Spotify founder threatening to move operations from Sweden (transl)

"It is crazy for us to Europe, with a larger population than the United States, not a single company on par with Facebook, Google, Apple, Microsoft, Amazon and the other large American companies. We want to show that it is possible"

The main reasons are taxes and restrictions that paralyze your company before it can make that move from startup->mid-sized company->large company. You are essentially a partner with the government (in Sweden, they have the majority share) and big bureaucratic governments aren't really known for their efficiency.

I was a hiring manager before starting my own company ~5 years ago and we looked into opening a branch in France. When you have more than 10 employees, firing a person is a court case with the unions (which are involved in almost every company). If they decide that the person should stay employed, there isn't anything you can do.

This is one of the reasons youth (and immigrant) unemployment is so high in France: hiring anyone with little to no experience is a huge risk to the company because you may not be able to fire them without wasting thousands and thousands of dollars. Needless to say, we didn't end up opening that branch.

In this sort of environment, you will never be able to grow a business to the size of Amazon. You will only be able to create a large corporation in a more favorable country like the US and open an office/branch there (which is what is happening now).