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Most startups in the UK have either:

1. Sold to a foreign buyer

2. Shut down

3. Relocated to the US

4. Are stagnant

The UK is up for sale (at a discount)




That is how globalisation is supposed to work.

British companies have bought plenty abroad too:


it works great until you realize that your country's most strategic economic assets are in the hands of a strategic rival or shut down.

Whether it works well or not is a different issue.

It is 1) a deliberate decision and 2) not unique to any one country.


You could say the same for traditional businesses. Or real estate. Or the farmlands. Even the political parties (for the princely sum of 50,000 quid).

The UK is up for sale.


And yet the UK attracts twice the VC investments the next European country does.

Is it because of the language?

Banking and incorporation laws.

London is the biggest tech hub outside of the US and one of the biggest financial hubs anywhere, plus Oxford and Cambridge are just 1 hour away by train.

> London is the biggest tech hub outside of the US

You must be excluding China there, as it alone has multiple tech hubs that make London look meaningless.


Which Chinese city is bigger than London in VC money?

Tech hub != VC money.

Read the thread again. Since you haven't given your any metrics of your own, the default is the one already in context of the thread.

Fair enough, though VC hub would've been a more apt phrasing then. I just mentioned it because in terms of actual tech development going on, the gap between 1. SV / China and 2. anywhere else (including London) is so absurdly vast it's almost meaningless to be 2nd in VC investment, you might as well be 10th.

That's fair, I don't disagree, I was just giving reasons why the UK gets so much more VC than European countries. I was probably a bit slapdash with my statement but I think it's true in the context I was speaking in.

It is a global phenomenon and is a result of how capital markets work. When you have money, it’s easier to make more money by gobbling up assets. US has capital more readily available to try new things, fail and eventually build massive successes. The successes then get reinvested in the form of even more capital.

When Manchester United is owned by US billionaires, everything else is up for grabs.




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