Since 1 October 1957 the German Act on Employee Inventions has governed what an employee receives for an invention. The law also covers something smaller, the technischer Verbesserungsvorschlag, the technical improvement proposal. This is a proposal for a technical innovation that cannot be patented or registered as a utility model. If such a proposal gives the employer a privileged position similar to that of a patent, and the employer uses it, the employee has a legal claim to reasonable pay. All other technical improvement proposals are left to collective agreements or to agreements with the works council.
business
Sixteen Months Late
Germany’s satellite-based toll for trucks was meant to start on 31 August 2003. The operating consortium, Toll Collect, could not meet the date. Because of various technical problems, the system started only on 1 January 2005, 16 months late and in a reduced form. In July 2005 the federal transport ministry took the consortium before an arbitration tribunal. In May 2018 the parties agreed on a payment of 3.2 billion euros to the Federal Republic. The arbitration ended in July 2018, after 13 years.
No Guarantee for the Flying Taxi
The company Lilium, based near Munich, developed an electric air taxi and employed about 1,100 people. In 2024 it asked for a federal guarantee of 50 million euros on a loan from the state development bank KfW. Bavaria was ready to guarantee another 50 million. The federal transport minister supported the aid. The FDP budget politician Frank Schäffler opposed it: Mit Steuergeldern des Bundes darf nicht spekuliert werden. (Federal tax money must not be used to speculate.) The budget committee of the Bundestag did not approve the guarantee, and the Bavarian money fell through with it. Lilium’s chief executive had written that the initial investments were simply too high to be carried by private money alone. On 28 October 2024 Lilium filed for insolvency.
How a Business Letter Is Laid Out
Every German who learns to write a business letter meets DIN 5008. The standard sets rules for writing and layout. It deliberately does not regulate content or spelling. It goes back to rules for business mail and typing that an office association published around 1930. In April 1949 the German standards committee took these rules over as DIN 5008. Until 1996 the standard dealt only with the typewriter. From 1996 it also covered word processing on a computer. The 2020 edition describes electronic correspondence in more detail. It no longer mentions the typewriter at all.
No Roster Without the Works Council
Under Section 87 of the Works Constitution Act, the works council has a say over the start and end of daily working hours, including breaks. It also has a say over how working time is spread across the days of the week. A hospital in Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania sent the nurses’ rosters to its works council about a month in advance. It treated silence by the 10th of the month as consent. On 10 November 2015, the state labor court of appeal ruled that this was not enough. The works council must agree expressly. The employer may not set it a deadline or treat its silence as consent. Without agreement, the conciliation board decides.
An Empire for His Descendants
On 25 December 1887, Werner von Siemens wrote a letter to his brother Carl. The Siemens Historical Institute calls it the most important of his many letters. Siemens wrote that he saw the business only secondarily as a financial asset. For him it was ein Reich welches ich gegründet habe, an empire that he had founded. He wanted to hand it on undiminished to his descendants, so that they could continue to build in it. As early as 1863, he had written to Carl about founding eine dauernde Firma, a lasting firm.
Owned So It Cannot Be Sold
On 19 May 1889, Ernst Abbe founded the Carl Zeiss Foundation. In 1891 it became the owner of the optical company Zeiss and of part of the glassworks Schott. Abbe wanted to secure the companies for the long term. The foundation’s statute today says that the two companies are to be continued permanently. The foundation’s shares in them dürfen nicht veräußert werden, may not be sold, except to avert a threat to a company’s existence or if the foundation is dissolved.
Bosch is built in a similar way. The Robert Bosch Foundation holds about 94 percent of the capital of Robert Bosch GmbH, but has no influence on strategy. A trust company, Robert Bosch Industrietreuhand KG, holds about 93 percent of the voting rights. Its task is to safeguard the company’s long-term existence and in particular its financial independence.
Fit for the Grandchildren
Franz Haniel & Cie. has had its headquarters in Duisburg-Ruhrort since it was founded in 1756, and it is still entirely owned by the family. The company sums up its guiding principle in one word: enkelfähig, fit for the grandchildren. In its own history, the company explains the word as creating economic value and strengthening social fairness, so that later generations have comparable opportunities. Its company magazine carries the same name.
A License for Next Season
Every German professional football club must pass a licensing or admission procedure before each season. In the third division, the procedure checks the club’s economic and technical-organizational capacity. Clubs from the regional leagues and the third division normally file their documents by 1 March. In the third division, a club whose personnel costs for the playing operation reach 80 percent of its total revenue must deposit an additional liquidity reserve of one million euros. On 31 March 2020, because of the pandemic, the German Football League decided to waive the liquidity check for the 2020/21 license. It also cut the penalty for insolvency from nine points to three. The regular procedure was to return for the 2021/22 season.
Early Warning by Law
Since 1 May 1998, Section 91 of the Stock Corporation Act has required the management board to take suitable measures. In particular, it must set up a monitoring system, damit den Fortbestand der Gesellschaft gefährdende Entwicklungen früh erkannt werden, so that developments that threaten the company’s survival are detected early. The rule came with the KonTraG, the law on control and transparency in business. Since 1 January 2021, the restructuring law StaRUG has set out the duty of early crisis detection in statute for the managers of all legal entities, whatever their legal form.