As of: February 19, 2024, 2:44 p.m
By: Lisa Mayerhofer
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Entrepreneur Patrick Theobald founded the IT start-up Peakboard, which is currently expanding into the USA and China.
© Peakboard/Patrick Theobald
The economy in Germany is weakening.
Entrepreneur and founder Patrick Theobald is committed to Germany as a location - and calls for our country to be shaken up again.
Stuttgart – The German economy is in the doldrums – Finance Minister Christian Lindner (FDP) and Economics Minister Robert Habeck (Greens) recently described the location as no longer competitive.
In addition, reports from traditional German companies such as Miele or Kärcher, which want to relocate their production to Poland or Latvia, caused a stir.
This also affects jobs in Germany.
What's next?
An industry of the future in Germany is the IT sector, which suffers from a notorious shortage of skilled workers, but is growing.
Can Germany collect points in this field?
Entrepreneur Theobald: “We still have an incredible amount of drive and inventiveness”
Ippen.Media
spoke about this with entrepreneur and founder Patrick Theobald.
Last year he sold his company Theobald Software GmbH, with branches in Europe, the USA and Asia, for a double-digit million sum.
Theobald is now leading his next IT start-up, Peakboard, which is currently expanding into the USA and China.
Theobald lives in both Taiwan and Stuttgart.
Mr. Theobald, why did you move to Taiwan while at the same time you have a company in Germany?
Theobald: I always wanted to emigrate to Asia.
The problem, however, is that you cannot run a company in constant physical absence.
You have to be physically present for your employees and customers.
That's why I commute between both countries.
On the one hand, this satisfies my desire to emigrate, and on the other hand, I have a physical presence in the office.
Then why not go all the way to Taiwan?
We have history in Germany.
90 percent of Germans work in my company.
You also have to keep in mind when changing locations: other countries have different challenges that you have to face as a company.
In Asia, for example, there is an incredibly strict hierarchy that, in my opinion, blocks a lot.
Also when it comes to politics: That's okay in Taiwan, but in many other Asian countries you can't enforce certain things as a company given the political conditions.
Germany has more advantages there.
But Germany also has location problems - at least that is what politicians, entrepreneurs and economists attest to our country.
I am fundamentally positive about Germany as a location.
We still have an incredible amount of drive and inventiveness.
That didn't work and we have to get back there and pragmatically spit on our hands.
Instead of the many discussions, we broke out an impulse.
Unfortunately, this is not coming from politics at the moment.
But I'm not giving up hope - despite the shift to the right, I'm trying to look to the future with optimism.
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The IT industry is usually accompanied by a buzzword: shortage of skilled workers. How do you see that?
We don't have a problem with skilled workers.
Our key to good employees is dual training as an IT specialist - this is an unusual offer for a start-up, but it pays off.
And will the workers stay?
Yes, they stay because we have benefits that bind them to us.
That's not necessarily the salary, as we can't always keep up with that as a start-up, but we offer cool projects and, for example, work from anywhere.
If Daimler forces people back into the office, then our offer is an argument for people who want to move around more freely.
Keywords: shortage of skilled workers and immigration – the traffic light coalition now wants to make it easier to bring foreign skilled workers to Germany. Can this also help IT companies? Studies show that many migrants quickly end their stay in Germany - are you familiar with this phenomenon?
I've heard about that too.
The reasons are anti-foreign sentiments in Germany.
If you don't speak the language, you will have a hard time in Germany.
It takes years to integrate into a new culture and often never succeeds in Germany, especially in rural areas.
And if they can't put down roots, people leave.
I have to add: Just bringing in foreign skilled workers is a total nightmare because of the bureaucratic but also political situation: Then people in India, Armenia and other countries read about the shift to the right and that of course immediately makes Germany unattractive as a potential new home.
Then the person you would like to hire would rather go to the USA or another country that is more open to foreign skilled workers.
But that's just a nail in the coffin.
So is there another nail in the coffin?
Yes, that's the bureaucracy: getting workers from Ukraine, Russia or South America to Germany legally is a feat; it's easier in other countries.
Do you also feel the excessive bureaucracy elsewhere?
Yes, it would be important to me that labor law and tax issues be reworked and simplified in some areas - such as foreign branches.
Our laws are also very employee-friendly - this is an achievement, but sometimes a hindrance with exorbitant costs for small businesses.
For example, when it comes to terminations: you have to let employees go every now and then, but it's like Russian roulette because you have no framework for structuring the employment contract.
Employee participation is also difficult: In other countries it is common practice to offer employees participation in start-ups, but in Germany this is hardly possible.
Digitalization – it’s a given for the IT industry, but Germany is lagging behind. What could help?
I'm afraid this is a mental problem, unfortunately.
We are deep in our world in which we do not understand that, for example, the gap size of the car is no longer the measure of things - it is now about software and simplification.
Too often we still approach problem solving with old recipes.
I think medium-sized companies are still managing digitalization well, but when I look at the larger automobile manufacturers, things are different: when it comes to important decisions like software development, the giant tanker Volkswagen is simply heading in the wrong direction.
And you stand by, powerless, because it's so anchored in people's minds.
What needs to change at companies?
It is important that a jolt goes through Germany.
And if politics doesn't provide any stimulus, then it has to come from us - the entrepreneurs, the employees, society.
Every single one is in demand.