Research: lobbying is becoming a core competency for startups and VCs - so what about Europe?

Editor's note: this is a guest post from writer and entrepreneur Raf Weverbergh, a Brussels-based corporate affairs and communications expert.

Here's one easy prediction for 2017: there will be more headlines about tech companies getting into scrapes with law makers and regulators.

And with that, we can expect a further rise in public affairs activity by startups, to the point that lobbying is fast becoming a "core competency" for entrepreneurs and VCs, according to professor Elizabeth Pollman of the Loyola Law School. European startups probably underestimate the extent to which this is true, but let's first take a look at the argument that Pollman makes about the US.

In an article that will be published in the forthcoming 'Handbook of Law and Entrepreneurship in the United States', Pollman argues that lobbying is the new normal in an industry that traditionally shied away from public affairs and policy makers: