Sunday, April 22, 2018

Is There a Silicon Valley of Germany?

Yes, and no.

German tech geeks and political folks will argue that around a dozen Silicon Valleys exist in Germany today.....all less in nature....but significant.

The first one that typically pops up is Silicon Saxony....which exists on the north end of Dresden (the far eastern side of Germany).  Somewhere between 250 and 300 companies (some are start-ups) exist there in this 'suburb', and the city will tell you that they've got 40,000 employees in the tech business.  The curious thing with this city is that even before the Wall came down....under the old East German culture and society.....Dresden was the geek capital. 

The second name that typically pops up is Silicon-Berlin.  In this case, it's a number of smaller operations which have brought in non-Germans, and the hype is the culture and urban nature of the city.....which leads onto start-up companies feeling the hype. 

The third name that is often mentioned is the Leipzig-Halle Airport area, and the nickname given is 'Solar Valley'.  Naturally....the bulk of development here is with solar cells and batteries.

Another popular area is BioCon Valley, which exists in Mecklenburg.  Their dynamic?  Health sciences.

Measurement Valley?  It's about an hour's drive north of Kassel (central Germany), in Gottingen.  It would be an engineering magnet for development.

Silicon Woods?  Well, it's a developmental park on the northeast end of Kaiserslautern, which has a strong relationship to the local university, and various start-up companies are staking out offices in the PRE-Park area of town. 

What you see is generally a wider developmental mentality, with literally dozens of project areas getting cash funding and hype....leading onto various regions in development.  All of these will become magnets in the future for engineering students. 


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