• Silicon Valley. If there was one place to be an ambitious digital start-up, it was the Valley. Today I know many entrepreneurs from Europe who have never set foot on the IT hotspot in California. That’s because there’s no longer any need to do so.

Berlin, London, Amsterdam – these are the new Valleys in Europe. In particular, the German capital is growing increasingly more attractive to digital visionaries. In the current global ranking of the leading start-up ecosystems Berlin has made a quantum leap to the 9th place. It is the only European destination in the top ten.

With regard to the share of exit volume in the past two years, Berlin is even ranked 5th and outpaces start-up destinations like NYC and Seattle.

Our new study (“Can European start-ups crack the code?”, free PDF download below) takes a detailed look at the maturing digital evolution in the Old World. Its main finding: It is time to break free from the US role model.

In a nutshell: The digital revolution is entering a new phase, thanks to a wave of technological disruption by big data, cloud solutions and the Internet of Things. Thus, start-ups are well advised not to worry too much about the success patterns of yesterday. These days, no one talks about “Silicon” anymore; the new building material is data.

Now is therefore the ideal opportunity for Europe to claim its share of the world’s digital economy. Rather than copy America’s example, Europe can now play its own trump cards, building on what has always made it successful: industrial expertise, diversity and internationalization. This is already happening, and European digital ecosystems are visibly maturing. These are only three signs of this change:

1. The vitality of the start-up scene.
   For some months now, not a day has gone by without news of yet more significant funds being collected for Europe’s “Superkids”. In the first half of 2015 European start-ups raised USD 6.9bn. That’s 86% more compared to the same period in 2014.
2. The growing interest of the “old economy”.
   Corporate players are beginning to enter the European digital fray. They are realizing the importance of digitization and starting to either pour money into venture capital funds or to create their own VC hubs.
3. Successful initial public offerings.
   IPOs and M&A activities are swelling liquidity into Europe. Just think about Zalando’s EUR 5.3bn and Rocket Internet’s EUR 6.5bn flotation in 2014. The number of successful non-public exits is likewise increasing. One example was the USD 219m acquisition of Berlin-based online reservation service Quandoo by Japan’s Recruit. One welcome side-effect is that these mergers have boosted the prestige of the European start-up scene – even in Silicon Valley.

Chances for Europe’s Superkids have never been better.

Despite all the positive signals, I still see a few important tasks. First and foremost, strong digital ecosystems do not consist only of self-organizing business communities. They are also heavily dependent on the regulatory framework. Regulators in Europe are increasingly aware of the challenges but many decisions are still on the way. Just think about the debate on Uber.

Nevertheless, the current outlook is quite positive: The chances for Europe’s “Superkids” have never been better. The US strongholds (the power of hard- and software) are no longer the drivers of innovation. Putting together intelligence and data is what makes winners. The opportunity is there to break free from American digital leadership.

Read on in our new study on the new Superkids (PDF download below). Plus: We revisit four myths about European digital start-ups and reveal insights into an exciting new species. Besides, we recommend our dossier about the Terra Numerata™ initiative.

• Photo Credits: Maskot / Getty Images; Katarina Radovic / Stocksy United