Spain also stops Peter Thiel: Moncloa asks public companies not to contract with the giant Palantir

At this moment, there is no specific law in the Cortes that explicitly and separately prohibits or generally limits the use of “foreign software” in Spanish strategic companies. What does exist is a package of regulations on critical infrastructures and sectors, industrial strategic autonomy, and investment control that could serve as a basis to impose technological requirements or restrictions. The two central pieces, the Draft Law on the protection and resilience of critical entities and the Draft Law on Industry and Strategic Autonomy, are still in the Congress of Deputies, at the stage of submitting amendments in committee, with extended deadlines until September 2, 2026. Therefore, any direct limitation on foreign software in strategic sectors, if introduced, is still at an early parliamentary stage.

1. Draft Law on the protection and resilience of critical entities

This is the text closest to a regulation that could affect the origin of software in strategic companies. It comes from the Ministry of the Interior and was approved by the Council of Ministers as a draft law on the protection and resilience of critical entities (Moncloa reference).

In its parliamentary processing in the Congress, it is registered as 121/000088, “Draft Law on the protection and resilience of critical entities”, of governmental origin. According to the official Congress file (initiative details), the Board:

– Entrusted its approval with full legislative competence to the Interior Committee.
– Opened an initial amendment period that has since been extended, noting that “the deadline for submitting amendments was extended until 2026‑09‑02”.

This places the draft in the amendment phase in the Congress: the Plenary will no longer intervene in the first reading (except by referral), and the regulation is still far from final approval. The text regulates the protection and resilience of entities that operate critical and strategic infrastructures, referring to Directive (EU) 2022/2557 and coordinating with the Cybersecurity Directive. Although the available parliamentary documentation does not literally mention a prohibition of foreign software, it does strengthen the framework of security, supervision, and certification (including a “national certification scheme on the resilience of critical entities”), within which it would be legally possible to condition technologies and providers.

2. Draft Law on Industry and Strategic Autonomy

The second relevant regulatory pillar is the Draft Law on Industry and Strategic Autonomy, registered as initiative 121/000043. It originates from the Government and aims to strengthen the industrial base, resilience, and the country’s “strategic autonomy,” including the protection of sectors of strategic importance, strategic industrial projects, reserves of productive capacities, and a certification system for strategic autonomy.

The publication in the Official Bulletin of the Cortes, accessible on the Congress portal (draft text) and the tracking file (processing status) indicate that:

– Its approval with full legislative competence has been entrusted to the Industry and Tourism Committee.
– The amendment deadline has also been extended until September 2, 2026.

In terms of parliamentary stage, therefore, it is exactly in the same situation as the critical entities law: amendments in committee in the Congress, with no subcommittee constituted nor report yet submitted to the Plenary or the Senate. The statement of reasons emphasizes the need to reduce external dependencies, strengthen strategic supply chains, and create a framework for industrial projects and strategic reserves (RECAPI), which could translate in the future into origin or technological sovereignty criteria, including software components, in certain sectors.

3. Other already effective regulations related to strategic sectors

In addition to these ongoing drafts, there are already approved regulations that indirectly affect the use of foreign technologies in strategic areas:

– Royal Decree-Law 6/2023, of December 19, later processed as Draft Law 121/000002 (publication in the BOE, processing as draft), introduces rules on the location of critical network elements (such as 5G): they may only be located outside Spain if the competent Ministry can fully exercise its inspection and sanctioning powers. This is not a prohibition of foreign software, but a functional limitation on the deployment of critical infrastructures and systems outside the direct control of the Spanish authority.

– Royal Decree-Law 1/2025, processed as Draft Law 121/000047 (initiative file), extends the enhanced control regime of certain foreign direct investments in strategic sectors until December 31, 2026. It affects foreign capital in strategic companies, not the software itself, but fits within the same logic of economic security and dependency control.

4. Conclusion: parliamentary situation and real scope

In summary, there is not yet a “foreign software law” for strategic companies, and none of the ongoing initiatives in the Congress is presented with that explicit purpose. Any potential limitations on software of foreign origin would be articulated, if included, through:

– The Law on the protection and resilience of critical entities (121/000088), currently at the amendment stage in the Interior Committee.
– The Law on Industry and Strategic Autonomy (121/000043), also at the amendment stage in the Industry and Tourism Committee.
– And, in the already effective sphere, the sectoral framework for 5G and strategic investment control.

Until these drafts pass the amendment phase, are approved in committee, voted on in Plenary, pass to the Senate, and, if applicable, return to the Congress for final approval and publication in the BOE, there will be no specific legal basis that directly and clearly limits the use of foreign software in Spanish strategic companies. Today, the debate is focusing on resilience, strategic autonomy, and investment control, rather than on the specific origin of the software.

