According to the latest call of the Horizon Europe Program, the EU is prepared to invest €180 million in innovative digital technologies. This investment is the latest in a series of calls designed to encourage collaboration in research and development throughout the European Union. AI, robotics, and new materials are critical for Europe’s transition to a digital, sustainable and inclusive future (European Commission, 2023). In the first half of 2023, the total volume of European investments will reach around $50 billion or more (State of European Tech, 2023).
As the global and European demand for technologies increases, so does the Netherlands’ expertise in this field. A distinct advantage is associated with fundamental technological knowledge, a multilingual workforce, digital infrastructure, and a great business climate, with a stable economy and low taxes, contributing to an innovative and open cultural environment. There are many references to the Netherlands as the “Silicon Valley” of embedded systems and one of the most wired European countries (Invest In Holland, 2015:2023).
According to Five Degrees, 2022, embedded finance, alternative financing, SaaS solution platforms, AI technologies, and RegTech are among the segments of the fintech industry on the rise (Five Degrees, 2022). In addition, new digital applications can also be developed (Invest In Holland, 2015:203).
Taking a look at the Dutch technology sector from within, it attracts a more significant number of international talent than most other sectors. The Netherlands, however, falls short of its peers in the EU regarding gender diversity. To close this gap, tech companies must collect more data, and investors must adopt policies that promote diversity and inclusion. In the Netherlands, the demand for hard-to-fill tech jobs continues to rise, with 59% compared to 57% in 2020 and 58% in 2021 (Tech Leap, 2023), making it vital to expand the talent pool.
As a result, the Dutch government shifted its focus to technology development. An excellent example of this is the Amsterdam Internet Exchange (AMS-IX). This exchange is one of the world’s leading digital data distributors (Invest in Holand, 2015:2023; Startup Headway, 2023). By investing in AMS-IX, the Dutch government created a platform that allowed for the efficient distribution of digital data and the exchange of information between multiple networks.
