Reports of the death of transatlantic business have been greatly exaggerated. Despite political tensions and tariffs, European startups will keep crossing the Atlantic — and so will their U.S. counterparts.
This makes the latest book published by global VC firm Index Ventures especially timely. ‘Winning in the US: The Founder’s Guide to Building a Global Company from Europe’ is a fully revised edition that draws on Index’s high-profile portfolio to explore how European startups can approach U.S. expansion as a pathway to global success.
One key lesson from the book is that there is no one-size-fits-all approach. But it is much more than a collection of anecdotes; the varied strategies adopted by scaleups such as ElevenLabs, Pigment and Wiz are analyzed and broken down into paths founders can choose depending on their business model and priorities.
As Sesamers prepares to bring a whole cohort of European startups to SXSW 2026, this is a topic close to our hearts. If U.S. expansion is part of your plans, the whole book is well worth reading. But to get you started, we have rounded up five key insights to guide your strategy.
Consider early US expansion
The most topical takeaway of this refreshed edition is that 64% of European startups are now expanding to the U.S. at pre-seed or seed stage, compared to 33% five years ago. That may seem counterintuitive, but it actually ties into several trends we are well aware of, including the normalization of distributed teams after the pandemic.
Expanding into the U.S. early on can pay off big time, and doesn’t always require a huge initial spend. Index-backed unicorn Collibra is one such example: It ventured into the U.S. as early as 2012, but only by sponsoring conferences and sending over team members to attend. Even when it secured its first clients there, it serviced them remotely. Yet, the U.S. now drives more than half of its revenue.
Conferences also played a role in the expansion strategy of Cradle, an AI-enabled biotech startup founded in 2021. With a lab in Amsterdam and an engineering team in Zurich, the company also pursued U.S. customers from the beginning, with its founders attending events there to meet potential buyers in person.
As Index found out, expanding into the U.S. didn’t just drive more business for Cradle; it acted as a booster. “Adoption of innovative technology in Europe takes a lot longer, so you can get started with companies in the U.S. way faster,” CEO Stef van Grieken said in the book. According to the company, the U.S. and Europe now both represent 40% of its customer base.
You need a versatile landing team
As defined in the book, “a landing team is a small group of employees sent from a company’s HQ to a new market or region to initiate and manage the expansion process.” These people are not just there to sell your products and services; they will also set the tone for your future operations, transmitting values, processes and product understanding.
With this in mind, Revolut partner James Gibson has a key recommendation: “bring talent from existing offices rather than trying to hire fresh.” He also put a number on that goal: have at least 30% of people from an existing office, with the reasoning that they “need to understand how finance works, who is in ops, how things are run in the other offices.”
That’s also why Index partner Nina Achadjian recommends prioritizing versatility over specialization. “You need team members who are willing to operate outside their comfort zones—people who can pitch to customers one day and troubleshoot product issues the next. The most successful landing teams blend deep product knowledge with cultural adaptability and entrepreneurial initiative,” she said.
According to the book’s findings, your landing team should include a mix of senior and junior/mid-level profiles, but its composition will depend on your business. For instance, the authors note, “If you already have a number of strategically important US clients and a land-and-expand GTM model, customer success roles will be important.”
You may not have to relocate
You may have noticed that the above didn’t mention CEOs, only some senior profiles — and that’s no omission. Quite a few startups find success in the U.S. without having their founding team move there; but it does take some intentionality.
Says Snyk and Tessl co-founder Guy Podjarny: “If you’re not going to have a founder in one of the locations, then you need a leader in that location, and that leader should be more than just a head of function. They should be a true executive that you involve in decisions that are company-wide.”
Going back to the versatility point, these profiles don’t have to be solely commercial. As Index highlighted, “an interesting pattern emerging from B2B companies such as Snyk and ElevenLabs is choosing highly technical first hires who end up taking on commercial roles.”
In-person time matters
You may not have to relocate, but you will likely have to travel some, and so will your team. One point that ‘Winning in the US’ insists on is that holding regular global team offsites can significantly improve alignment.
Their recommendation is to do it at least once a year for the entire team, and even more often for distributed functions — they are worth the time and cost. Per Index: “The more distributed the team, the more frequent these offsites should be.”
Offsites aside, there will be frequent business travel, which your company needs to facilitate — with budget, but also with policies that encourage team members to get to know each other across different offices. “Our travel policy is simple: if you wouldn’t blush to justify it, it’s OK,” Adyen Co-CEO Ingo Uytdehaage said.
Conversely, you will need rules to make this level of travel sustainable — this is a marathon, not a sprint. Podjarny developed his own criteria, which could work for other founders with families at home:
- No trips in successive weeks ;
- No weekend travel ;
- Always home for breakfast and dinner with his children when not traveling ;
- Taking vacations, including at least one two-week trip ;
- Schedule regular date nights.
Learn from conferences
Despite requiring time away from home, conferences are a key component of international expansion. Miro founder and CEO Andrey Khusid told Index that attending conferences in the U.S. allowed him to meet high-profile speaker and expert Elena Verna. Following their meeting, she advised the team on growth and eventually became Miro’s interim head of marketing before joining Swedish unicorn Lovable as head of growth earlier this year.
As Index noted, the impact of Khusid’s efforts was amplified by the work he did before, during and after his trips. Here are key things he did and that you can do too:
- Use LinkedIn to ask your network for introductions before your trip, and then ask new people you meet for further introductions.
- During events, find speakers who resonated with you the most, spend time with them after their talks and email them with follow-ups.
At Sesamers, we believe in the power of crossing borders and building bridges. As we gear up for SXSW 2026, we’re energized by how game‑changing the right events can be — sparking the connections, conversations and opportunities that turn transatlantic ambitions into reality.
Contact us to learn more about the opportunity to showcase your startup at SXSW 2026. We’ll also share more info as the date gets closer.