"The results are really great too": A year of technological superlatives

In 2020, the ntv podcast "So techt Germany" looked for the recipe for the success of German technology in 58 episodes. Elon Musk, Silicon Valley and digitalization were the big buzzwords. Germany is not an industrial museum, said e-scooter pioneer Florian Walberg.

What a year 2020 – a crazy year, many will say. For many it was also a bad, terrible and expensive year. In the technology industry, however, it will certainly be considered the most exciting year of the past. Corona plays an important role here, but sometimes it does not play a role at all. There remains on the one hand the bankruptcy of the payment service provider Wirecard and on the other hand the success of Biontech. Two tech stories from Germany could hardly be more different.

In June 2020, Wirecard was the first company from the German flagship stock index Dax to apply for insolvency proceedings – an unbelievable business crime. A highly acclaimed technology company that made it into the Dax and was considered a beacon of hope for Germany. Now there is only talk of secret services and disappeared billions.

For many experts and entrepreneurs a disaster for the location. So also for Manuel Heyden, boss and founder of the online trading platform Nextmarkets. With them, Wirecard was one of the most widely traded stocks on the platform – "long and short," says Heyden. So there is always something to be earned on the stock market with a scandal. Nevertheless, it is a tragedy for Heyden on several levels: "Bad for Germany as a business location, bad for the regulatory authorities and bad for the auditors," he says in retrospect.

Tech investor Christian Angermayer also invested in Wirecard and lost money, he says in the podcast. He himself also knows Wirecard from the customer side and they were satisfied, only "there were fewer customers than you thought". The Wirecard topic would certainly continue to be very present if it weren't for a particularly beautiful tech success story 'Made in Germany'.

BNT162b2 – a technology fairy tale from Germany

The product BNT162b2 will take Biontech to unimagined dimensions in the coming year. The abbreviation stands for the first approved vaccine against the coronavirus. Biontech was hardly known to anyone in Germany before the Corona crisis. But the company was in the right position at the right time. Biontech was of course known to insiders and connoisseurs of the biotech scene.

In 2019, the company's share was listed on the Nasdaq technology exchange. At that time, the company was the most valuable biotech company in Germany with a market value of $ 3.1 billion. Due to the vaccine hype, the market value has increased more than fivefold. Basic research can therefore be worthwhile, as the Biontech success shows.

Germany is "too beautiful for innovations", says tech expert Mario Herger in "So techt Germany". Tech fairy tales like Biontech show that really good and successful innovations are also possible in Germany. Investors like SAP co-founder Dietmar Hopp have believed in biotech companies for years and see no profits for years, until one day.

Hopp, for example, has invested in CureVac, the second German biotech company that has developed a vaccine and is currently testing it. Presumably, CureVac will receive approval in April. Then Hopp's investments will probably also pay off.

Biontech probably produced a blockbuster through Corona. Blockbusters are drugs that generate billions in sales for years. It is questionable whether the virus will go away with the vaccinations. As a result, the vaccine could become a long-runner for the company.

Keyword of the year: digitization

Otherwise, the tech year 2020 was shaped by Corona and the question of whether the pandemic would give a boost to digitization. For many experts, however, Corona can only be a trigger. The Wuppertal entrepreneur and book author Jörg Heynkes summed up the topic in the podcast: "Digitization must save humanity". Probably the greatest challenge is the climate crisis. "In comparison, the corona pandemic is a laughing stock," says Heynkes. Germany’s digital future doesn’t leave Frank Thelen in peace either, even if he has withdrawn from "Die Höhle der Löwen". Digitization was just the beginning, now it is entering the "age of exponential progress".

And according to Thelen, Germany does not play a role. This is all the more dramatic because technologies such as artificial intelligence, blockchain or quantum computers "are changing the world and the economy even more profoundly than I initially thought". With his second book "10x DNA", published in 2020, he wants to start a wake-up call. Ultimately, thinking has to be changed. "That takes time," admits Thelen. In Germany, too, there is a need for digital heroes who exemplify visions and have the courage to build large companies.

E-scooter pioneer Florian Walberg would also like more courage. In China, "the German Industrial Museum" is a standing term, but that does not go far enough: "We are sometimes really slow, but the results are sometimes really great."

2021 – the year of digital currencies

Digital currencies will really pick up speed in 2021. The currency Diem (project name Libra), initiated by Facebook, is due to start in January. Many are eagerly awaiting the start and the reaction of the established central banks.

Everyone is working feverishly on digital versions of euros, dollars and the like. According to experts, the ECB will offer the first versions of a digital euro in mid-2021. At first only for specialized companies – to try it out, so to speak.

Time is of the essence, because the Chinese have long since introduced the digital yuan and are testing it in the "open air". This is not about digitally paying for bread rolls or the next refrigerator. This is about the digital business models of the manufacturers of machines, cars or consumer goods.

In order to automate payment processes, you need a currency that can also be "programmed". There is still a long way to go until then. One thing seems certain, however: 2021 will be a crucial year for this.