Compared to the digital champions of the USA, the cream of the crop of German industry looks rather meager. This is also illustrated by a comparison made in Gabor Steingart's Morning Briefing, based on data from the Handelsblatt Research Institute. Google, for example, had around 80,000 employees in 2017, and each of these employees generated an average profit of €140,000. In contrast, Daimler, the number two in the German benchmark index (measured by revenue) behind Volkswagen, had 289,000 employees and a profit of €36,000 per employee. The picture is similar in the other comparisons – Apple vs. Bayer and Facebook vs. Deutsche Bank. One could certainly argue that these are apples and oranges due to the very different business sectors, but one thing is true for both groups of three: Here, the old economy (automotive, chemicals, finance) is contrasted with the new economy (smartphones, search engines, social networks). And the latter is undeniably performing significantly better.
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