[djpr]

> Germany doesn't have many "unicorns" so politics will protect them until way too late, for the companies, for the share/stakeholders and the planet.

Interesting. Is there a strong feeling of innovation/unicorn envy among the wider business culture in Germany? Is it a fear of being stale, comparisons to Silicon Valley & Asian tech scene, or something else? I'm curious if you have more insight on this?

[Barrin92]

I'm German and I honestly have the opposite feeling. I participated in "startup culture" for a few years and I want to never touch it again.

I think in the German industry itself there is no real fear of staleness because our systems of innovation generally work differently, on occassion there is a media hype cycle about "rising economy X" displacing everyone, but that has been going on since the 80s when the UK's financialisation was everyone's favourite model. I'm glad we didn't follow on that front... well I guess except for Wirecard that is.

[raxxorrax]

There is a profound lack of developers to start. I was in a German startup and it was awesome. Product didn't pan out for the mass market (medical devices) but the few devices we build by hand are now used for studies in clinics. So it wasn't at all wasted. Software sucks though because I wrote it shortly after finishing my studies with negligible experience. But it works at least. I got support from another developer at some point into the project, but finding qualified people was basically impossible.

Still, developers are probably mostly active in traditional industries. Manufacturing needs software experts for example, the product isn't necessarily software itself. There are advantages and disadvantages to that. Overall I don't think Germany/EU is friendly for startups. There are grants for some business ideas, but it is mostly older established folk that know the details of successfully getting capital.

In general, I think there is a huge fear of being "left behind digitally". Not so much in the industry itself than in politics or on a personal social level. The demographics responsible for implementing digital innovations often speak english and just use international solutions. There is little "local patriotism" in software. Perhaps there is also a strong idealism which lets people get involved in open source instead of creating business models and market digital services. Again, advantages and disadvantages.

edit: To the question about the kind of medical devices perhaps in reaction to the "shitty" software I mentioned: medical devices that cannot kill you and were mostly for diagnostic support. It was safe, the software "architecture" was all over the place though.

[ChuckNorris89]

>There is a profound lack of developers to start.

I don't think so. Judging by the low salaries most companies are offering in parallel with the huge number of devs on reddit from outside of the EU wanting to move to Germany it doesn't look like there's a shortage of developers, quite the contrary.

If there was a shortage, pretty shore we'd see higher salaries being offered.

[pmontra]

Or they don't want to pay more than that so they don't find developers. I saw friends moving from Italy to the UK, Germany and the USA because of that. Maybe developers from Germany move to other countries as well.

[nogabebop23]

Germany recruit and attracts a lot from Eastern Europe, specifically Romania. This definitely helps keep salaries lower

[ChrisMarshallNY]

I have worked with Romanian software developers, in the past.

Basically, I was quite impressed with their brilliance and almost insane work ethic.

The ones I worked with were kind of unorganized, but that was a small sample.

[oblio]

Romania barely has 100k devs in total, I doubt they move the needle that much.

[Grollicus]

I think there's a cultural difference. Developers don't seem to be trusted as much here, which means software development isn't that much of a difficult job which would merit higher pay. The "meat" of the work - architecture, design etc. doesn't seem to be done by software developers so much as by specialized roles, often people who don't or almost don't code. These roles are paid comparably better, but if you lump all the web devs and people implementing business logic into the same category you'll get lower wages on average.

[raxxorrax]

That might indeed be true, but it can probably be detrimental to the software industry as a whole. I think at least basic coding experience is needed to plan architecture and design maintainable software to start with. Especially for getting experience for the viability of available solutions.

I have seen more software projects fail because of over-engineering for alleged maintainability, extensibility and a too generic design. Some would say that violates KISS. Many have shifted to more iterative development, which doesn't exclude the need for a solid architecture and extendable software, but it can improve time to an MVP. Quality can suffer, but you also gain experience.

Business logic can be as complex as you want. In fact one of the highest paid field resolves around optimizations in this particular field. SAP is an example here but there are others. "Cubing" data on your normal business data server isn't trivial, but allows to answer questions about trends management is very interested in and they have all the money bags.

