I’ve been in London for the last month and have heard policymakers react to the wake up call Elon Musk just delivered. The decision of the U.S. to shut off intelligence and throttle the military v…
U.S. companies kind of have, of course, kind of “bought” European CEOs, and not even in a sinister way: they showed them what they (the first-movers and quasi-monopolies in the market, chock-full with VC money) could offer, and at what cost. Of course, European alternatives to that would seem relatively limited and expensive. At the time, choosing U.S. hyperscalers certainly was the rational thing to do because they offered the best “bang for the buck” for European companies.
But now with the looming threat of these same hyperscalers having to cut off European companies’ access, European companies need to reevaluate their cost-benefit analysis. By my estimate, the threat of somebody being able to remotely shut down your business from one day to the other should scare the living shit out of companies and leave them scrambling for alternatives, or a hedge against this risk at the very least. And yet: crickets.
U.S. companies kind of have, of course, kind of “bought” European CEOs, and not even in a sinister way: they showed them what they (the first-movers and quasi-monopolies in the market, chock-full with VC money) could offer, and at what cost. Of course, European alternatives to that would seem relatively limited and expensive. At the time, choosing U.S. hyperscalers certainly was the rational thing to do because they offered the best “bang for the buck” for European companies.
But now with the looming threat of these same hyperscalers having to cut off European companies’ access, European companies need to reevaluate their cost-benefit analysis. By my estimate, the threat of somebody being able to remotely shut down your business from one day to the other should scare the living shit out of companies and leave them scrambling for alternatives, or a hedge against this risk at the very least. And yet: crickets.