Bitspiration 2015- Europe's West Coast for Awesome Startups (Sigrid Johannisse)

### Overview At Bitspiration 2015 in Poland, Sigrid Johannisse, Director of StartupDelta, presented on building and scaling startup ecosystems in Europe, using the Netherlands' national initiative StartupDelta as a blueprint. Working alongside Special Envoy Neelie Kroes, StartupDelta aims to merge regional tech hubs into a unified, interconnected ecosystem to position the Netherlands—and Europe as a whole—as a competitive alternative to Silicon Valley for scaling technology businesses.

### Key Topics - **StartupDelta's National Ecosystem Model**: Rather than promoting isolated regional hubs, StartupDelta integrates clusters across Amsterdam, Rotterdam, technical universities, and eastern regions into a single coordinated network accessible within 90 minutes. - **Cross-Sectoral Innovation**: Combining the Netherlands' strengths in core technologies (nanoelectronics, photonics, and quantum computing) with traditional industry leadership in agriculture and food to spur cross-disciplinary IT innovation. - **Policy and Systemic Reforms**: Adapting national regulations, fiscal incentives, and intellectual property frameworks originally designed for large corporations to better serve startups. - **Internationalization and Talent Mobility**: Establishing global mentoring networks in hubs like New York, Boston, San Francisco, and Tel Aviv; setting up hub-to-hub exchange programs (such as an MoU with Toronto); and proposing an EU-wide startup visa during the upcoming Dutch EU presidency. - **Support Mechanisms**: Operating the "Orange Carpet" service to help foreign startups land, find housing, navigate the Chamber of Commerce, access capital, and test the European market.

### Technical Details & Infrastructure Johannisse highlighted structural and infrastructure advantages underpinning the Dutch ecosystem: - **Connectivity**: Cited by UPS as the world's most connected economy, offering rapid 24-hour physical transit access across Europe alongside top-tier broadband infrastructure. - **Advanced Tech Clusters**: Research and commercial leadership in nanoelectronics, photonics, and quantum computing housed across Dutch technical universities. - **Corporate Density & Unicorns**: Home to domestic multinationals and tech companies including Shell, Unilever, Philips, ASML (commanding 80% of the semiconductor lithography/chip machine market), TomTom, Adyen, and Booking.com, as well as European hubs for Tesla, Sonos, LinkedIn, and Netflix.

### Takeaways & Q&A During the Q&A session, Johannisse outlined three observed categories of startup founders: globally minded proactive teams that scale rapidly; early-stage founders seeking mentorship and market fit; and newer entrants attracted by entrepreneurship culture. Addressing international expansion, Johannisse emphasized the "Orange Carpet" initiative, which assists smaller foreign companies (e.g., 30-person US teams) in entering and validating their products across the 500-million-consumer European market without prohibitive upfront capital investments.