Still, developers aren't payed that badly to be honest and you have options to reduce your workload, so that you don't end up with 60h work weeks or regular crunch. Projects might take as long as some unrelated airports in some setups I guess. If you code in a quiet smaller city, you can kiss 6 figures goodbye of course, but in many cases you are the best paid person in the room.

[pythonwizz]

What kind of medical devices did you build?

[raxxorrax]

Sorry, I am not available for hire right now. I have some experience with regulated software for medical devices, but any generic developer could learn the regulatory requirements with a little effort. Mostly related to ISO 62304 and in general ISO 13485. The tools to meet regulatory compliance are general tools developers employ in most projects already. The important part is that the development process is formally defined.

The device I worked on was classified as IIa. There was a focus on a thorough risk analysis and we ensured mechanism were in place to shut down the device in any case of emergency.

I don't want to say what kind of device it was, it had to do with higher frequency ultrasonic sensory.

[pythonwizz]

We are starting to develop a medical device, so if you are interested please provide your contact information.

[Pyramus]

German here with startup experience abroad. No there isn't - and it baffles and worries me to the same extent. (Many) Germans think of innovation as incremental, and don't realise how much Germany is missing out in terms of disruptive innovation.

[mschuster91]

> Is there a strong feeling of innovation/unicorn envy among the wider business culture in Germany?

Everyone wants to be like the SV hipsters, no one can because the higher-ups are still mentally and literally stuck in fax times, there is almost no venture capital (and the venture capital that is here gets invested into stuff like Rocket Internet whose "business model" is to copycat US ideas), banks (across the EU) won't dish out dumb money because unlike the US we have public funded pension systems and not capital-based ones and we have strict loan regulations (Basel framework).

> Is it a fear of being stale

Culturally, us Germans are known for being extremely risk-averse, bankruptcies are socially shamed. This of course clashes with the US way of life that from the bottom to the top embodies "fail fast", and the youth yearns for change but as explained above that's hard to do.

[raverbashing]

Who says the US doesn't follow the Basel framework? https://www.federalreserve.gov/supervisionreg/basel/basel-de...

[lazyjones]

> there is almost no venture capital

That's simply not true. There is a lot of VC but there aren't many good startups - because the best people are heading straight for SV instead of dealing with a second-rate environment and a second-rate (in IT) labor force.

[gumby]

The German venture market (USD 6B) is about the size of a second tier market like Los Angeles. MoneyTree says that SV investment In Q1 of 2020 was about 2X Germany’s total for last year.

Not to mention that what gets invested in is mostly food delivery, shops and not particularly technical businesses (which are a very large investment sector in the US but aren’t considered “startups”. What gets written up in, say, Gründerszene are companies like the one that would tell you where to get your car repaired.

[lazyjones]

> The German venture market (USD 6B) is about the size of a second tier market like Los Angeles.

I don't know where that number comes from, but I'll assume it's the sum of investments and not the sum of capital available for investment since the latter is a bit hard to determine.

[gumby]

Deals done into {Germany,LA,SV,SF} from funds anywhere in world. That’s what I think is meant when someone says there is “almost venture capital” — is money available to invest there? These data are available from the usual sources online (Moneytree report, E&Y etc etc etc in English and German sources).

I don’t know of any German funds that make venture investments outside Europe though doubtless some exist. Still, if you want to back into the size of the domestic venture funds, pick a percentage (70%?) of the investments made as having come from domestic sources and figure that a fund wants to put all its committed capital to work within the first couple of years, and figure that the total venture pool is perhaps $7B. There are bigger single venture firms a few blocks from my house in Palo Alto. For example I walk past Accel every day to get a coffee.

As you say there just aren’t many companies there being funded, and when I read the local blogs and such people seem to want “the lifestyle” (or hate it) more than talking about building major businesses. To me it’s indistinguishable from people starting a sandwich shop.

[lazyjones]

> Deals done into {Germany,LA,SV,SF} from funds anywhere in world.

