Episode · Apr 9, 2026 · 41 min

"We need 10 DeepMinds" | Nicolas Autret on what's missing in European Deep Tech

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About this episode

Europe produced a €690 billion deep tech sector. So why does 70% of its late-stage funding still come from outside the continent?

In this episode of Follow the Gradient, Melanie Gabriel and Christian Woese sit down with Nicolas Autret, partner at Walden Catalyst Ventures and co-author of the 2026 European Deep Tech Report. Nicolas has spent 23 years in European venture capital, held board seats at companies including Graphcore and ANYbotics, and invested through both corporate VC and independent funds across semiconductor, robotics, and AI.

This is not a conversation about optimism or pessimism. It is a structural diagnosis of what prevents Europe's deep tech ecosystem from reaching escape velocity, told by someone who has watched it from the inside for over two decades.

We talk about:

Why Graphcore, once valued at nearly $3 billion and backed by over $700 million, could not keep pace with NVIDIA when AI models grew from 200 million to 1.5 trillion parameters in seven years
The three structural gaps holding back Europe's deep tech flywheel: 70% of late-stage capital from non-European investors, 14 of 18 IPOs above €500M on NASDAQ, and 75% of M&A value captured by US acquirers
Why European deep tech is only 4% below its 2021 peak while regular tech remains down 54%, and what is driving that resilience
How European founders should structure their companies: keep headquarters and tech teams in Europe for talent and cost, build sales and partnerships in the US where the customers are
Why European corporates suffer from "not invented here" syndrome and what it costs the startup ecosystem in lost customers and delayed adoption
What must change in 10 years for European deep tech to succeed: late-stage funds, standardized university IP licensing, corporate-startup collaboration, and a cultural shift toward commercializing research

Nicolas describes a continent that has the talent, the research, and the early-stage funding, but has not yet built the structural machinery to turn those inputs into global companies. Whether you agree with his diagnosis or not, the numbers make the gaps hard to ignore.

Our biggest takeaways, including Nicolas's perspective on why European founders underestimate the structural constraints on scaling hard tech:

https://www.followthegradient.io/p/nicolas-autret-podcast

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Where to find Nicolas Autret:

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/nautret/

X: https://x.com/nautret

European Deep Tech Report 2026: https://europeandeeptechreport.com

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🎙 Follow the Gradient: conversations about building a business from Europe while staying sane.

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Melanie: https://www.linkedin.com/in/melaniexgabriel/

Christian: https://www.linkedin.com/in/christian-woese/