Seb Johnson

Talking about UK and European Tech. Subscribe to my newsletter to keep up to date.

[Seb Johnson @SebJohnsonUK]

Find someone who loves you as much as Nik hates VCs

[David Senra @davidsenra]

Revolut founder Nik Storonsky says one of his investors tried forcing him to fire his best person:

“He was forcing me to fire my best person, because he was too hardcore.”

“Of course I didn’t fire him. I said no.”

“Pretty early on I realized that quite a few VCs, they are not very operational, and they can be actually dangerous for the company if they have enough power. So every single investment round, we just remove VCs.”

“Now I don't have any VCs on the board. I think that's the best. You always need to have operators rather than VCs on the board, people who actually build business and who know how to do things.”

[Seb Johnson @SebJohnsonUK]

Phenomenal news.

The store was set to create 40 jobs, reduce emissions AND provide affordable groceries.

None of which we need

[Cllr Joanna Wright @clrjoannawright]

Planning Application for a Lidl superstore on the London Road, Bath REFUSED

[Seb Johnson @SebJohnsonUK]

@AlmaCap114204 And yet it’s £620m more than we had last year. How much bigger will it be in 1, 5, 10 years

[Seb Johnson @SebJohnsonUK]

This is amazing.

The UKs Sovereign AI fund has been given another £120m.

When the fund launched the doomers said it was nowhere near big enough to be significant.

Less than a year on and it’s been given more money.

In a few years this will be a multi billion fund.

NICE

[Sovereign AI @UKSovereignAI]

We’re excited to announce an additional £120m for Sovereign AI to back the future of AI in Britain.

An extra £60m to invest in the UK’s most promising AI companies, expanding into Physical and Industrial AI.

And £60m more for R&D procurement, backing innovation in areas such as AI security and AI for healthcare.

We want to help founders start and scale in Britain, and turn innovation into impact.

[Seb Johnson @SebJohnsonUK]

@AFitzgerald1992 @DadaJudith @langdock @neemustafa @Valarian @calfonsorico @fractile_ai @BellaYamamoto4 @maxeichler nice

[Seb Johnson @SebJohnsonUK]

I'm going to start a fund exclusively backing startups where their investors left their VC to join them:

> @DadaJudith joined @langdock
> @neemustafa joined @Valarian
> @calfonsorico joined @fractile_ai
> @BellaYamamoto4 joined Orbio AI

Big alpha here.

How do i buy shares in these companies.

[Seb Johnson @SebJohnsonUK]

@trevgoes4th 😂

[Seb Johnson @SebJohnsonUK]

> build something hard
> inspire the next generation to build something hard
> flywheel spins and britain re-industrialises

nice @AFitzgerald1992

[Alexander Fitzgerald @AFitzgerald1992]

Cute letter to receive of a morning

[Seb Johnson @SebJohnsonUK]

https://t.co/cY7YtyLOSD

[Seb Johnson @SebJohnsonUK]

Anthropic is launching a European consultancy that:

"will embed AI consultants and engineers into European businesses"

It will launch by the end of this year with hubs in London and Berlin.

A large proportion of the UK economy is based on professional services / consultancies.

Anthropic is swooping in to gobble it up.

[Seb Johnson @SebJohnsonUK]

The five fastest European companies to hit $100m of ARR are:

5. @ElevenLabs: 20 months

4. @WeAreLegora: 18 months

3. @bfl_ai: 12 months

2. @Lovable: 8 months

1. @microagi: 6 months

The top 4 are also four of the top ten fastest growing companies OF ALL TIME.

Nice

[Seb Johnson @SebJohnsonUK]

The last time I tweeted about Palantir I was accused of being a wannabe tech bro trying to suck up to the company.

This time I've been a called a "cuck", "communist" "div" with "palantir derangement syndrome"

Enough X for today I think 😂

[Seb Johnson @SebJohnsonUK]

Palantir:

"We are definitely, most certainly, NOT a spyware firm or sinister in any way"

Also Palantir:

"hey mr MP couldn't help but notice you've mentioned Palantir 130 times in the last 5 years on social media and in your public appearances"

yes. not spyware-y or sinister at all.

[Seb Johnson @SebJohnsonUK]

@Fremond_ And if I paid them to do this to you and sent you a letter with the results that would be weird

[Seb Johnson @SebJohnsonUK]

Palantir:

"We are definitely, most certainly, NOT a spyware firm or sinister in any way"

Also Palantir:

"hey mr MP couldn't help but notice you've mentioned Palantir 130 times in the last 5 years on social media and in your public appearances"

yes. not spyware-y or sinister at all.

[Louis Mosley @louismosley]

The crime: intimidating MPs.
My motive: correcting the record.
My method: quoting Hansard and offering to meet.
My weapon: "Kind regards."

🫡

[Seb Johnson @SebJohnsonUK]

@Fremond_ And all social media posts, interviews and written articles?

[Seb Johnson @SebJohnsonUK]

@aswren Does Hansard include “interviews and opinion pieces, and on social media"

[Seb Johnson @SebJohnsonUK]

@RobWhite_UK @labourlewis This was also social media, interviews etc… any and every public appearance

[Seb Johnson @SebJohnsonUK]

okay but that is a different argument entirely.

youve gone from its "trivial with ai",

to

"they'll be monitoring every single word said by anybody senior in the entire public sector"

my point is that, irrespective of how they calculated the number of mentions, putting it in a letter and sending it to the person is a strange thing to do.

especially for a company that is trying to refute claims that its a "spyware firm"

[Seb Johnson @SebJohnsonUK]

@JackPrescottX except this was also "in the Commons, in written questions, in early-day motions, in interviews and opinion pieces, and on social media"

[Seb Johnson @SebJohnsonUK]

@lukerramsden right - and i think palantir staff spending their time analysing the entire backlog of a politicians public commentary is weird.