Hi friends,

Here’s a question worth sitting with: What changes when cyberattacks become cheap enough to target almost any business?

AI is changing the economics of cyber risk. Attacks that once required specialist expertise, time and dedicated resources can now be automated and run cheaply at scale. That brings serious security threats much earlier into a company’s life, including for startups that may not yet have mature systems, processes or security teams.

It also changes what good defense looks like. Static playbooks struggle when attackers keep adapting their methods. Preventing breaches still matters, but companies also need the ability to detect, understand and respond quickly when something gets through.

These changing cybersecurity dynamics are the focus of our latest episode with Ahmed Achchak, Co-founder and CEO of Qevlar AI, and Réza Malekzadeh, General Partner at Partech, an investor in the company.

For founders, the implications go well beyond the security team. They affect how you design the product, how much technical debt you may have to undo later and how easily larger customers can trust you.

Security can no longer be an afterthought. It needs to be built into the product and the company from day one.

On the investment side, AI is creating room for a new generation of defensive platforms.

But technical speed alone will not decide who wins. Security products need to explain how decisions are made, give customers control over what gets automated and prove that they work in real environments. In this market, trust is not just a sales argument. It is part of the product.

Ahmed and Réza bring both sides of this into the conversation: why static playbooks are giving way to dynamic AI, how security teams can investigate and respond faster and what it takes for a young European company to earn enterprise trust and compete globally.

Listen to the full episode below.

We hope you enjoy this edition, which brings together additional resources on this topic as well as more conversations, insights and upcoming events from across European tech and venture.

with 💖
David & Andreas

As AI makes attacks easier to scale, security has to be built into products, systems and workflows from the start. These resources explore practical safeguards, secure AI design and the operating models needed to deploy AI responsibly.

AI is expanding both the attack surface and the market for defence. These resources examine where investable opportunities are taking shape across cybersecurity, critical infrastructure, encryption and trusted AI infrastructure.

Is your portfolio selling to the right accounts?

Rising CAC, weaker win rates and softer NRR may not be execution problems. They can signal that a company is targeting the wrong accounts.

GoodFit estimates that companies miss 60% of their ICP, while around 70% of accounts in a typical CRM sit outside the actual qualified market.

GoodFit suggests a five-step audit:

EUVC is bringing together a curated group of corporate venture leaders, VCs, founders and strategic ecosystem voices in Copenhagen on the same day as TechBBQ Investor Day.

Co-hosted with Startup Aarhus and sponsored by DLA Piper, the gathering will focus on three priorities for Europe’s next chapter: resilience, AI and venture clienting.

Who this is for

• Corporate venture, innovation and strategy leaders
• VCs and investors working with corporate partners
• Founders and operators building solutions for large organisations
• Ecosystem leaders advancing collaboration between startups, investors and corporates

Featured organisations include ACME Ventures, Carlsberg Group and Novo Nordisk.

To preserve the quality and relevance of the conversations, attendance will be limited to 80–120 participants. This is an invite-only event, and each request to join will be reviewed with care.

In the 100th episode of This Week in European Tech, Mads Jensen and Dan Bowyer of SuperSeed are joined by Lomax Ward of Outsized Ventures and Andrew J. Scott of 7percent Ventures.

They look back at how European tech and venture have changed since the show launched two years ago, compare Europe’s progress with the pace of change in the US and consider what the next two years could bring.

Highlights