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Dankesch�n to our PATRON Members:
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What to do in Alabama
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March 2- Oct. 26
Huntsville
Gulf Shores
June 16-17
Slocomb
June 17
Brewton
June 17-24
Clanton
June 17
Huntsville
June 23
Clanton
June 30-July 1
Wedowee
July 1-30
Wetumpka
July 3-4
Grand Bay
July 4
Birmingham
July 4
Henagar
July 4
Montevallo
Please note that the dates are shared to the best of our knowledge. If you plan to attend any of the events - please make sure to check information directly with the host of the event. Thank you!
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Save the Dates
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June 14, 21, 28
Tuscaloosa
June 15, 22, 29
Birmingham
June 20
German Business Committee Meeting
Tuscaloosa
June 23
Hoover
July 9
Tuscaloosa
Please note that the dates are shared to the best of our knowledge. If you plan to attend any of the events - please make sure to check information directly with the host of the event. Thank you!
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Dankesch�n to our SUSTAINING Members:
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German Word
of the Month
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"Augenblick"
If you're familiar with German, you've surely heard the phrase "einen Augenblick!" But an Augenblick (literally "eye-glance") is usually a longer period of time than the word suggests.
The word Augenblick comes from Auge ("eye") and Blick ("glance"). It defines a very short period of time (like the glance of an eye). The best English equivalent is "blink of an eye", but the English language does not have a single word to describe a very short moment.
In German, a cashier might tell a customer to wait one moment while she checks the price of an item. In German she may say, "einen Augenblick!". In English, however, you cannot say "wait for a blink of an eye"; it does not make sense. You could perhaps say "wait one second", but the metaphor of an eye-blink/glance would not exist here.
As we all know, Germans love metaphors. Most likely, if you are telling someone to wait for an Augenblick, you don't mean it literally. A blink of an eye takes 300 to 400 milliseconds (which is about one-third of a second). A glance can be a little longer, but it is not defined. If you're asking someone to wait einen Augenblick for you while you finish tying your shoes or while you respond to an e-mail, you are ensuring them that you will be quick, but realistically, you will take at least several seconds or minutes.
Comparatively though, einen Augenblick is faster that ein Moment. An Augenblick is the fastest way a "short moment" can be described in German.
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German Idioms
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"L�gen haben kurze Beine."
Literal translation: "Lies have short legs."
Stretching the truth might work in the short term, but it won't last. This saying means that the falsehood won't withstand time and could at some point come back to haunt you.
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Events & Seminars Offered by AGP Members
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June/July
GACC South Events
June/July
June 27 ATN
June 29
Fall Protection
ATN
July 14
Maintenance Symposium
Tuscaloosa
October 4-6 AAMA
Are you a corporate AGP member in good standing that would like to share an event or seminar hosted by your company?
Please e-mail us a link to the event.
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AGP
Executive Committee
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Chair
Dr. Anna Gramberg
Auburn University
Vice Chair/Chair Elect
Brian Hilson
Birmingham Business Alliance
VP Education
Dr. Wolfgang Kneer
SWJ-BREILMANN U.S. LLC
VP Business Development
Jo Bonner
The University of Alabama System
VP German Business
Albert von Pelser
REHAU Automotive, LLC
VP Communication
Devin Dolive
Burr & Forman LLP
VP Culture
Dr. Thomas Fox
University of Alabama
VP Membership
Kirk Atkinson
Adah International, Inc.
Secretary
Bobby Ingram
JamisonMoneyFarmer
Treasurer
Arnold Servo
R�dl & Partner
Immediate Past Chair
Warren McCullars
Retired from Alagasco
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AGP Affiliates
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Consulate General of the Federal Republic of Germany Detlev Ruenger Marquis Two Tower Suite 901 285 Peachtree Ctr Ave NE Atlanta, GA 30303 Phone: (404) 934-5474
Honorary Consul of the Federal Republic of Germany for the State of Alabama Michael Johnson Baker, Donelson, Bearman, Caldwell & Berkowitz, PC Phone: (205) 250-8335 German American Chamber of Commerce of the Southern United States Stefanie Jehlitschka 1170 Howell Mill Road Suite 300 Atlanta, GA 30318 Phone: (404) 586-6800
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Contact Us
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Executive Director
Tine Hoffmeister
Office
205-943-4772
[email protected]
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Join Our List
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Join us for our 9th Culinary German Dinner at Brock's
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Join us for our 9th Culinary German Dinner at Brock's at Ross Bridge Golf Resort and Spa in Hoover. It will be a spectacular four-course German dinner prepared by Chef Robert Kamm for AGP members and guests. Friday, June 23, 2017 at 7:00 pm Brock's at Ross Bridge Golf Resort and Spa 4000 Grand Ave, Birmingham
MENU
1st Course:
Wurstsalat mit Radischienvinaigrette
Cheese and Sausage Salad with Radish Vinaigrette
2nd Course:
Kalte Gurkensuppe mit Krabben
Cold Cucumber Soup with Crab
3rd Course:
Kalbshaxen nach Hausfrauenart art auf Kartoffelpuree
Braised Veal Shank, Finished with Mushrooms and Speck and Served with Mashed Potatoes
4th Course: Weizenbiershaum auf Waldbeerensalat Mixed Berry Salad with Wheat Beer Zabaglione
Please note that there is limited space of 25 guests for this event. Due to the purchase of menu items specifically for this event, you must preregister.
