European tech leaders are telling venture capitalists to take their seven-day workweek demands and shove it. The rebellion kicked off after 28-year-old Harry Stebbings from 20VC declared on LinkedIn that “7 days a week is the required velocity to win right now.” Yeah, right.
Suranga Chandratillake, a general partner at Balderton Capital, wasn’t having it. He called the constant-work demand “bad advice” and compared effective work to athletic training. “Even sprinters don’t sprint all the time,” he said. Common sense, apparently, is in short supply among some VCs.
The drama escalated when Martin Mignot from Index Ventures jumped in to promote “996” work schedules – that’s 9am to 9pm, six days a week. You know, the same grinding schedule that Chinese tech firms made infamous.
European founders responded by calling the grindset mentality “toxic” and “childish.” Amelia Miller went further, condemning the approach as “unbelievably toxic” and arguing that excessive hours lead to poor time management and discriminate against parents. Can’t imagine why.
This whole mess highlights a bigger clash between European work culture and Silicon Valley’s worship of burnout. While American VCs preach endless hustle, European startups are trying to build something different. Maybe they’ve figured out that zombies don’t make great founders.
The timing couldn’t be worse. European startups are already struggling hard in 2025. According to Slush’s Startup Struggle Survey of 607 early-stage founders, 68.37% have zero funding.
These companies, typically founded around 2021 with 2.5-person teams, face what the survey calls “existential” challenges. And now VCs want them to work themselves to death? Cool strategy.
Meanwhile, TechCrunch just abandoned Europe entirely, dealing what founders called “a gut punch to the ecosystem.” The publication had been crucial for early visibility of companies like Revolut, Wise, and Vinted before they became unicorns. So European startups lost their biggest media outlet and gained lectures about working seven days a week. What a trade.
The European startup scene seems determined to forge its own path. The European Founders Week 2025 is still happening July 5-13 in Albania, bringing together 100 founders and investors for beach activities, co-working, and actual human interaction. Many founders are exploring how machine learning can identify patterns in their business models that predict success without requiring constant human presence.
No mention of mandatory all-nighters.
Maybe European founders have realized something their American counterparts haven’t: You can’t sprint a marathon. Even if some VC on LinkedIn says otherwise.
References
- https://thenextweb.com/news/startup-founders-7-day-work-week
- https://sifted.eu/articles/techcrunch-leaves-europe-shut-down-startups
- https://startupnetwork.eu/sne_events/the-european-founders-week-2025/
- https://www.thenewfederalist.eu/a-european-spring
- https://tech.eu/2025/05/07/insights-from-slushs-2025-startup-struggle-survey/
