Newsletter

In April, we par­tic­i­pated in a trip to Japan with a Thürin­gen del­e­ga­tion and were able to inter­act with the startup com­mu­ni­ties in Osaka and Tokyo, which were impres­sive.  In the last 5–10 years the Japan­ese startup ecosys­tem has exploded in size and greatly improved in qual­ity, as work­ing for a Japan­ese con­glo­morate is no longer seen as the only esteemed career path.  In Japan, as in many parts of the globe, it has become en vogue to found a startup. 

This trip to Japan crys­tal­ized our view that the pro­lif­er­a­tion of star­tups (often very sim­i­lar star­tups) around the world has been expo­nen­tial in the last years, notwith­stand­ing the pan­demic and geopo­lit­i­cal wars and con­flicts.  Infor­ma­tion and, even more impor­tantly, ideas are tra­vers­ing the globe at light speed with very lit­tle fric­tion.  This extremely rapid and easy access to new ideas, no mat­ter where they emerge in the world, cre­ates tremen­dous value for human­ity and is spur­ing inno­va­tion on an unprece­dented level.  While this devel­op­ment is awe-inspir­ing, it also means that any idea that can be eas­ily repli­cated will be repli­cated.  Impor­tantly, for star­tups and investors it dra­mat­i­cally increases the pre­mium on inno­va­tions that are truly dif­fi­cult to copy or emu­late. 

…