The State Society of Industrial Participations (SEPI) is a public law entity of the state public business sector whose basic mission, according to Spanish legislation, is to manage publicly owned shareholdings and execute the Government’s policy regarding the public industrial sector. Its basic framework is found in Law 5/1996, of January 10, creating certain public law entities, amended, among others, by Law 20/2006, of June 5, and in the Order of July 13, 1995 on the organization and functions of SEPI. From these norms, its general objectives, business and financial management functions, and internal governance competencies are defined.

1. General objectives of SEPI (Law 5/1996)

Law 5/1996 creates SEPI as a state company attached to the Ministry of Industry and Energy, with its own legal personality and full capacity, and assigns it several basic objectives:

First, the law establishes that SEPI must pursue “the achievement of greater profitability of the shares and participations assigned to it, in accordance with the industrial strategies of the participated companies”. That is, it acts as a state holding company oriented towards the economic efficiency of the public companies it groups.

Second, it is tasked with “setting criteria for the management of shares and participations (…) in line with the public interest”, explicitly introducing the dimension of economic and social policy in the management of the public portfolio.

Additionally, SEPI assumes “the management and amortization of the debt generated by the National Institute of Industry”, thus inheriting a substantial part of the financial legacy of the former INI. Finally, the law assigns it “the execution within the scope of the companies it owns, of the Government’s guidelines on modernization and industrial restructuring”, including the application of special regimes and partial derogations of Community competition rules when provided by Union Law.

2. Main business management functions

To fulfill these objectives, Law 5/1996 specifies a list of SEPI’s own functions:

In terms of group governance, it is responsible for “promoting and coordinating the activities of the companies it owns”, as well as “setting the strategy and supervising the planning of the companies it controls (…) and monitoring its execution, ensuring the fulfillment of the objectives” assigned to each. However, the ordinary management of the companies corresponds to their own governing bodies.

From a patrimonial point of view, SEPI is assigned “the holding, administration, acquisition, and disposal of its shares and social participations”, which includes both internal group reorganization and divestment operations and new participations.

The law also foresees that it may carry out “all kinds of passive financial operations, whatever the form, including the issuance of convertible or non-convertible bonds, notes, bills, and other similar securities, as well as other treasury and debt management instruments”, and may also “guarantee operations arranged by directly or indirectly participated companies”. Complementarily, it is enabled to “carry out all kinds of active and passive financial operations regarding the participated companies”.

Finally, SEPI may assume “other functions (…) assigned by the Government in the area of modernization of the state public business sector”, which gives its competencies additional development margin by governmental means.

3. Financial and indebtedness competencies (Law 5/1996 and Law 20/2006)

Law 5/1996 and its amendment by Law 20/2006 regulate in detail the financial and indebtedness regime, an essential part of SEPI’s competencies.

Law 20/2006 rewrites the provision on the Society’s resources and establishes that these include, among others, “the goods and values that constitute its assets and their products and income”, “the revenues generated by the exercise of its activities”, “those from credits, loans, and other financial operations it may arrange” and, significantly, “the contributions made charged to the General State Budgets”.

It also expressly enables SEPI and majority-owned companies to receive “transfers, subsidies, guarantees, debt subrogations, capital increases, and any other equivalent contributions charged to the General State Budgets, Autonomous Communities, or Local Corporations”.

The same Law 20/2006 introduces a key competence: debts contracted by SEPI through the issuance and placement of fixed-income securities may enjoy “the State guarantee” under the same terms as Public Treasury obligations, up to the limit set by each Budget Law. Likewise, it foresees that SEPI group companies may issue redeemable shares to strengthen their equity.

4. Internal organization and control (Order of July 13, 1995 and Law 5/1996)

The Order of July 13, 1995 specifies the internal organization and assigns functions to the governing bodies: the President and the Board of Directors. It establishes that the Board is responsible for the “administration, direction, and management” of the Society, including approving the basic organization, internal management rules, staffing and personnel criteria, operating and capital budgets, the action program, investments and financing, as well as operations of constitution or participation in companies, the transfer or increase of shareholdings, and the issuance of notes, bonds, and other securities.

The President, in turn, permanently represents the Society and its Board, convenes and chairs meetings, directs SEPI’s services, approves contracts within the limits set by the Board, presents budgets and action programs, and authorizes expenses and orders payments.

Complementarily, Law 5/1996 imposes duties of parliamentary control and transparency: the President of SEPI and those of the participated companies must inform the Congress and Senate Committees when requested, and SEPI and the group companies must submit to the General Courts, through their Budget Office, the same information and within the same deadlines as listed companies before the National Securities Market Commission.