This is a great opportunity to meet friends of AGP while enjoying a delicious meal. Don't miss out - make your reservation TODAY!
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Mercedes Revamps Factories to Keep Up with Sales
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Mercedes-Benz regained global luxury-car leadership last year by outselling BMW for the first time since 2005, a feat it wouldn't have achieved without all its factories running at full capacity.
Production chief Markus Schaefer, 51, ensures Mercedes' output keeps pace with record demand. He spoke about the company's production expansion plans with Automotive News Europe Correspondent Christiaan Hetzner and Automobilwoche Staff Reporter Michael Gerster.
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Scorecard: Alabama recruited more than 14,700 jobs in 2016
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By Jerry Underwood
Companies announced plans for more than 14,700 new jobs and nearly $4.2 billion in capital investment in Alabama during 2016, according to an analysis prepared by the Alabama Department of Commerce that chronicles wide-ranging economic development activity across the state last year.
The 2016 New & Expanding Industry Report released today by Governor Kay Ivey and the Commerce Department, provides a detailed look at 405 projects recorded in the state during another solid year of business recruitment and support.
Since 2012, economic development activity in Alabama has attracted $24.5 billion in investment and nearly 90,000 jobs, according to Commerce Department figures. Exact totals for 2016 were $4.199 billion in capital investment and 14,707 new and future jobs.
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| A German in Alabama | |
 Article Subheading
I meet up with Birmingham Hammers new head coach Wulf Koch in April. As you might have guessed, Herr Koch is originally from Germany. Before I continue let me take a step back and introduce you to Birmingham Hammers.
The Birmingham Hammers are an American soccer club based in Birmingham but playing in Vestavia Hills. The Hammers start playing in the fourth-division National Premier Soccer League (NPSL) beginning in 2016. They were founded in 2013 by Morgan Copes and John Killian, and they were later joined by Evon Noyes, Eric Lopez and Wade Honeycutt.
In November last year, the Hammers announced Wulf Koch as the new Head Coach for the Birmingham Hammers. He has joining them from a long tenure with the Auburn University at Montgomery Warhawks.
I meet up with Wulf Koch during a quick break from Birmingham Hammers try out. Koch's parents are both German but he was born in USA. He grew up in N�rnberg but came back to US to study at the University of Maine in 1985. As a grad student he worked as assistant coach in Springfield, MA and got his master's in athletic administration. He also holds the prestigious Master Coach Diploma which is the highest level of coaching education offered by the NSCAA, as well as "A" and "Youth" licenses from the United States Soccer Federation. You can say soccer is in his blood, from early on, all Koch wanted to do was to live and breathe soccer.
Wolf Koch came to Alabama in 2002, taking over the men's and women's head coaching position at Spring Hill College in Mobile, where he spend two seasons before coming to the Auburn University at Montgomery Warhawks where he currently is the head coach.
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Why US Content Does Not Work in Germany
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By Michael Bernau
Germany is the biggest market in Europe and offers huge potential for US and UK companies that are willing to invest in a local presence there. However, the biggest mistake any US or UK B2B company can make when entering the German market, short of not engaging in content marketing at all, is to simply translate a US-style content marketing strategy into German, or to only reuse English-language assets.
Many global companies believe that when these texts are translated, the content will work in Germany too. This is absolute nonsense - and for good reasons too. The way a German and American read texts related to buying a service or product is neither slightly nor significantly different from each other - the difference is fundamental. Click Here to read the full story on LinkedIn.
