Entrepreneurs First is scrapping schemes in France and Germany in favour of new programmes for European entrepreneurs in the US, as it continues to ramp up a focus on the other side of the Atlantic.
Since launching in 2011 in London, Europe’s most-renowned accelerator has paired around 500 startup founding teams through its unique Love Island-crossed-with-Y Combinator programme format. EF says the value of its portfolio is upwards of $13bn.
This year saw the company builder run cohorts in the UK, France, India and the US, alongside a two-month intensive residency programme with 40 recent graduates temporarily living in a hacker house in Germany.
It’s now closing down the French cohort and relocating its Germany-based hacker house to the Bay area.
Paris-based staff will refocus on scouting talent across Europe for programmes in the UK and US, initially focusing on entrepreneurial communities in Paris, Zurich, Stockholm and Munich.
Shift to the US
The shift is being driven by the entrepreneurs taking part in EF’s European cohorts asking for more US exposure and the patterns emerging 18 months on from first launching programmes in San Francisco, says Alice Bentinck, cofounder and CEO.
“American customers are very fast in terms of procurement experimentation,” she tells Sifted. “They have very deep pockets and it means our companies are getting to hundreds of thousands of dollars in annual recurring revenue (ARR) within three months of landing in the US.
EF’s transition west comes as startups in Europe are facing ever increasing pressure from investors to generate revenue quickly, with AI tools slashing the time it takes to develop and roll out products.
“We’re hearing from [founders] time and time again that they want to get to the Bay area,” says Bentinck.
This isn’t the first big international expansion at EF. In the late 2010s, the accelerator launched programmes in Singapore, Berlin, Hong Kong, Paris, Bangalore and Toronto. All but Bangalore are now shut down.
“Our new strategy is building companies in Europe and India, and incorporating them in the US,” Bentinck told Sifted in July. “We are trying to build a bridge between here and the US.”
Cohorts in London and Bangalore now spend the first 12 weeks of the programme in home cities, before selected founder teams head to SF for the final 12 weeks (there's also a cohort based in SF from the get go). Those teams can raise up to $250k from EF and an investment partner for a chunk of equity.
The prominence of AI labs in the US has driven much of European founder interest in getting to the US market quicker, says Bentinck.
“The more the Bay area has increased its dominance in cutting edge AI, it’s pulled more and more of the very best founders over there,” she tells Sifted.
Hacker house
EF now plans to launch a residency programme in San Francisco, based on the two-month hacker house it ran in Germany over the summer, exclusively for European fouunders — which it’s calling ‘the Bridge’.
The original programme was designed to help founders with less than two years experience post-graduation develop a startup idea before moving them out to the Bay area.
“The founders loved the experience, but one of the challenges is it’s pretty punishing trying to do customer development on American hours from Europe,” Bentinck says.
“We think they could make more progress in the American market by being there, closer to their customers.”
The programme in SF will last the same period of time at a hacker house in the Bay area, with EF providing full board and housing and supporting founders with all visa requirements.
EF will host three cohorts of the Bridge in 2026, alongside three of its traditional cohorts in London and Bangalore and a constantly running SF cohort.
Despite shuttering some Europe-based schemes, the company builder says more European founders will participate in programmes in 2026 than 2025 due to cohort sizes increasing.