Before founding Palantir Technologies in 2003, Peter Thiel was already an established figure in Silicon Valley as co-founder and first CEO of PayPal, manager of his own investment fund, and an intellectual activist of libertarian-conservative bent. Born in Frankfurt (1967) and raised between Europe, South Africa, and the United States, his trajectory combines a solid education in philosophy and law at Stanford with early steps in law and finance. In the late nineties and early two thousands, his success with PayPal and his role as the “intellectual architect” of the so-called “PayPal Mafia” provided him with the capital and network of contacts that later made Palantir possible. At the same time, his political and ideological activity was articulated around a radical critique of liberal democracy and a defense of extreme economic liberalism, already visible during his university years.

Origins, education, and early professional experiences

Peter Thiel was born in 1967 in Frankfurt, then West Germany, and emigrated with his family to the United States as a child. Part of his childhood was spent in South Africa, in a context marked by apartheid and Christian nationalism, ideologies that early influenced his worldview, as detailed in this profile from The Guardian reproduced in eldiario.es. Back in the United States, he studied Philosophy at Stanford University and later obtained a law degree (JD) at the same institution, a combination that provided him with tools both for theoretical analysis and legal practice, according to his biography on Wikipedia and the profile from El Demócrata.

After graduating in Law in 1992, he briefly worked as a legal assistant for Judge J. L. Edmondson at the United States Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit, before turning to finance. Shortly after, he joined Credit Suisse as a derivatives trader, where he became familiar with complex financial products and global markets, a key experience for his later leap into venture capital, as summarized in Wikipedia.

From Thiel Capital to PayPal: consolidation in Silicon Valley

In 1996, Thiel took a decisive step by founding his own investment fund, Thiel Capital Management (also associated with the manager Clarium Capital), with initial capital of around 1 million dollars contributed by family and friends, according to Wikipedia and the analysis from El Orden Mundial. From this vehicle, he invested in emerging technology companies during the dot-com bubble, with a clear bet on projects that challenged the financial status quo.

The big leap came in 1998, when he co-founded Confinity, a company that would eventually give rise to PayPal after its merger with Elon Musk’s X.com. Although some journalistic accounts simplify that story, sources agree that Thiel was the first CEO of the resulting PayPal, led its growth strategy, and piloted its IPO in 2002, before the sale to eBay for about 1.5 billion dollars, as highlighted in the profile from El Demócrata. This success established him as one of the central “technoligarchs” of the so-called “PayPal Mafia,” a group of former executives and employees who later propelled companies like LinkedIn, Yelp, SpaceX, or Airbnb, a narrative widely covered by eldiario.es.

Early investments and building economic power

Thanks to the capital obtained after the sale of PayPal, Thiel increased his activity as a high-impact investor. Although the investment in Facebook is after 2003, even before Palantir he had built a reputation as the “banker of the first generation of Internet 2.0,” combining his own fund with early stakes in technology projects, as detailed in Wikipedia. This positioning placed him at the center of Silicon Valley’s financing networks just as a new wave of innovation in software, data, and online services was opening.

Political and ideological trajectory prior to Palantir

Alongside his professional career, Thiel was building a strongly marked political identity. During his time at Stanford, he founded The Stanford Review, a student newspaper of libertarian and conservative orientation from which he criticized campus progressivism and defended a “diversity of perspectives” against what he perceived as liberal hegemony, as recalled by both Wikipedia and the analysis from El Orden Mundial. This intellectual activism was the seed of an ideological trajectory that, over time, would radicalize.

Some chronicles, such as the extensive report from eldiario.es, emphasize that his formative years in South Africa and his reading of apartheid as an “economically solid” system shaped his rejection of redistributive policies and much of Western social-democratic architecture. This background connects with his later affinity with the so-called “Dark Enlightenment” and with views that consider liberal democracy an obstacle to the full realization of capitalism, something already hinted at in his interventions and writings prior to 2003.

Situation in 2003, on the threshold of Palantir

When Palantir was founded in 2003, Thiel arrived as an entrepreneur who had taken a company public and sold it with great profit, an investor with his own fund, and a libertarian ideologue with a critical discourse towards the State and democratic institutions. His experiences in the financial system, his early exposure to debates on security and encryption at PayPal, and his conviction that data analysis could transform both markets and national security constitute Palantir’s starting point, as summarized in the profile from El Demócrata. It is this combination of capital, Silicon Valley networks, and a very defined political agenda that explains his professional and political trajectory prior to the creation of the data analysis company that later made him even more well-known.