Martin Sebena

Germany, China, and the space in between | @HKUniversity PhD

[Martin Sebena @MartinSebena]

How should Europe address China Shock 2.0?

I am happy to contribute a few quotes to this excellent FT miniseries on the impact of the China Shock 2.0. The second piece in this series discusses the EU's response and my view is that what is currently shaping up in terms of legislation can be described as a "managed embrace" of Chinese investors - de facto copying the approach of the Chinese state in the past three to four decades.

Link to the article is below, but make sure to also read yesterday's opening article:

https://t.co/6Exdr6sxtl

[Martin Sebena @MartinSebena]

So much talk about European sovereignty, only to end up under American AI hegemony

[Luca Bertuzzi @BertuzLuca]

The EU is set to join Pax Silica, the US-led initiative to secure supply chains (and counter China) for AI chips & critical minerals. After weeks of debate and US reassurances, EU ambassadors are expected to approve the move on Wednesday.
https://t.co/IQZnIf7wfF

[Martin Sebena @MartinSebena]

Preco Slovensko zaostava v inovaciach?

Podla generalneho sekretara Zvazu automobiloveho priemyslu je to kvoli transakcnej dani. Takze pred rokom 2025 sme nezaostavali? Paneboze...

https://t.co/djyrYAlpR3

[Martin Sebena @MartinSebena]

@HuJirui Haha hezké. Rozporoval by som aj slovo prestizni, v rebríčku sú na úrovni Palackeho univerzity alebo univerzity v Szegede.

[Martin Sebena @MartinSebena]

@danielnetrval Súhlas ale bola to veľmi moderná súprava Českých dráh :)

[Martin Sebena @MartinSebena]

Zvyknem sa vysmievat kvalite nemeckeho mobilneho pokrytia, ktore je biedne kvoli rokom neinvestovania.

Ale dnes som sa na trati Bratislava - Nove Zamky vratil 15 rokov do minulosti. Tak zly signal na rovine nemaju ani v tom Nemecku!

[Martin Sebena @MartinSebena]

@Marek_Kollar Medzi Mikulášom a Popradom sú výpadky ale to beriem ako členitý terén. Na juhu je rovina

[Martin Sebena @MartinSebena]

@Marek_Kollar Aj u nás sa o Číne píše takmer výlučne ako o black mirror, podľa toho to aj vyzerá.

[Martin Sebena @MartinSebena]

1. dajte porovnanie vyvoja v UK a v krajinach ktore nemali thatcherizmus, aby sme mali kontrolnu vzorku. nikde inde neklesla inflacia, len v UK, vsak?
2. zacnite graf v roku 1990. preco ste si vybrali neskorsi start?
3. najlukrativnejsie casti statnych firiem z nich boli vytiahnute a predane oligarchom. statu ostali kosti. to ukazuje vas treti graf

Grafy jak zo siedmej ce ale hned nadava do analfabetov

[Martin Sebena @MartinSebena]

Sialene, sialene, sialene.

(Ale pre uplnost - toto je dan z nadmernych ziskov, ktora bola po prvom navrhnuti v roku 2022 unisono hejtovana liberalmi aj progresivcami)

[Martin Sebena @MartinSebena]

Explore the full programme on below posters 👇

[Martin Sebena @MartinSebena]

Conference on the geopolitics of semiconductors in Hong Kong

Join us to explore current tensions, developments and opportunities in the semiconductors space! Featuring @Aligarciaherrer as a keynote speaker and a fireside chat with @captainklein

[Martin Sebena @MartinSebena]

@fbermingham This is a sensible recommendation, however, I believe that the EU side’s escalatory rhetoric partly reflects virtue signalling and scapegoating China for their failure to deal with problems and crises.

[Martin Sebena @MartinSebena]

This is a good post on Germany potentially doing well in physical AI. What caught my attention are the low valuations of those firms, a fraction of Silicon Valley’s AI startups (often with zero revenue). What’s the reason?

1) Is there a limit to the revenue/profit potential of these firms?

2) does it reflect the comparatively shallow VC financing in Europe?

3) is there insufficient hype around physical AI?

[Ole Lehmann @itsolelehmann]

Germany is a sleeping giant of physical AI

everyone's been writing Germany off in the AI race because there's no German OpenAI and no big data center story.

but theres actually two AI races happening:

the first is software. chatbots, LLMs, data centers. US/China are winning that, not even close.

the second one is physical. robots that pick up boxes, weld cars, carry groceries, stack pallets.

and on this one Germany is one of the top contenders in the world

this stat might convince you (it convinced me):

Germany is 3rd in the world for robots per factory workers (449 robots per 10,000 human workers).

only South Korea (1,220) and Singapore (818) are ahead.

Japan is behind at 446. the US is all the way back at 307.

so Germany already runs more of its economy on robots than almost anywhere else on earth.

and the German companies building this next wave of physical AI are some global heavyweights.

a few worth knowing...

> Neura Robotics in Metzingen is building humanoid robots and raising €1B from Tether at a €4B valuation (this was March 2026). Volvo already in from an earlier round.

> Sereact in Stuttgart raised $110M in April 2026 to build the software brain that lets robots see and grab things. already runs 1 billion+ real-world picks for BMW, Mercedes, and Daimler Truck.

> Agile Robots in Munich was the worlds first robotics unicorn. revenue doubling yearly, around €200M now, heading for €1B.

