There are increasing fears that Germany’s automotive industry will not be able to master the problems it faces in the future. Some experts even claim that the demise of this paragon of industries – along with its suppliers and more than 800,000 employees – is imminent, arguing that the hurdles ahead are simply too large. To make matters worse, most of the leading managers at Audi, BMW, Daimler, Bosch and …

Imagine you live in Berlin, one of Europe’s most vibrant cities. You really love your apartment and your neighborhood. It’s affordable, the people are nice, parks and grocery stores are just around the corner. In a matter of minutes, public transportation gets you to the center of town, with all its cultural and commercial offerings. Commuting to work is a snap. Why would you ever move?

Enter your new landlord, …

While welfare recipients in Germany are required to disclose extensive details about their wealth and possessions before they can receive benefits, data on large-scale property owners is at best nebulous. Why the double standard?

Germans love to argue about issues of wealth and poverty. In most cases, they focus on money and taxes, that is, on wages, salaries, savings and inheritances, whether in the form of cash, savings, securities, machinery …

For a long time, climate change was a phenomenon of the future. While always more and more threatening with each new scientific forecast, its gloom and doom has remained something most of us could manage to ignore – until now. Who could really say for sure whether this particular flood or that extremely hot, dry summer wasn’t just a natural event like so many others throughout history?

Today, that phase …

For many Germans, the demonstrations held on Fridays by schoolchildren calling for climate protection have exposed a family scandal of sorts. While everyone knows and quietly accepts that the entire family has long been dumping its waste behind the house, the sudden demands made by their youngest to bring an end to the ignorance and denial seem as cheeky as they are inspiring.

While it’s true that there’s been a …

It had to be those red cowboy boots. “My favorite shoes, very comfortable,” Tom Enders says, raising his jeans a bit to show off his footwear. His last meeting with the media in a Munich hotel, no pressure any more. Enders is relaxed and in a good mood, his aides will confirm that this has not always been the case in past years.

He just received his first lifetime achievement …

It should have been the high point of its global conquest. In 1999, after a series of acquisitions, in terms of its balance sheet Deutsche Bank rated as the biggest bank in the world. In actuality, it was the beginning of its downfall. Today’s Deutsche Bank is but a shadow of its former self. Its share price, at $144 in 2007, is now less than $10. The largest German bank …

The chief executive of the pharmaceutical and chemical giant Bayer is preparing for a tumultuous meeting with his shareholders. They will convey their displeasure about the company’s massive loss in value to Werner Baumann at the corporation’s general meeting on April 26. Their anger is understandable. While before the acquisition of Monsanto, a share of Bayer was worth €105, it currently sells for around €60. For a short time, the …

If you’re flying from the United States to Germany and you want to use the American ride-hailing company Uber to get from the airport to downtown, there are two things you need to know: first, you’re going to have to land in one of only a few German cities and, second, you should bring a lot of time to spare. While in many US cities and several countries around the …

The next generation of wireless systems – 5G –
promises to revolutionize our lives. The new mobile communications technology will blow away all current wireless standards and set in place certain pre-conditions for telemedicine, driverless cars and Smart Cities. These advancements are made possible, in part, by a data transmission rate of more than 10 gigabytes per second – i.e. 20 times faster than what 4G can achieved.

Only four …