I’ve been in London for the last month and have heard policymakers react to the wake up call Elon Musk just delivered. The decision of the U.S. to shut off intelligence and throttle the military v…
And yet, I still do not see corporate Europe make even the tiniest move to hedge against the risk that at some point, oligarch-owned U.S. companies will pull the plug on them. I wonder what their rationale is. Are European corporate strategists just too stupid or stubborn to see this as an obvious threat to their companies’ very existence? Do they believe this will just “blow over” and things will just return to normal after Trump? (Spoiler: they won’t.) Are they planning to lobby European politicians into kissing ass and bending the knee once the U.S. returns with new demands running counter to European interests?
I assume the corporate ones are only looking for shortterm gains, and the strategists in government/politics that actually have influence are all bought.
Why should I buy a fire extinguisher? My house isn’t on fire, so what am I going to do with that investment? In the meanwhile, I can use that money on something that will bring about an immediate benefit, such as a mini fridge for my 7up cans or a deep fryer for chicken wings.
Sounds stupid, I know. That’s exactly how companies work. That old code written in the 1980s still works, so why bother rewriting it. This old server still runs and we’re not even maxing out its capacity, so we’re definitely not upgrading it. Instead we will keep on pouring millions on patching the old code even though there are only a handful of people who know that language. Meanwhile, we will also complain about electricity prices, even though newer servers would cut electricity expenses to a fraction. Companies are totally allergic to capex, but somehow they can always handle absurdly high opex.
And yet, I still do not see corporate Europe make even the tiniest move to hedge against the risk that at some point, oligarch-owned U.S. companies will pull the plug on them. I wonder what their rationale is. Are European corporate strategists just too stupid or stubborn to see this as an obvious threat to their companies’ very existence? Do they believe this will just “blow over” and things will just return to normal after Trump? (Spoiler: they won’t.) Are they planning to lobby European politicians into kissing ass and bending the knee once the U.S. returns with new demands running counter to European interests?
I assume the corporate ones are only looking for shortterm gains, and the strategists in government/politics that actually have influence are all bought.
Why should I buy a fire extinguisher? My house isn’t on fire, so what am I going to do with that investment? In the meanwhile, I can use that money on something that will bring about an immediate benefit, such as a mini fridge for my 7up cans or a deep fryer for chicken wings.
Sounds stupid, I know. That’s exactly how companies work. That old code written in the 1980s still works, so why bother rewriting it. This old server still runs and we’re not even maxing out its capacity, so we’re definitely not upgrading it. Instead we will keep on pouring millions on patching the old code even though there are only a handful of people who know that language. Meanwhile, we will also complain about electricity prices, even though newer servers would cut electricity expenses to a fraction. Companies are totally allergic to capex, but somehow they can always handle absurdly high opex.