>RobCo in Munich raised $100M in early 2026 at a ~$500M valuation. their robots learn new tasks by watching a worker do it once instead of getting programmed line by line. already pushing into the US and aimed at the small and mid-size factories that make up most of german industry.

> Fraunhofer (Germany's network of 76 applied research labs) built the evoBOT in the video below. self-balancing, two arms, carries 100kg of cargo, being tested at Munich Airport right now.

but why is Germany specifically well positioned for physical AI though?

three things stack on top of each other.

first, the factories. Germany has thousands of family-owned precision manufacturing shops that have been logging sensor data for decades.

that data is basically the training fuel for physical AI and almost nobody else has it at this depth.

second, the customers are already there in-country.

VW, BMW, Mercedes, Porsche, Bosch, Siemens. a robotics startup in Stuttgart can ship its first commercial deployment to a brand everyone recognizes in year one.

that's why Sereact's customer list reads like a german car show lol.

third, the engineer pipeline. Fraunhofer spins out companies like Agile Robots straight from its labs. KUKA built the first 6-axis electromechanical robot arm back in 1973. they've been doing this for 50 years.

so the chatbot race is mostly settled and Germany lost spectacularly

but the robot race is still early innings. and i think Germany's well positioned

[Martin Sebena @MartinSebena]

Putting Paul Graham on PowerPoint slides for the 1st week of the semester

[Paul Graham @paulg]

A lot of the emails I get from founders are now written in a hard-hitting journalistic style. I know they're written by AI, because no founder ever wrote this way before. And once you realize something is written by AI, it's hard not to ignore it.

[Martin Sebena @MartinSebena]

Aby to nezapadlo - ako odviest pozornost od toho, ako nam AI firmy tuneluju a unasaju stat? Pouzivaju staru neoliberalnu fintu - hodte vsetko na Cinu. Cina je nepriatel, my sme dobri oligarchovia.

[Cole McFaul @colemcfaul]

A few weeks ago, I joined @AnthropicAI as a Geopolitical Analyst! So excited to join the team at an important juncture in the US-PRC competition in AI.

We just published a paper that explains some of our thinking on that competition, why maintaining US AI leadership is critical to ensure the safe and responsible deployment of AI, and why the window of opportunity for policy action is now. Would love to hear your thoughts!

[Martin Sebena @MartinSebena]

TANAP postuje AI vytvorene fotky (ten zeriav v strede ma dve hlavy) ale v komentaroch tvrdia ze su tie fotky realne. Este bude s umelou inteligenciou veselo.

[Martin Sebena @MartinSebena]

Šéfredaktorovi Trendu sa nepáči štatistika, podľa ktorej má priemerná slovenská rodina väčší majetok než priemerná nemecká, a rozpráva o tom hlúposti na úrovni ekonomického analfabeta

1) vraj je to len o tom, že šli nehnuteľnosti papierovo hore. Tak treba byť dôsledný v porovnávaní:
- nehnuteľnosti šli hore aj v Nemecku.
- papierové vlastníctvo je aj akcií, dôchodkového pripoistenia atď. To všetko môže stratiť hodnotu tak ako môže stratiť hodnotu nehnuteľnosť. Teda rovnakým spôsobom sa môžeme vysmiať majetku Nemcov

2) Z vlastníctva nehnuteľností nebudú dôchodky. Ale budú. Ak má Slovák dôchodok 800 eur a Nemec 3000 eur, tak musíme urobiť adjustment.
- buď na SK stranu - Nemcovi po nájme ostane 2000 eur a Slovákovi 750 eur
- alebo na nemeckú stranu, kde do SK príjmu pridáme potenciálny nájom, tj porovnávame 3000 eur s povedzme 1200 eurami

Takže tie čísla reálne pomáhajú s dôchodkami. Šéfredaktorovi pripomeniem, že priemerný dôchodca hypotéku neplatí. Plus pripomeniem, že ak nemecký pracujúci míňa príjem na nájom (a nie na hypotéku), tak na rozdiel od toho slovenského nezvyšuje hodnotu svojich assetov. Samozrejme, môže tie peniaze sporiť či investovať inak, ale kvôli nájmu má nižší disponibilný príjem.

Nemci dávajú za nájom v priemere štvrtinu príjmov, ale 12% všetkých Nemcov dáva na nájom viac ako 40% príjmu, a títo sú všetci v spodnej polovici tabuľky, čo sa týka hodnoty majetku, takže v porovnaní so slovenskými dôchodcami vychádzajú extra zle.

[Týždenník TREND @etrend_sk]

🎙 Celý rozhovor na YouTube → https://t.co/b9QVTVS46B
Polovica slovenských domácností je bohatšia ako polovica nemeckých.
Nie je to vtip — vyplýva to z dát ECB o bohatstve domácností.
Len to nikto z nás necíti. Pretože toto bohatstvo je zamurované v stenách, v ktorých bývame.

[Bruno Maçães @MacaesBruno]

I must confess I am surprised at the reactions against Israel’s treatment of the European protestors. Israel killed tens of thousands of children in Gaza, killed young children with deliberate sniper shots to head, starved babies, shot hundreds of bullets into a 5 year old girl..

[Martin Sebena @MartinSebena]

Wasn’t her competence for the post that she’s Eastern European and a woman?

[Martin Sebena @MartinSebena]

In times when the EU is under pressure from all sides, its foreign policy is headed by one of the least competent persons.

[Marc Botenga MEP @BotengaM]

The EU has no Middle East strategy because *checks notes* there's too much going on in the Middle East. You can't make this up. This is the EU foreign policy chief. In 2026.