Colao: « Europe? He can play in the front row on the tech. Now it’s time to invest in us « 

« The time has come to invest, in Europe, in Italy and in the companies of our continent ». Such an optimistic Vittorio Colao was time that it was not seen. «In a not easy world, shaken by leadership as strong as unpredictable, we have a duty to instill to young European European Europeans. To transmit a message of optimism and ambition at the same time. It is enough to go around Europe to see how much our attractiveness in the academic and economic field grows ».
Understandable optimism. On 29 May Colao will be in Boston in Harvard where he will be awarded as the winner of the Alumni Achievement Award 2025 of the Harvard Business School. It is the highest recognition given to the former students for the results obtained. To scroll through the list of those who preceded it, the presidents of the World Bank, bankers such as Jamie Dimon at the helm of JPMorgan are found. And mythical business captains such as Jeffrey Immelt of General Electric, financiers such as Ray Dalio Founder of the major Hedge Fund in the world, the Bridgewater Associates. And so Colao, passionate about Europe but rewarded by America, will find himself to be The first Italian and among the very few Europeans of that club created by the prestigious US University. It will count a company from nothing (Omnitel), make it become Vodafone, be the protagonist of investments and financial operations all over the world for hundreds of billions, stay in the board of giants such as Unilever and Verizon and then have been digital minister in Italy.

Is this recognition that makes it particularly optimistic?
«If you want, I can also list the many problems we have in Europe and Italy. But once we know what we do? Do we continue to live with pessimism? ».

Meanwhile, try to tell them …
« Thanks to the Draghi report, Europe has declared a strategy: technology, defense, research and financing for innovation, simplifications just to name a few. It is as if he had put the first march, now it is a question of passing in the second, third … and above all not curb ».

Who brakes?
« If we look at technology, the EU has started initiatives to finance Aigigafactory, to bring risk capital to innovative companies, to simplify heavy directives for businesses. But states, governments at the moment have to do more. If we consider a weakness not to have infrastructure in space, are we sure should we continue to defend national programs with the teeth? If there is already ACT, each European country really has to make its law on artificial intelligence? « .

A sign that governments are keen to be present on an important sector …
«As long as we do not reduce to making redundant laws with the European one, already dotted with hundreds of amendments, but we focus on things to do. Do not make conference philosophy when China and the USA invest hundreds of billions ».

Okay but AI cannot be in hand only in magnates and technocrats.
«Precisely for this reason we have to work on the initiatives more decisively. The world is discussing to accelerate the benefits of AI, not only to prevent their risks ».

For example?
«I go back from the two days organized by Google in England, but many other companies make similar initiatives, where together with the discussions on risks there are much opportunities. As on the Life Science. Identifying a tumor in advance thanks to diagnostics to save human lives. Predicting the structure of the proteins allows you to develop better drugs before and to a smaller cost. Digitating health and using to program prevention and simplify management makes doctors concentrate on patients with better results ».

But with a view to companies.
« No. It is about helping public health. When I tell you that I am optimistic about technology in Europe, it is because I see that from healthcare to supercomputer for the AI, from chips to space, from robotics to biotechnology, we have public-private initiatives that, if implemented by all member states avoiding local sovereignties, can make us recover ground « .

It is undeniable that Europe is moving but the others, America and China, have already made a nice piece of road.
“We have to start from what we have. Do we already have a network of 8 supercomputer? Let’s double it. On chips and cloud are we back? We develop selectively and recover with alliances. Are we small on space? We aggregate companies and concentrate budgets to accelerate European constellations. And who said that the Ai must be only LLM, so to speak chatgpt, Claude, Gemini? We have a large manufacturing industry, we can vertically develop artificial intelligence in some sectors in which we could be a leader. Or at least not subject to dependence on others ».

We must have a lot of hope.
«No, they are very concrete things. Airbus is concrete. Reduce the 270 regulators of European technology – and both the complex European directives and the cumbersome national laws – is concrete. We can attract researchers thanks to the enhancement of the ERCs and our university excellence ».

In the USA, universities are in fact under attack.
«The battle for interference in universities, which the new American administration is doing, is deeply wrong. When attacked science, academy, the conditions are created to dry the vitality of a country and ultimately democracy. And this makes Europe more attractive ».

Will it be so even but practically?
«At this moment the United Kingdom approaches, Norway and Switzerland are increasingly tightened by the EU. We can do a lot if we put the Draghi relationship to good use. As soon as we apply a minimal part, as with the common defense driven by the Russian invasion of Ukraine, we discover that things can be done together. We continue like this, with more ambition and will see that we can be optimistic, we like our young people ».

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