EMDIEL Participants Dive into the
Heart of innovation
What happens when entrepreneurial minds from ESCP’s Executive Master in Digital Innovation and Entrepreneurial Leadership (EMDIEL) land in the world’s most iconic tech hub?
One unforgettable week in San Francisco packed with startup visits, VC insights, innovation labs, and firsthand exposure to the culture that built the world’s biggest tech giants.
Get an inside look at how Silicon Valley reshaped their mindset, ambitions, and approach to digital leadership.
In this behind-the-scenes Q & A, our Executive Master in Digital Innovation and Entrepreneurial Leadership (EMDIEL) participants share their biggest takeaways from the power of bold thinking to the importance of failing fast and scaling smart.
ESCP: What business models or strategies shared by companies like Microsoft or OpenAI could be applied in your own organisation or ventures?
Marc Mataix-Sanjuan: At Microsoft, I had one of the shortest yet most insightful conversations of the entire trip. My EMDIEL project explores how to adapt the "Garage" concept to industrial SMEs, so I asked Jacob, the lab manager, what formal training he’d received for the role. His response? “None.”
Seeing my surprise, he clarified: “I had complete freedom in how to organise it - the training, the setup, everything. They just gave me extremely clear objectives and KPIs.”
That moment stuck with me. In many corporations, we obsess over the how process, methodology, governance and forget the why. It was refreshing to see that in an organisation of over 220,000 people, there’s still room for creativity not only in what you do, but how you do it.
ESCP: Which discussion or company visit during the EMDIEL Silicon Valley module left the biggest impression on you, and why?
Anabella Bolsenkoetter: The fireside chat with Cyril Guiraud was, without question, the highlight of our module for me. As a musician-turned-entrepreneur, Cyril brought an extraordinary blend of creativity and grit to the conversation, urging us to shift our focus from racing side-by-side against peers to forging our own “vertical path” of deep expertise and purpose. He challenged us to filter out the constant chatter of what he calls “noise” and tune into the real “signals” that spark breakthrough ideas, drawing on his experiences in both music and startups to illustrate how true innovation happens when you zero in on what truly matters.
Rather than abstract theory, he shared practical tactics for refining feedback loops, iterating swiftly, and scaling the solutions that work. By the end of the session, I had a fresh mental model for cutting through distractions, following the signals that align with my strengths, and charting a course that feels uniquely mine.
ESCP: What lessons from Silicon Valley's ecosystem can be applied to fostering innovation and AI adoption in your region or industry?
Mei Siang Cheong: One of the most striking lessons from Silicon Valley is the power of a mature startup ecosystem, where multiple generations of founders actively mentor newcomers and open doors through strong networks.
This kind of ecosystem maturity fosters not just innovation, but also a culture of generosity and shared learning. There’s also a pervasive entrepreneurial spirit. People aren’t just working in startups, they’re investing in each other, launching side projects, and treating risk as part of daily life. Innovation in Silicon Valley is highly visible and normalized, from self-driving cars on the streets to AI messaging in everyday advertising (eg, billboards on the highway), which makes the future feel tangible and energizing.
In contrast, many parts of Europe still struggle with fragmented ecosystems, risk-averse mindsets, and regulatory constraints. Crucially, Silicon Valley benefits from an extraordinary depth of wealth and capital, allowing bold ideas to find funding quickly and scale rapidly. While Europe is on its own path, its ecosystems can naturally evolve in a similar direction as more founders gain experience and networks deepen but there’s also an opportunity to accelerate this by addressing market fragmentation and strengthening capital markets infrastructure across the continent.
ESCP: After your interactions with founders and insights from various VCs, what patterns did you see emerging in how startups are leveraging AI for competitive advantage?
Marc Mataix-Sanjuan: I saw two distinct applications of AI, and it's important to differentiate between them.
First, AI as a productivity tool. Many startups use it to speed up MVP development, automate outreach, or write code. It’s all about moving faster and gaining efficiency.
What really stood out, though, was how they used the time they saved: for more human connection. In-person meetings, deeper user conversations, team workshops. In an AI-driven world, that genuinely surprised me. The best founders weren’t replacing interaction — they were creating space for it. We tend to forget how important that is, and how intentional we need to be about what we do with the time AI frees up.
Second, AI as a core technology. The most effective founders were crystal clear about the problem they were solving and used AI only when it was essential. Take Ozcan from CAREX AI. His mission is to measure blood pressure accurately using just a smartphone. AI wasn’t a tactic, it was a necessity, making sense of vast amounts of data for something as delicate as health.
On the other hand, startups like Gomery, a ticketing app succeeded without embedding AI at the core. They focused on solving the real problem. But they didn’t dismiss AI; they remained curious, open to revisiting it if and when it made real sense.
The pattern was clear: don’t lead with AI. Lead with the problem and let the technology follow.
ESCP: What will you take back to Europe?
Alexia Kindemba: I will take back the energy. There’s something undeniably contagious about Silicon Valley’s spirit. It celebrates boldness, rewards risk-takers, and redefines failure as learning. It creates space for ambition. That energy is something we can bring home not by imitating, but by adapting.
More importantly, I return with a renewed sense of urgency to shape a compelling European narrative. Europe doesn’t lack capacity, it lacks cohesion. A shared vision. A story that says: This is why we build. The Valley offers one: think big, act fast, change the world. And it works because it inspires. We don’t need to be the next California. We can be something else: a force for responsible, human-centered innovation. A place where dignity and democracy shape our digital future.
I’m coming back with ideas, questions, and a deep conviction: Europe has what it takes to lead in the age of AI. But it must believe in itself enough to move, enough to speak, and enough to build.
ESCP: Has this module influenced your views on the skills needed to lead in a world increasingly influenced by AI, and if so, how?
Marc Mataix-Sanjuan: Yes I bought a book on the Socratic Method at City Lights. (San Francisco’s most philosophical souvenir, clearly.)
Now, more seriously: AI has fundamentally shifted what matters in business education. Before, it was all about execution and speed. But those are no longer true competitive advantages — AI gives you that by default. What becomes critical now is how we think. The ability to question, to frame problems well, and to think critically is becoming the real differentiator. In that sense, philosophy is back — not as an academic exercise, but as a strategic necessity.
A perfect example is the Art Thinking workshop we started this Master with. Tools that help us define the right problem are becoming the new gold standard. AI can help solve problems faster but if we’ve framed the wrong one, it just accelerates the disaster.
Take a concrete case: do we want an AI agent that resolves customer issues at lightning speed? Or would it be smarter to have fewer issues in the first place, by holding a well-designed human-led workshop to fix the root cause?
Campuses