Gig economy 

Glovo gets a dose of gig economy controversy

The gig economy debate just keeps rumbling on: are gig economy workers self-employed — or employees?

As California goes up in arms against ride hailing firms Uber and Lyft over its classification of their workers as employees, Spain's Supreme Court has this month ruled that delivery platform Glovo's riders are its employees. 

Glovo's cofounder Sacha Michaud says they're not — and they don't want to be, either. 

Tim Smith digs into the debate.

😊 Making Europe the best place for startups 😊
 

Europe’s tech sector is flying — but it could always do with more capital and more talent. What will it take to get that?
 

Join us for two days of discussion with the likes of TransferWise's Taavet Hinrikus, Farfetch's Sian Keane and Stripe's John Collison to find out. 29-30 October. 

Sign up here.

 Deeptech 

Brain hacking HQ: Europe?

This summer Elon Musk wowed the world when he appeared onstage with Gertrude, a pig with a coin-sized computer chip in her skull connecting her brain to a computer.

Musk said it was a landmark moment in the quest by his company, Neuralink, to give humans "superhuman cognition" and control machines with their minds.

What nobody mentioned, however, was that a little British company called Bios is doing pretty much the same thing as Neuralink — only in many respects better. 

Meet the European companies hacking our brains.

🚗 Saving car insurance companies billions 🚗

The automotive insurance industry us estimated that insurers lose billions of euros each year to fraudulent claims. Oopsy.

That makes Estonian startup DriveX's automated vehicle inspection technology pretty attractive to them though.

For Microsoft for Startups, Kit Gillet finds out how it works. [Sponsored post]

 Fintech 

Fintech's top angel investors

Behind every great company is a motley crew of angels investors. 

But who, in the fintech sector, is the most 'successful' angel of them all? 

In collaboration with software firm Cledara, Sifted has compiled a list of the angel investors who have backed more than one of Europe's leading fintechs.

So, who can spot fintech potential a mile off?

Sifted Suggests 

🤹 Choosing a VC: The stuff people don’t talk about. Northzone's Deepka Rana helps make the world of VC a teeny bit less confusing.

📒 A practical guide to Series A fundraising, from Kindred. Also includes links to a whole bunch of other useful articles to read from others.

🤷 Sifted Talks: Smart fintech spending 🤷

In tricky times, which investments are worth making to keep your company growing, without frittering away capital which is hard to come by?

Join Sifted's fintech correspondent Isabel Woodford and an expert panel from Notion Capital, Oracle NetSuite and Currencycloud to find out.

Grab your (virtual) seat here.

In case you missed it 

🤯 Do we really need to build €50bn companies in Europe? Calls for uber unicorns are rising.

📚 What's the best way to learn to be a VC? A new training programme thinks it has figured out how.

🚀 Can anyone catch up with SpaceX? These companies hope so.

Events (virtual!)
 

🍹 Celebrating diversity and inclusion in business | 27 Oct
Join Foundervine and WeWork Labs to discuss the social and economic barriers faced by ethnically diverse founders in the UK and Ireland. Tickets are free.