Recent flagship reports (Letta and Draghi reports) and articles (Adilbish et al., 2025) have highlighted how the techno-economic position of Europe in the global scenario has progressively deteriorated over the last few decades. Compared with the United States and Asia, the European entrepreneurial model has been less able to leverage digital technologies to generate unicorns or other forms of innovative startups, stimulating important strategic reflections on the future competitiveness of Europe’s digital economy. The recent focus on the term scale-ups underlines the effort of policymakers to propose an innovation model based not only on the creation of new companies ( startups ), but on fast-growing organisations capable of triggering wide industrial transformation (with spillovers effects on employment, productivity and know-how) thanks to their disruptive business models.

Against this background, the European Commission defined in 2025 the EU Startup and Scaleup Strategy. The strategy based on five pillars (innovation-friendly regulation, better finance and best access to funding, fast market uptake and expansion, talent attraction and retention, and access to infrastructure, tech-hubs and services) has the objective of creating a more dynamic entrepreneurial ecosystem to support not only the creation but, above all, the growth of the most promising European-based startups. One year after its introduction (see the strategy factsheet and its state of play), the strategy stands out as one of the first attempts at the European level to put startups at the core of the EU’s Research and Innovation strategy, with the aim of systematically addressing structural factors responsible for the scaling problem, such as a lack of dedicated finance, entrepreneurial migration, the role of incumbents, regulatory burden, and the commercialisation of inventions and research.

Fostering digital innovation in Europe has also been at the core of recent European Commission proposals, such as Commission's review of the EU Merger Guidelines and the European Technological Sovereignty Package both brought forward in 2026. These two initiatives represent, in light of the recent geopolitical turmoil, the setting conditions for long-term technological leadership, while preserving strategic autonomy, competitive markets and democratic values.

The conference thus provides a timely occasion to discuss the structural bottlenecks and future opportunities Europe faces, with the aim of overcoming a simplistic model based on the emulation of Silicon Valley entrepreneurship. As Van Ark et al. (2008) put it almost two decades ago, the need for Europe is to find "a new model to make better use of its own innovative capabilities".

Through a keynote address from a high-level representative of the European Commission, and a series of thematic panels, the conference will explore the key topic of how to build a successful startup engine.

The five panels are designed to systematically cover key topics in the debate:

• Successful stories of recent and current Unicorns born and developed in Europe: challenges and enablers with a focus on how to finance the scale-up phase (Panel I)
• An assessment of structural factors behind the innovation gap between Europe and the United States (Panel II)
• An evaluation of the role of innovation defence in the draft Horizontal Merger Guidelines (Panel III)
• An assessment on how startups and scaleups could contribute to build European strategic autonomy in key enabling technologies (Panel IV)
• The industrial policy priority options for the future of European competitiveness between foundational technologies (e.g. AI, semiconductors, cloud computing), application (SaaS, Platforms) or industrial (embedded in European traditional manufacturing) (Panel V)

Practical information 

Invited speakers will mostly be present at the EUI campus in Florence. Participants will also be able to attend the event in person in Florence. The registration fee to join the event in person is €150. The fee covers the cost of coffee breaks, dinner on 22nd October and lunch on 23rd October 2026. A shuttle bus from the EUI campus to Florence train station and airport will be organised for the registered participants after the end of the Autumn Conference. The registration fee does not cover travel and accommodation expenses in Florence. Participants of the 2026 CDS Autumn School will be able to attend the conference free of charge.

The audience will also be able to follow the conference online, free of charge. Please note that online registration is required to receive online credentials.