What Language Should Startups Speak?

European Straits #148

Hi, it’s Nicolas from The Family. Today, I’m reflecting on the importance of mastering foreign languages, especially English, if we ever want to grow successful tech companies in Europe.

Last week was dominated by the GovTech Summit in Paris, where I moderated a panel about regulatory innovation. Since the panel was not filmed, I thought I’d share my past writings on the question of regulation in a time of paradigm shift:

• Regulating the Trial-and-Error Economy (The Family Papers, May 2016)

• New Technologies Need New Regulations (European Straits, August 2017)

• Going From Faking It to Making It (European Straits, June 2018)

Now as I reflect on how to make Europe stronger in the Entrepreneurial Age, I keep coming back to the hard question of languages. Basically my view is that Europe is lagging behind because we speak so many different languages here. And sure, English should be the lingua franca that makes it easy for Europeans to communicate with one another. Alas, so few people master it, …