warns Critical Raw Materials Act targets likely missed (dependency on China still extreme).
Problem isn’t geology—it’s permitting + processing + time (10–20 years to mine/start).
US hosts rare earth summit; Europe tries to coordinate while still exporting heavily to the US.

56:53 — Deal of the Week
Lomax’s portfolio: Portuguese founder Pedro building LLM-driven clinical trial planning → reduces protocol amendments/costs.
Raises $52.5M Series A (one of Iberia’s biggest; top-tier EU Series A scale).
Dan: January saw 5 new European unicorns (Aikido shoutout highlighted).
Mads: new European growth fund Cambara targeting €30–50M checks; €750M raised toward €1B.