[bitL]

Everyone in Germany I know who actually made a world-class product had to escape some inept manager at some large German corporation, and those people are automatically excluded from any government subsidies due to a lack of political contacts. So the money will go to people with political skills and buzzword bingo, likely not being able to understand anything they are talking about. Then, in 5 years everyone will look back and wonder why Germany is again 5 years behind and resorts to importing all software from US; then external factors will be found to blame (or some poor scapegoats that didn't cover their backs). And a next gen of clueless managers will step up for another cycle with another hot technology.

[friedsdeirf]

German automakers and other heavy industry makes some world-class products and are politically connected up the yin yang

[bitL]

I was talking specifically about SW industry. It's actually an issue that plenty of people think the same approaches that made Germany great in automotive could be applied to software as well...

[friedsdeirf]

OK, if you're specifically talking about software. Software has certainly not been Germany's forte... But there's more to the world than software - and those industries will also bake AI into whatever they're making.

[bitL]

Most of the automotive research in AI by German automakers is done in their Silicon Valley research centers. Most of the low-level work to produce cars is done in V4 countries. The rest is done in Germany.