The Start-Up Concept and the Economic Future of the EU after M. Draghi's Report

Abstract

Recently, the former ECBank president M. Draghi loudly recalled Europe's lagging economic power, but without giving an original approach to reversing the trend, other than increased funding. Therefore, the article is an attempt to critically review the state, but also the unused potential of the EU start-up culture, which can provide a more reasonable and faster response at least to the part of the challenges. Following this direction, a brief comparison between the European and US start-up ecosystems is provided regarding the position and function of the HEIs in them. The data reveals that, in addition to their distance from the success of start-ups in the US and Asia, EU economies are also lagging behind the UK, which is no longer part of it. The pattern repeats when it comes to entrepreneurship education in Europe. Therefore, a direction is outlined for reflection on how to structurally change and improve the quality of the participation of HEIs in ecosystems across the continent, incl. with the introduction of a new look at training and collaboration with external organizations.