European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen has set out plans to make it easier to start and scale companies across the EU, expand access to late-stage funding, and speed up approval processes for technologies such as autonomous vehicles, in a keynote speech at the WinWin Brussels Summit.
Von der Leyen said the EU’s “Single Market” of 450 million people remains a major advantage, but entrepreneurs still face “a maze of different rules and requirements” when expanding across borders, according to a readout of her speech published by the European Commission on Tuesday.
She highlighted a Commission proposal for “EU Inc.” — described as a single company form that would apply across the EU — which she said would let entrepreneurs set up a company fully online “within 48 hours” and for “less than €100.”
Von der Leyen also pointed to what she described as a gap in growth funding, saying European scale-ups typically raise 50% less capital than peers in San Francisco.
She said the Commission has launched a “Scaleup Europe Fund” bringing together public and private investors, and claimed it had invested in eight companies in its first two months and helped them raise close to €5 billion.
Clean transition and AI in industry
Turning to climate policy, von der Leyen reiterated the EU’s goal to become “the first climate-neutral continent by 2050” and said the EU has agreed a 2040 target to cut emissions by 90%.
She said more than €1.2 trillion has been invested in “sustainable activities” across the EU since 2021, and argued that recent events had increased the costs of imported fossil fuels, claiming that “since the closure of the Strait of Hormuz” they had cost Europe an additional €127 billion.
Von der Leyen also cited the EU Emissions Trading System — a carbon market that requires certain sectors to buy allowances for their emissions — saying emissions in covered sectors have fallen by around 50% since 2005, while the economy has grown by 30%, and that the system has generated more than €270 billion in revenues.
She said the Commission is working on an “Industrial Decarbonisation Bank” and “aims to mobilise €100 billion” to support industrial transformation.
On artificial intelligence, von der Leyen noted she had appointed Jim Snabe as Special Envoy for Industrial Artificial Intelligence earlier this year, and gave examples including AI monitoring industrial machinery and the use of AI-supported mammography in breast cancer screening.
She also called for “faster and simpler approval” for autonomous vehicles, arguing that companies should be able to complete a single approval process and then deploy across Europe without additional barriers.
