> It feels like there's a real opportunity here for European companies to step up and make a big play, but will they?

Big plays are possible only with big capital, and that isn't what happens in the EU tech market.

Lack of serious VCs is a problem on one hand, but to blame is also the EU Horizon program which will favor large established companies (which innovate very little), and the fact that the funding direction changes with hype cycles (in 2020 that was digital transformation, in 2024 it was AI and similar).