This contribution deals with the rise of direct investment flows from ‘third-world’ to ‘first-world’ countries. To analyze this trend, we chose to focus on China and India due to their high economic growth regime and their rapid pace to embrace the world economy, which place them at the forefront of the surging wave of FDI and multinational companies from emerging economies. The European Union which is the largest host region worldwide for FDI flows is the target of the paper, and the central point is to better assess the possible effects of the arrival of Chinese and Indian firms on its economy. The paper is based on firm-level data. After providing understanding on Chinese and Indian FDI on a global scale, we draw from the existing academic literature hypotheses that are tested on findings derived from a proprietary dataset. On the basis of these insights, we identify and discuss the plausible economic impacts of those investments on European economies.