Vision for the Future of Europe

Our manifesto on why newcomer entrepreneurship is central to Europe's renewal.

The European project has always been more than a political or economic arrangement. At its core, it is an idea: that shared prosperity, dignity, and opportunity can bind together diverse societies more powerfully than fear or fragmentation ever could. In this context, the economic inclusion of newcomers — and in particular newcomer entrepreneurs — is not a peripheral concern. It is a defining test of Europe's capacity to renew itself.

The Structural Challenge Is Real, and Urgent

Europe is confronting a convergence of structural challenges that cannot be wished away. Demographically, the continent is contracting. According to Eurostat, the EU's working-age population (aged 20–64) is projected to shrink from 262 million in 2025 to 198 million by 2100 — a reduction of over 63 million people . The EU's old-age dependency ratio is forecast to nearly double, from 34.5% today to 59.7% by 2100. The natural population change in the EU has been negative since 2012 — meaning deaths have outnumbered births for over a decade . Growth in recent years has come almost entirely from migration.

These trends are not uniform. In Latvia, Lithuania, Greece, Bulgaria, Romania, Portugal, Croatia and Poland, the working-age population is projected to fall by more than 20% between 2023 and 2050 . The consequences — for labour supply, tax revenues, pension systems, and regional cohesion — are already being felt.

Against this backdrop, Europe faces additional transitions: digitalisation, decarbonisation, and rising global competition. The continent needs entrepreneurs. It needs risk-takers, innovators, and founders who will build the businesses of the next decades. It cannot afford to leave any source of that talent unused.

Newcomers Are Already Building Europe's Economy

The data is unambiguous: newcomer entrepreneurs are a structural pillar of European economic life, not an edge case.

Between 2011 and 2021, migrant self-employment created nearly 4 million jobs across 25 OECD countries — accounting for 15% of total employment growth during that period . On average, each working-age migrant in the OECD generates 0.2 additional jobs through entrepreneurship alone. By 2022, migrants represented 17% of the self-employed across OECD countries — up from just 11% in 2006 .

Within Europe, the picture is especially striking. In Germany — one of the world's primary destinations for newcomers — over a quarter of all entrepreneurs are immigrants or children of immigrants , with higher entrepreneurial activity rates than native-born Germans. In the United Kingdom, immigrant and non-white ethnic populations have consistently been the most entrepreneurially active groups, even through the disruption of Brexit . Across Belgium, Denmark, France, Norway and Sweden, research consistently shows that migrants are more likely to be entrepreneurial than the native population .

And this entrepreneurial spirit is resilient. During the height of the COVID-19 pandemic, early-stage entrepreneurial activity among UK natives fell from 9.8% (2019) to 6% (2020). Among immigrant entrepreneurs in the UK, the rate of activity actually rose during the same period .

Entrepreneurship Is a More Powerful Form of Integration

Newcomer entrepreneurship represents a qualitatively different form of economic inclusion — one that goes far beyond participation in the labour market.

Employment integrates people into existing structures. Entrepreneurship allows newcomers to actively shape those structures: creating jobs, revitalising local economies, and responding to unmet market needs. In doing so, newcomer entrepreneurs help transform diversity into economic advantage.

This matters deeply for the European project. Europe was built on the promise of mobility, opportunity, and shared rules that allow individuals to contribute across borders. When newcomer entrepreneurs face systemic barriers — limited access to finance, non-recognition of skills, fragmented support ecosystems — Europe undermines its own founding principles. Conversely, when Europe enables newcomer-led businesses to start, scale and thrive, it reinforces the idea of a continent where contribution, not origin, defines belonging.

Newcomers Are Driving the Innovation Economy

As Europe navigates the green and digital transitions, it requires exactly what newcomer entrepreneurs disproportionately provide: innovation, new processes, cross-border market access, and the willingness to take risks.

The evidence on newcomers and innovation is striking. Research on immigrant-owned firms finds that they are more likely to create new products, improve existing ones, adopt new processes, and invest in R&D — with substantially higher levels of patents and productivity than native-born-owned businesses . Studies on US patent data found that while immigrants comprised 16% of inventors, they were responsible for 23% of all patents issued between 1990 and 2016 — and their contributions went further still, making their native-born collaborators more productive too.

The innovation spillover is real. When German-Jewish chemists emigrated to the US in the 1930s, inventions in the fields they entered jumped by over 30%, with patent production nearly doubling in some cases . The ripple effect extended to native-born collaborators for decades.

Inclusive entrepreneurial ecosystems are therefore not only more equitable — they are more competitive and more future-ready.

This potential will not realise itself by chance. Newcomer entrepreneurs across Europe consistently face barriers that their native-born peers do not: restricted access to credit and capital, limited recognition of foreign qualifications, administrative and legal complexity, linguistic obstacles, and exclusion from mainstream business networks.

The European Commission has itself acknowledged that migrants often lack knowledge of the cultural, regulatory and business environment of their host country, and that administrative and socio-cultural difficulties hamper the potential of migrant entrepreneurs and the sustainability of their businesses . Yet few OECD countries have dedicated services for immigrant entrepreneurs within their mainstream support infrastructure.

This is a policy failure with measurable economic costs. Talent that exists is going unsupported. Businesses that could be created are not. Jobs that could be generated are left uncreated. Regions that could be revitalised remain stagnant.

Supporting newcomer entrepreneurship requires intentional governance: systems that reduce administrative friction, improve access to capital, recognise foreign qualifications, and provide tailored support from ideation to scale.

It also requires a shift in narrative — from viewing newcomer entrepreneurs as exceptional success stories to recognising them as a structural asset to Europe's economy. The demographic and economic evidence makes the case compellingly: Europe needs new businesses, new jobs, and new sources of innovation. Newcomer entrepreneurs are ready to provide all three, if Europe is ready to enable them.

Ultimately, newcomer entrepreneurs are not beneficiaries of the European project. They are co-creators of it. By building businesses, generating employment, and anchoring economic activity in local communities, they strengthen Europe from the ground up.

A Europe that chooses to invest in newcomer entrepreneurship is choosing growth over stagnation, cohesion over division, and confidence over fear.

The future of the European project will be shaped by who is enabled to participate in it. By placing newcomer entrepreneurs at the centre of its economic vision, Europe does not dilute its identity — it reaffirms its founding promise and equips itself for the decades ahead.