Introduced by Andreas Munk Holm, this EUVC Live at GoWest series spotlights the thought leadership of policymakers, institutional investors, GPs, corporates, and public capital leaders around one defining question:
How does Europe mobilise its own capital to secure its technological future?
Across the sessions, one theme emerges repeatedly:
Europe does not lack talent.
It does not lack innovation.
It does not lack savings.
It lacks coordination.
Over the past decade, Europe has wrestled with a persistent question: why does a continent with world-class engineering, industrial depth, and technological expertise struggle to scale strategic systems at the pace required?
In this EUVC Live at GoWest episode, Philippe Tibi, The Tibi Initiative (French Ministry for the Economy, Finance and Recovery) and Professor at École Polytechnique Paris, and Chris Elphick (BVCA) address that question directly.
While his work has focused on capital markets, the core insight applies more broadly: Europe’s constraint is not innovation capacity.
It is architecture.
Whether in finance or transport, structure determines scale.
The Architecture Problem
Europe designs high-speed trains, advanced battery systems, autonomous platforms, and green mobility solutions. Yet deployment at scale remains uneven, fragmented, and slow.
The structural challenges are familiar:
Fragmented national systems
Misaligned regulatory regimes
Underinvestment in cross-border integration
Slow permitting and procurement cycles
Risk-averse institutional frameworks
As Philippe Tibi argues in the financial context, Europe’s weakness is rarely invention.
It is coordination.
Fragmentation as Structural Friction
Transport remains deeply national.
Rail standards differ. Signaling systems vary. Grid capacity is inconsistent. Infrastructure planning cycles are misaligned.
This fragmentation increases:
Capital intensity
Execution risk
Project timelines
Operational complexity
Scaling across Europe becomes exponentially harder than scaling within a unified system.
The same structural diagnosis Tibi applies to capital markets applies here: fragmentation dilutes power.
Public Capital as Enabling Infrastructure
A central theme in the talk is that public intervention should function as infrastructure, not substitution.
Infrastructure does not replace markets.
It enables them.
In transport transformation, this means:
Absorbing systemic risk
Anchoring long-term programs
Providing continuity through cycles
Crowding in private operators and financiers
Industrial transitions whether in energy corridors, rail electrification, or supply chain modernisation require patient capital.
Private markets alone rarely tolerate long development cycles and delayed returns.
The Scale-Up Gap
Europe frequently succeeds at pilots and demonstrators.
It struggles at the network-level deployment.
Scale in infrastructure is not incremental.
It is systemic.
Cross-border corridors, interoperable systems, and synchronized regulatory regimes determine whether projects remain local experiments or become continental platforms.
As with growth-stage technology finance, scale is strategic.
Ecosystem Alignment
Capital provides fuel.
Industrialization requires alignment.
Transport transformation depends on:
Manufacturers
Utilities and grid operators
Logistics providers
Corporates as anchor customers
Governments as long-term procurers
Deep industrial systems scale within ecosystems, not in isolation.
Architecture Determines Sovereignty
Transport infrastructure underpins:
Energy security
Industrial competitiveness
Defense mobility
Supply chain resilience
Climate transition
Scale is not merely financial.
It is geopolitical.
Retaining ownership, standards, and governance depends on architectural coherence.
The Core Insight
Philippe Tibi’s central argument is about capital.
But its logic extends further.
Europe does not lack ideas.
It does not lack engineering talent.
It does not lack savings.
It lacks deliberate architectural coordination.
And architecture, by definition, must be designed.
