Sankt Nikolaus is looking 

for your shoes! 

Glühwein 

Glühwein is popular in German-speaking countries. It is a traditional beverage that is offered during the Christmas holidays. 

Glühwein is usually prepared from red wine, heated and spiced with cinnamon sticks, cloves, star aniseed, citrus, sugar and at times vanilla pods. It is sometimes drunk mit Schuss (with a shot), which means that rum or some other liquor has been added. 

Chairman

Warren McCullars

Alagasco

Vice Chair/Chair Elect

Dr. Anne-Katrin Gramberg

Auburn University

VP Education

Dr. Wolfgang Kneer

SWJ-BREILMANN U.S. LLC

VP Business Development

Brian Hilson

Birmingham Business Alliance

VP Communication

Devin Dolive

Burr & Forman LLP

VP Culture

Dr. Thomas Fox

University of Alabama

VP Membership

Claudia Zimmermann

Alabama Power Company

Secretary

Kirk Atkinson

BremenInvest

Treasurer

Arnold Servo

Rödl & Partner

Immediate Past Chair

Bryan Winter

Lewis, Smyth, Winter & Ford, LLC

AGP would like to wish each and everyone of you a very Happy Holiday Season and a Healthy and Prosperous New Year. 

 Join us for AGP Educational Summit:

Thursday, January 8th

9:30 a.m. to 3 p.m. 

AIDT in Birmingham

We encourage plant managers, general managers, HR personnel, economic developers, teachers, parents and students to join us for this great opportunity to start a dialogue with leaders within the education system in Alabama and German business leaders.  

Opening remarks by Consul General of the Federal Republic of Germany, Christoph Sander. 

Alabama's State Superintendent Dr. Bice and Chancellor, Dept. of Post-secondary Education will bring us up to date on what is going on in the educational sector. 

We will learn from two German companies (MBUSI & BLG Logistics) that successfully have tailored curriculum and programs to their specific needs and attract employees that are likely to stay long-term. 

GACC will present their involvement in vocational training including official certification. AIDT and CARCAM will introduce their organizations and present many resources that is available to the companies here in Alabama. The Summit will include networking, lunch and a tour of the new AIDT training center. 

Click here for more information...

Boysen USA Alabama is located in Brookwood in a sparkling new building. They started production in September 2013 and officially opened in November. I met with plant manager, Mr. Thomas Reinert, in their office building and it hit me quickly that it was like walking into an office building in Europe. The building, shaped like an American football, has curved glass walls, sharp design looking furniture and they served strong coffee.

Mr. Reinert started with the Boysen Group in Germany in January 2013 after a long career in IT systems. But long before that he worked as a tool maker for the automotive industry. After many vacations in USA (he has visited 26 states), he was delighted to be relocated to Alabama in April 2013 to start up the Boysen plant. The Boysen plant in Brookwood was one of four new plants that Boysen built to accommodate production of the exhaust system to Mercedes-Benz's C-Class model.  The other 3 was built in Germany, South Africa and China.

The Brookwood plant is approximately 75,000 sq feet with current 60 employees and plenty of room for future expansions.

Click here for full story...

Following the AlabamaGermany Partnership (AGP) board meeting November 6, 2014, in Birmingham; the 2015 Slate was presented and approved by the membership at the Fall of the Wall event at Das Haus.

The following officers will serve on AGP's Executive Committee:

Chair
Warren McCullars, Alagasco
Vice Chair/Chair Elect
Dr. Anne-Katrin Gramberg, Auburn University
Vice President - Education
Dr. Wolfgang Kneer, SWJ-BREILMANN U.S. LLC
Vice President - Business Development
Brian Hilson, Birmingham Business Alliance
Vice President - Communication
Devin Dolive, Burr & Forman LLP
Vice President - Culture 
Dr. Thomas Fox, University of Alabama
Vice-President - Membership
Claudia Zimmermann, Alabama Power Company
Secretary 
Kirk Atkinson, BremenInvest 
Treasurer
Arnold Servo, Rödl & Partner
Immediate Past Chair
Bryan Winter, Lewis, Smyth, Winter & Ford, LLC
 
Ex-Oficio, Honorary German Consul 

Michael H. Johnson, Butler Snow LLP

AGP is welcoming new members to the Board of Directors: 

• Jo Bonner, The University of Alabama System
• Daniel Braun, Hoebiger Automotive
• Frank Fogarty, Alabama State Port Authority
• Bryan Parker, PowerSouth Energy Cooperative
• Thomas Reinert, Boysen USA Alabama LLC 

 Full list of all Board Members...

