3 billion the largest of the year in GDR

Real shock treatment. This is what has been the industry of Germany from the East over the twenty years following reunification: first bleeding blank many branches made obsolete by the transition to market economy - of chemistry to the machine tool via the car-, and then the outbreak of promising niches, often worn by new technologies, including through the massive contribution of grants. "After a re-industrialization marked by significant growth rate, the new Länder have again a competitive industrial sector dominated by medium-sized businesses", said the latest report on the State of reunification published late September by the German Ministry of the Interior in Berlin. In fact, the former GDR is far from the industrial desert some imagine...

The Fräger plant, inaugurated in Thuringia, Altenburg, in 2004, is an example from hundreds of Cree last industrial sites which hatched areas on the edge of the cities. "We have chosen to install us here first for the quality of the local workforce," says Martin Fräger, head of the mechanical company whose head office is located in the Land of Hessen, West of the country. Altenburg, a handful of engineers were taken among the 2,000 who worked, the time of the GDR, in a huge combine manufacturing sewing machines, which was disbanded. Initially, the plant engaged gears for a single client, the car manufacturer Volkswagen. Today, the clientele is diverse, in relating also to the wind energy sector, and the site became the largest group with 140 employees, including about 20 apprentices. Over a large area still empty, machines will soon be installed for the manufacture of gears for an electric vehicle, the Stromos, latest innovation of the Fräger group. An another OEM auto, Feuer Powertrain, booming since its installation in the region in 2002. Behind this "success story", there is a contractor of Bavarian origin, Dieter Feuer, who took the crumbs of a combine manufacturing Diesel engines. Well assisted, at the outset, regional and European subsidies. Today, the company specialized in crankshafts delivers 70 of its production abroad, particularly in emerging countries. "It is here that our competitors are installed," proudly explains Bernd Gulden, co-leading the company. According to him, no need to go more foothold in Eastern Europe to lower payroll. "Our concept of machining is already extremely automated." Just 10 workers by rotation on a site of 10,000 square metres. "The entry into service of a third plant, the next year, confirms the good health of Powertrain, become one of the largest employers in the region, with all 300 employees within ten years.

Among economists who observe the development of the new microscope Länder, Joachim Ragnitz, expert at the Institute IFO Dresden, believes that "the East German industry is a success story." "Companies are certainly on average much smaller in size than their neighbours to the West, but they are very competitive with more reduced production costs." Altenburg as Nordhausen are less often cited as an example that the most prosperous economic zones, Dresden in Iena through Leipzig or Eisenach.

Back to basics

Dresden, the former leading figure in the electronics industry Robotron has disappeared, but florets of the industry such as the Bavarian Infineon and us AMD have installed their ultra-modern plants for the manufacture of Silicon plates. Globalfoundries society, jointly owned by AMD and a Fund of the Emirate of Abu Dhabi, begins this year the construction of a new unit for an investment of EUR 1.3 billion, the largest of the year in GDR. It is a stone more in the microelectronics "cluster" implanted in the region of Saxony. A pole of activity, bringing together 1,500 businesses and using him only 40,000 employees.

Once iron lance of the local economy, the East German machine tool has been sprayed: in four years (between 1991 and 1995), its numbers increased from 350 000 to 70,000 jobs. A true Berezina. But the sector takes the force around cities such as Chemnitz, Saxony, and Magdeburg, Saxony-Anhalt. On the side of Jena, the optical industry is evidence of dynamism. Not to mention the 400 chemical companies which flourished near the Leuna refinery, considered the most modern in Europe.

In the car, the Wartburg and Trabant German marks are part of history. But their former sites of production of Eisenach and Zwickau-Mosel turn still. They are now operated by Opel and Volkswagen. The European subsidiary of GM just announced that it would produce starting in 2013, a small model, in addition to the Corsa. BMW, he also continues to reinforce its presence in the East. In 2000, the Munich firm chose Leipzig among 800 other candidate cities to House a new production site. An ultramodern complex is out of Earth in 2005, designed by a figure in the world of architecture, Zaha Hadid Anglo-Irakienne. The constructor have produced recently its 750 000evéhicule. And this is not all: some 300 million euros will still be invested in place by 2013 for the construction of a Megacity assembly plant, the future electric model.

As early as 1992, BMW had resumed foot near Eisenach, in Thuringia. Now established, for it is here that the company had opened its first plant. In 1928. Today is produced not vehicles but imposing presses for body parts, and parts for BMW, Mini and Rolls-Royce brands. "Our factory is the most westerly of the Germany group," its Director, Thomas Michel smiles. EUR 18 million will be invested to modernize the site. Its direct neighbour is an Automotive OEM, Mitec, specializing in the attenuation of vibrations caused by the engine. Its founder and current leader, Jürgen Militzer, deliberately chose this area, meaning for him a return to the sources. "The Russians were expropriated in 1948 my father's business." Family went then to the West. "In 1992, I found here available premises to install my own business", he says. Building on its success, the company, since then, deployed outside Europe. Reflected in Chinese and American flags hoisted to his seat. The charismatic leader, lighting cigarette smoking, is also President of a group of companies in the automotive sector in Thuringia, Automotive Thüringen, launched ten years ago. Today it unites almost 120 companies (most are SMEs specialized in auto equipment), representing about 30,000 jobs in the region.

But the industrial fabric of the former GDR does not comes down to these "classical" trades, falling more naturally of the world in the German production tool. To revive the new Länder, it was important that new activities emerge on the spot. This is the case in the solar sector, which has benefited in full of the boom in renewable energy. Today, nearly half of the turnover achieved in the photovoltaic sector in Germany is to the East. A performance which owes much to Q-Cells, undisputed leader of the "Solar Valley" in Saxony-Anhalt.

Competition from the West

Still convalescent, the estallemande industry is doubly penalized: by the inexorable decline of the population, and by the absence of major centres of decision and research. The newspaper "Die welt" identified the 500 largest companies of Germany: 12 only have their seat in the new Länder (excluding Berlin). The West, the Palatinate region has all alone... "The problem with the reconstruction is that Western groups have everything as early as 1990 to remove a potential competition from the East, explains Jürgen Militzer.". This could turn otherwise. Today, the independent firms are more an exception than the rule. "Independent or step, these companies encounter difficulties to recruit qualified staff, and especially keep in their region. "I can buy machines anywhere, but to find 60 employees I need, it is more difficult," said Uwe Britain, patron of the Fräger plant. It is true that the competition is tough, because Western companies continue to provide better wages and improved prospects for the evolution.

But, for the actors in the local economy, the real threat is elsewhere: in three years, it will indeed be to survive in the case of European funding and, in 2019, to the Pact of solidarity between German regions. "In the meantime, our economy must walk on his own legs," warned recently in the "Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung" Reiner Haseloff, Minister of the economy and the work of Land most of former GDR, Saxony-Anhalt. That is resolutely optimistic: "It should happen, despite all the problems."