The year in deeptech

Happy New Year and welcome to our end of year deeptech special! Here you will find some of our best pieces about startups harnessing the power of science and profound technologies from flying cars to quantum computing to artificial intelligence. We are back to our usual newsletter service on Monday.

 Cars 

Better than Tesla

After a stunning rise in the stock price this year, Tesla is now worth much as the nine largest car companies globally as investors bet the company with change the automotive market forever.

But many European companies out there are doing at least parts of what Tesla does better — from electric roadsters to giant battery factories. Why aren't they worth $630bn?

Here are the European companies making faster cars and better batteries than Tesla.

👬 It takes a village 👭

Graphic designers, project managers, programmers. Make sure your next project stays on track, on budget and is delivered on time. Fiverr Business gives you a catalogue of top talent. Use code SIFTED20 for 20% off Fiverr Business.

Find out more. [Sponsored post]

 Health 

Europe’s killer nanobot startups

Nanobots don’t look like the robots of science fiction novels.

Instead, they’re so tiny you can’t see them at all — they’re often only around 30 nanometers big (whereas a human hair is some 100,000 nanometers wide).

Which are the startups getting into this new area of research?

And what are they being used for?

 EU 

Launching Europe’s “unicorn factory”

Jean-Eric Paquet, the EU’s urbane director general for research and innovation, has big ambitions for European startups.

More importantly, the French official has a €10bn war chest, run by the European Innovation Council (EIC), to back his plans.

“The EIC should become Europe’s unicorn factory,” he tells Sifted. “We are creating possibly the biggest deeptech equity fund in Europe.”

What are the EIC's plans?

 3D Priniting 

Europe’s 3D printing industry booms

These days you can print everything from human tissue and vegan steaks to industrial parts and a pair of jeans.

While the technology is not yet quite at the level of the Star Trek replicator machine, there is a thriving European tech ecosystem edging us in that direction.

This can be seen in the European patent applications related to 3D printing, which has been growing at a rate of 36% a year according to the latest data from the European Patent Office.

Where is the growth?

🎆 It’s been a tough year 🎆

2020 forced many startups to adapt to change at lightning speed. We worked with Google for Startups to explore how six founders from the Google for Startups class of 2020 made it through the year.

Read their stories. [Sponsored post]

 Space 

Building houses on Mars

Barbara Belvisi, a French VC and entrepreneur, wants humanity to become "a multi-planet species".

So she is building experimental habitats that we could use on Mars, starting in the Mojave Desert in California.

What are they like?

Holiday (deeptech) reading 

Here are some articles from other people we enjoyed recently. Check them out:

🏭 The current state of industrial startups in Europe, from Robin Dechant.

👓 Can VR help tackle unconscious bias? From Alice Bonasio.

🤖 5 Requirements for investing in AI startups, from Omar Ismail.

🧑‍🚀 Inside Gravity’s daring mission to make jetpacks a reality, from Wired.

🐽 We’re about to start sending messages with our noses, from Wired.