Le Web08 - Day 1 - Techcrunch UK

Mike Butcher is on stage and is here to give an update on the start-up scene.

2007 was an unusual year where a lot of acquisitions were made like DoubleClick by Google.

2008 feels very different as the market is becoming more complex. Merger & Acquisitions were made more at a local level. A small UK company acquired by a bigger fish in the UK.

end of 2008, there have been some recent investment trends (networks go niche like Kindo, mobile applications, professionnal content like TVTrip or VideoJug, shopping gets social like Twenga)

There is still a lot of activity in Europe and not everything comes from Silicon Valley (ex: Rummble, Goojet or Kype). Europe start ups start to mature looking at the local European TechCrunch event in Athens or Istanbul

Mobile/3G, Social Applications are one of the strenghts in Europe.

1/ Ability to deal with diverse markets/different languages
2/ Mobile
3/ Governments support start up