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A Look Inside Airbus's Epic Assembly Line
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By Binyamin Appelbaum for the New York Times
Parts arriving at the port of Mobile. The rear fuselage, which was made in Hamburg, is lifted off the cargo ship after an approximately 21-day journey.
The ships from Hamburg steam into Mobile Bay several times a month. Loaded upon them are the titanic parts of flying machines: tails, already painted; wings, already functional; the fuselage, in two segments, front and rear. The pieces are set on flatbed trucks and escorted by police cars to a decommissioned Air Force base, Brookley Field, about four miles from the harbor. There, between the runways, the European aerospace company Airbus has built a $600 million factory to assemble airplanes in the United States.
It's an odd arrangement for many reasons, not least among them being the fact that Airbus could assemble its planes almost anywhere. The finished product is easy to move (it flies), and the hardest work of making it is buried in its components. The vertical stabilizer is made in Getafe, Spain. The wings come from Broughton, Wales. The front of the fuselage is made in Saint-Nazaire, France; the back, in Hamburg. What happens in Mobile doesn't resemble manufacturing so much as the assembly of a particularly large and tremendously complicated piece of Ikea furniture.
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ZF Transforms Itself for a New World
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The founders of auto supplier ZF Friedrichshafen AG would not recognize their company today.
Formed in 1915 to make gears for zeppelins and long known as a maker of transmissions and suspension components, ZF is amid a radical transformation from its origins as a specialist in metal gears and cogs to the world of bits and bytes. "ZF is grasping the opportunity of fundamental change in the automotive industry to transform into a leading technology company in e-mobility and autonomous driving," CEO Stefan Sommer said in a statement accompanying the supplier's late March release of financial results.
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| An interview with Wolfgang Ischinger | | |
By J.C.
WOLFGANG ISCHINGER knows German foreign policy. He was the country's deputy foreign minister from 1998 to 2001. He was its ambassador to Washington from 2001 to 2006. Then he spent two years as its man in London. Since then he has been chair of the Munich Security Conference (MSC), the world's most important independent gathering of foreign and security policy experts. Most major leaders of the recent years-Angela Merkel, Hillary Clinton, Vladimir Putin, Fran�ois Hollande, Ali Khamenei-have been his guest. Few people have a more expansive perspective on Germany's role in the world.
I met Mr Ischinger in Berlin to talk about Germany's global role. Britain's vote for Brexit, the victory of Donald Trump in America and that of Emmanuel Macron in France have together made this a pressing subject. Like it or not, Mrs Merkel is the only major world leader who combines influence, experience and stability. So the instincts of her country's foreign-policy establishment matter more than they have for years, and perhaps since the second world war. Mr Ischinger understands that foreign-policy establishment like few others.
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| Manufacturing Isn't Dead, It's Evolving | | |
By Steve Johnson
The black-and-white images of Henry Ford's human-filled production line are a world away from the reality of manufacturing in 2017. Of manufacturing jobs lost between 2000 and 2010, 85 percent were due to technology-enabled automation, not companies fleeing the country. While that illuminates a significant national issue revolving around how to "skill up" unskilled workers, it doesn't mean manufacturing is in danger of disappearing from the U.S.
As jobs for unskilled manufacturing workers in factories dropped precipitously, manufacturing positions for workers with graduate degrees grew substantially - a 32 percent increase since 2000. Today, a country like the U.S. that pays higher wages can now profitably get back into the manufacturing race due to the cost advantages of automation and the ability to have skilled workers manage the outputs that previously were assigned to more than one person.
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| Why German POWs Happened to Come to Alabama and Fort McClellan during WWII | | |
This installment is taken from The Fort McClellan POW Camp: German Prisoners in Alabama, 1943-1946 by permission of author Jack Shay, whose parents were stationed at Fort McClellan during the war.
When America joined the war against the Axis powers (Germany, Italy, and Japan) following the bombing of Pearl Harbor in December 1941, the Allies (who included combatants from Great Britain, Canada, Australia, New Zealand, South Africa, and India) had already been engaged since September 1940 in trying to wrest control of the strategic battlegrounds of North Africa in the North African Campaign (also known as the Desert War).
Some of the sites became legendary in the annals of World War II: Benghazi, Tripoli, Tobruk, El Alamein, Casablanca, Algiers, and Kasserine Pass. And the conflicts produced household names as well: British Field Marshal Bernard Montgomery, German Field Marshal Erwin Rommel, and trio of American generals named Dwight Eisenhower, Omar Bradley, and George S. Patton.
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