That's not the same as the available venture capital. If there are no good investments to be made, the potential venture capital simply isn't (all) invested. So the point that lack of VC is a problem is wrong, it's the attractive startups that are missing. It's the same in Austria - I invested in 2 startups, got a little burned and have since not invested for lack of good opportunities. I've also been asked a few times by a larger German company for my opinion on potential investments, so I know they're looking and can't find anything worthwhile. Funding is not the problem! And the "market size" is only indicative of the (too few) good startups, not of the potentially available capital.

[sushshshsh]

May I also additionally ask how on Earth a 50k salary for a software engineer is at all justified? After paying taxes and rent, it seems to me there is not much money left over for saving or lifestyle spending?

It seems like an unfair situation

[jlangenauer]

Why is it unfair? No-one is forcing anyone to accept development work for 50k per year, yet there are plenty of people happy to do it.

[sushshshsh]

Define plenty? It seems to me the other commenters have offered counter points to you.

In the US, before taxes, an income of $130,000 to $170,000 is the norm in bigger cities. I imagine based on my calculations that the difference between Berlin's discretionary income for SWE and NY/SF/SEA/BOS is probably an extra $50,000 post tax.

[Tomte]

And what do you think do houses cost in Germany, compared to "bigger cities" in America?

I know plenty of people in that income range myself who do own houses (or apartments in some cases) and wouldn't think of forgoing their summer vacation in Menorca or Ibiza.

"The other commenters" is just one, and he's factually wrong. No matter how much HNers love to pile on, 50k Euros is a respectable income in most parts of Germany.

The idea that all software engineering is in Stuttgart, Munich or Berlin is laughable. We have lots and lots of family companies of the so-called "Mittelstand" strewn across the province (but West Germany primarily). Some of those are hidden champions. In towns and regions few Americans will ever have heard of.

[sushshshsh]

I've heard of plenty of American and also German towns and cities and even if I was living for free in a caravan (which I've done for many months in my life, much like Germans who go to music festivals will do in the summer), I don't see how it is possible to make a substantial savings in life on a yearly post tax income of $25,000.

After an entire decade of working, this will only result in a best case scenario of $250,000 in savings, which, for my personal lifestyle is not going to work. I think collective action for higher wages is proper here.

[lazyjones]

> how on Earth a 50k salary for a software engineer is at all justified?

Too many mediocre developers available (local & EE), too few good ones (they're in the US, UK, Switzerland). Also, if you can't find software engineers at that price, you just close the office and move it to Poland or so. Hence fewer employers remain.

[Tomte]

And yet, people manage to buy houses and fly on vacations on that income.

[rob74]

Trust me, in Germany with that income you can either buy an apartment (not a house, at least not in a place where you will find a software developer job nearby) or fly on vacations, but not both...

[patall]

My parents earn together ~90k, just bought a house and travel about 4 weeks a year through all of europe and still support us three kids. So thats not true, at least not if you are living in a smaller city. And for places like Berlin or Munich, 50k a year would be ridicoulously low. CEO in a start-up in Berlin told me a few month ago that they are hiring poeple with literally 2 to 3 coursera courses in machine learning for around 60k, more experienced people rather in the range of 90k. Big corp like Bayer will hire you with a PhD starting around 120k (as analyst without further responsebilites, team managers obviously get more). Given the Copay on Retirement and Health Insurance, that equates to an US salary of around 150k USD. Quite a bit lower than SV, but not as bad as some people want to make it.

[pheug]

You get 401k match and health insurance at any good employer in the US too. As well as much lower taxes. German taxes are just batshit crazy, second only to Belgium. How people can afford to FI/RE with these taxes and pay is beyond me. Oh wait they don't! One of the lowest median wealth per adult in western Europe!

[econcon]

I don't think it's true, a lot of my German friends have been traveling for 3 years in south East Asia without having any real job while I hear from German old men that new generation is not as passionate about working as they were at their time. So what gives? How do Germans maintain such high quality life without working, it's mystery to me.

[ChuckNorris89]

Easy, inherited wealth. Germany has one of the most unequal wealth distributions in Europe.

