I flew to San Francisco for the first time exactly 13 years ago. In 2012 I simply decided to spend a month in the city and discover the US for the first time. I remember getting out of the Montgomery bart station and feeling like I was in a new world.
Back then I was running my very first company, WeTalk. I had built this tech community in Italy called HostingTalk when I was 19 and tried to transform that into a business selling to all the Italian ISPs and building a professional community for people interested in webhosting, domain names and servers.
While I was lucky to have my business, completely bootstrapped and paying me a good salary, I felt I needed something else. It’s difficult to remember now what it was exactly, but I remember going to my office and thinking “What will be different today?”. Part of that was the frustration of having built a business in Italy for Italian companies. It felt like a cage after a few years.
Since 2012 I came back to the US hundreds of times, I’ve built a business here (Cloud Academy, the brand got shut down in 2024 after I sold it to a PE firm – you know, big mistakes give you bigger learnings). I lived in SF for a few years and learned a lot from everyone I met. Customers, friends, colleagues. It changed me in so many ways.
I am currently back to open the US market for Anthropos and I was just reflecting on what makes the US so special for people building things. It would be a mistake to think that’s Silicon Valley.
My experience working with americans is that a lot of what I am saying here it’s in their culture and it applies to most of them. Silicon Valley is simply where all of that gets to another level.
Embedding entrepreneurship into the society
People build things, they quit jobs to try to build their venture, they connect entrepreneurs to people and jump into things taking risks.
I met an almost retired highschool teacher two days ago. He taught business for 23 years. They have a special class where students get to understand differenet businesses, how they get built and they simulate creating one themselves. My friend Parsa was his student back then. Today he runs a company.
I believe this would be the easiest and most effective way to build more companies in Europe and in Italy: teach people what it means to build a company, why it’s cool and it can be great for the society. Yes, Europe is the land of bureaucracy, but that’s a problem for another day. Entrepreneurs will find their way no matter what.
Connections, feedback and hard work
Early on I thought people were simply kind with me. They connected me with their contacts, made intros and sponsored me in ways that felt confusing to me at first. Why are they doing this with me? What do they want in exchange?
Yesterday night I pitched 20+ people and got great feedback for Anthropos and our AI Simulations. It felt so great.
The lesson learned is that this is the powerful secret of a culture that loves to connect and help entrepreneurs. Why? Because there is respect for people building things and everyone wants them to succeed. They know they will create jobs, wealth and prosperity.
I know a lot of my European friends look at this as pure capitalism and they say that with a bit of reluctance. We should put that thought to bed once and for all and stop chasing an ideology that gave us countless rules for every aspect of our lives from leaders that had no problem watching our continent being at the bottom of every ranking and still celebrating their lack of pragmatism with new regulations. Investing in entrepreneurship works, look at where the US are today and where the EU is. Work-life balance is so better in Europe, but who will pay our pensions? Are we sure that a comfortable life that incentivize taking no risks will give us a bright future?
Who will explain to our kids that while the world was inventing the future of work with AI our top leaders were regulating cookies on websites with our approval?
A few months back someone told me what we don’t need to work harder (while I was asking for that), but smarter. It’s the classic BS I hear in Europe. It comes from the same problem. Hard work is not celebrated, it’s something you report to your HR team.
It’s easy to say that there is more capital here. It’s true but that’s a consequence. Entrepreneurship is built in the fabric of the US society, it’s celebrated and taught in school. That is the difference.
Is it too late for Europe?
When I mention what I do in Switzerland (and Italy) people think of me as someone that is likely rich and works a few hours per day. It’s a cultural thing. Europe doesn’t love entrepreneurs and even less do Italians.
I understand why they think that, it’s what they taught us. But in the era of YouTube and AI, where you can learn whatever you want from the best people in the world, it’s time to put an end to this way of thinking. It’s not doing us any good, is it?
I always hope people will be more in favor of rebelling to another stupid regulation or law Bruxelles decides to impose us. I always hope they will simply ignore that and focus on building. I am confident it will start happening for young people and they will break this system. I simply hope it will not be too late. History taught us that it takes centuries to recover for such mistakes.
The younger Stefano that was building Cloud Academy 13 years ago today feels a lot more tired typing this while jumping from one flight to another, from a meeting to a call. But nonetheless I cannot help myself but still feel amazed by the drive and ability of America to help entrepreneurs build the future. We have lots to learn.
Stefano