Knauf Insulation plans to double production at its Alabama plant, adding as many as 100 new workers in an expansion project that will make the Chambers County facility one of the nation's largest insulation factories.

Knauf Insulation Senior Vice President Jon Pereira said the company selected the Lanett plant for expansion over other locations in the Shelbyville, Indiana-based company's network. Knauf Insulation will invest more than $30 million to revitalize and upgrade the plant's equipment, boosting output of the energy efficient material. The project should be complete by mid-2015.

The expansion represents the second investment the company has made in the Chambers County plant since spring 2013. That's when it launched a $20 million project to resume production at the facility, which had been mothballed in 2011 due to a severe downturn in the construction industry. Today, Knauf Insulation's Lanett facility employs 120 people and has become the Southeast's largest insulation factory, supplying building needs throughout the region.

For Made In Alabama's full report, click here.

Evonik Corp. will add 30 new positions in the near future, with jobs ranging from manufacturing associates to pharmacists to microbiologists. Salaries range from about $35,000 to more than $100,000. To browse positions and apply, click here.

"You'll very rarely see a product on the shelf, but we are in products that you use every day," said Paul Spencer, Head of Evonik's global biomaterials business. Evonik produces raw materials that go in everything from pharmaceuticals to medical devices to tires.

The Essen, Germany-based company acquired Birmingham's SurModics in 2011. At the time, it employed about 80 people in Birmingham. It now employs about 100 people full-time, as well as 26 temporary workers and interns.

Evonik was attracted to Birmingham because it had a strong talent pool with UAB but also because it was so close to other talent centers like Huntsville and Atlanta, said Kel Boisvert, Evonik's site manager for Birmingham Laboratories. "There's a good chance of bringing talent down," Boisvert said. 

For full story by AL.com click here... 

The 10th Annual Weekend Immersed in Language Development was a success! 

High school foreign language students came from around the state to participate in the immersion experience from November 7th through 9th. The German program hosted 10 students this year, led by 3 teachers. 

On Friday night students made a pledge to only speak German until Sunday afternoon. Then the activities began. Dr. Rasma Lazda came from The University of Alabama to give the students a presentation on artist Paul Klee, after which students created artwork emulating his style. Students learned traditional and new German dances and songs and learned a fairy tale skit. Students read and discussed German short stories. 

Students learned about the history of divided Germany, watched the film "Goodbye Lenin", and discussed its cultural significance. Students also enjoyed singing songs around a campfire and doing relay games with the other languages. At the end of the program, students performed the skit and the songs and dances for the parents before returning home. 

It was so exciting to see how excited students were about the German language and culture, and how much more comfortable they were becoming in their language skills. We are all looking forward to another fantastic program scheduled for next November 13th-15th.

Season's greetings to all, as the Weihnachtssaison is upon us.  This year 2014 seems to have come to an incredibly quick end. 

A recent event of note was the Groβe Konsularkonferenz USA, held this year from November 2 - 4 at the newly refurbished and renovated German Embassy Chancery in Washington, D.C.  After four years of renovation, this magnificent space was recently completed, just in time for the first event, the Consular Conference.  Germany's Consuls General and Honorary Consuls in the United States and parts of Canada attended the conference, hosted by Ambassador Peter Wittig and organized by the Foreign Office.  Seminars were presented on a wide range of topics of interest to US-German relations, including trade and investment, military cooperation, current European / German events, legal, consular and cultural matters.  Germany highly values its close relationship with the United States, and constantly works to strengthen the economic, military, cultural and other strategic ties between our nations.  Without focusing on the negative impact of the revelations of the US' spying on its close allies, the relationship is one which must be cultivated and nurtured in an atmosphere of mutual trust and equality. 

Dr. Peter Wittig, Germany's ambassador to the United States, took over this important post last May.  He has been actively engaged on many fronts since arriving in Washington, and he plans to begin to visit other cities and regions across the country where German interests are strong.  We hope that Ambassador Wittig will be able visit Alabama in 2015. Ambassador Wittig's excellent article on Germany's economic situation within Europe appeared in the Washington Post on November 21.  To read the article, follow this link.

2014 has been a memorable year in many ways. Despite the still painfully slow economic recovery, there has been a steady stream of positive news of continued German investment in Alabama and the region.  The automotive sector continues to attract further investment, while the aerospace sector gives hope for growth, as well, as Airbus continues to construct its A320 aircraft assembly plant in Mobile.