Their boomer parents worked hard and saved a lot and managed to buy lots of assets, especially real estate, back in the 60's - 80's when salaries were high and properties were cheap. Now they can just kick back and relax while all that sweet rent money, that skyrocketed in the last two decades, comes in.

If you move to Germany now you definitely won't enjoy this kind of standard of living as your rent costs will be financing their mortgages while you won't manage to save enough to buy one of your own since property prices now are way higher, wages are low and taxes are high.

[sushshshsh]

Thank you for providing your perspective :)

[ThePhysicist]

I mean SAP has roughly 30 BN € in revenue and according to their marketing more than 70 % of all transactions worldwide run through an SAP system. If that's not a "unicorn" company I really don't know what qualifies. You could of course argue that SAP is quite old already (founded in 1972, soon to be 50 years old), but so is e.g. Intel (founded in 1968).

It's true we missed the boat on the second and third waves of IT companies, but there are many unicorns in the manufacturing sector that most people in IT have just never heard of because it's outside of their bubble, these companies often dominate the world market in their respective segments though. For example, do you associate Germany with 3D printing? Probably not. Well, turns out some of the leading companies in industrial 3D printing technology were created here, in 2016 GE for example tried to acquire Germany-based SLM Solutions for 1.4 BN €.

[ChuckNorris89]

Nobody says SAP is not a good example but the problem is that it's only 1(one) company in such a huge and wealthy country.

Smaller countries like Sweden or The Netherlands host more successful unicorns than Germany.

[ThePhysicist]

As I said I think the problem is more that most people from IT just tend to ignore companies that don’t fit into their worldview. There are plenty of highly successful technology companies in Germany, just not so many in software.

[ChuckNorris89]

>the problem is more that most people from IT just tend to ignore companies that don’t fit into their worldview

Why is this a problem? If I studied IT and want a good job in IT then that will interest me the most. Sure, it's good for the overall economy, but what good is it to me that I'm surrounded by pharma or mechanical engineering companies if IT is my bread winner?

[dasv]

Pharma and mechanical engineering companies need IT people, too, even if their core business is not IT.

[ChuckNorris89]

Sure, but there is a huge difference in pay, career prospects and respect between being the IT guy at a non tech company and being the IT guy at a company who's main focus is tech.

That's the problem Germany has, it's full of successful companies that aren't IT related so people who want good jobs in IT are forced to either leave to SV/CH/London or stay and be "the IT guy" at a non tech company where you get treated as a cost center.

[mschuster91]

SAP is a solid business, but have you used their software? Once? It's atrocious and the developer experience is even worse, ABAP gives me shudders to this day. Not to mention that somehow, whenever a big IT project in government or private industry crashes, SAP seems always to be lurking.

SAP is not "modern" in any sense and certainly not "innovative". Unicorn companies generally are both.

[ThePhysicist]

It’s enterprise software, so by definition it “sucks” to the average developer due to its complexity and accumulated tech debt. Show me one software tool that has as much functionality as SAP and does not suck by your standards. Unicorns like Slack have better UI/UX because they solve a conceptually much simpler problem. Maybe you could say it’s better to find a large market that can be addressed with a simple tool, but being in a large market with an incredibly complex product also has its benefits. I doubt for example that SAP will be disrupted by a unicorn with better UI because the upfront cost of building the same functionality that SAP offers (and which is not superfluous) is horrendously high. Regarding Slack I can absolutely imagine that it will be disrupted in the near future, because it’s conceptually a much simpler product.

[celloductor]

SAP is a behemoth and a success story, but you are missing the point. by the same logic you could even put Oracle in the category. but they are hardly described as a unicorn, or a startup by most people.

[lazyjones]

> Is there a strong feeling of innovation/unicorn envy among the wider business culture in Germany?

It's not the business culture that's driving this, it's politics. Germany simply isn't a competitive environment for entrepreneurship anymore with problems in many areas: schools, taxation, immigration (too easy for unqualified workers), legislation. Politics is in denial and desperate for success stories that would prove things aren't so bad.

[ChuckNorris89]

Can you please elaborate how/why immigration is easy for unqualified workers in Germany? I thought the point of immigration is to bring in qualified workers to boost the economy.