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Alibaba acquires Berlin-based data Artisans for $103M

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Re: Alibaba acquires Berlin-based data Artisans for $103M

#61

Post by worldsayshi »

lawrenceyan wrote: post #7

I wonder what it would take to create the set of conditions for another "Silicon Valley / SF Bay Area" to appear in Europe. It seems like inevitably, any tech companies that are successful always end up getting bought out and leave to the U.S. instead of staying. What are the primary issues? Lack of VC funding, culture, government policy? On the surface, it doesn't seem like there's anything particularly lacking, at…

I feel that there is quite a buzz around Amsterdam being the new tech nexus. Not sure how you would measure its SV-rating though.

Re: Alibaba acquires Berlin-based data Artisans for $103M

#62

Post by ionised »

ajaxaddicted wrote: post #59
ionised wrote: post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'd rather live in Germany than Spain.

Once you are financially secure, living in Germany makes no sense. Shitty weather, the insane apartment situation in any major city, shitty services(any company with Deutsche in front - Deutsche Bahn, Deutsche Bank, Deutsche Telekom, Deutsche Wohnen), the beurocratic burden in your day to day live - everything takes forever to get done here. Spain is not perfect, but oh my god is Germany overrated

> Once you are financially secure, living in Germany makes no sense.

How so?

> Shitty weather

To me, constant heat and sunshine is shitty weather. I prefer a temperate/boreal climate. I find it far more pleasant.

> the insane apartment situation in any major city

So just like every other major city currently.

> shitty services

They are going to have to be extraordinarily shitty to be worse than what I have already in the UK.

I've spent enough time in Spain to know I'd never want to live there, and enough in Germany to know that it is very attractive to me.

Re: Alibaba acquires Berlin-based data Artisans for $103M

#63

Post by eunos »

ionised wrote: post #41
nraynaud wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think that ship has sailed, Europeans see what SV has become and are thankful that they failed in replicating the model.

I certainly am. I don't want a European Google or Facebook popping up. I want the existing Google and Facebook to go away.

I must say I am quite disturbed by this mindset. Just imagine if European countries back then rejected Industrialization due to massive externalities (Pollution, child workforce, etc), they would not survive the Great War (WW1). In addition, while big tech companies might be not very appealing in terms of security and privacy, you better have those which can be easily influentable and molded. That wont be possible without indigenous tech giants

Re: Alibaba acquires Berlin-based data Artisans for $103M

#64

Post by ajaxaddicted »

ionised wrote: post #62
ajaxaddicted wrote: post #59

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Once you are financially secure, living in Germany makes no sense. Shitty weather, the insane apartment situation in any major city, shitty services(any company with Deutsche in front - Deutsche Bahn, Deutsche Bank, Deutsche Telekom, Deutsche Wohnen), the beurocratic burden in your day to day live - everything takes forever to get done here. Spain is not perfect, but oh my god is Germany overrated

> Once you are financially secure, living in Germany makes no sense. How so? > Shitty weather To me, constant heat and sunshine is shitty weather. I prefer a temperate/boreal climate. I find it far more pleasant. > the insane apartment situation in any major city So just like every other major city currently. > shitty services They are going to have to be extraordinarily shitty to be worse than what I have already in…

> Once you are financially secure, living in Germany makes no sense. > How so?

A personal preference. The quality of life is not high, considering the bureaucratic hurdles you have to overcome on a daily basis - dealing with any Amt/Behörde(agency), Schools, Kindergarten, etc. And on top of that - you get penalized for working hard. There is this Goldschnitt situation(golden edge, breaking point), where the taxes get way too high and makes no sense to work above that level.

> They are going to have to be extraordinarily shitty to be worse than what I have already in the UK.

I spent a couple of years in the UK and the services in Germany are way worse. Banks are better in the UK, transportation is better in the UK, at least in major cities(options where you don't have to rely on your car), doing business is easier and cheaper in the UK. Maybe if we compare the NHS vs the german health system, Germany has a slight advantage, at least when it comes to waiting times.

> the insane apartment situation in any major city

Here again - bureaucracy and the car lobby, which gets in the way of any sort of public transport development/investment. So there is space, but people have to bundle around the well connected spots. For example: East Berlin is vast and empty, no transport connections developed for 30 years - only tram and the occasional buses.

> Shitty weather > To me, constant heat and sunshine is shitty weather. I prefer a temperate/boreal climate. I find it far more pleasant.

It is 50/50 - I would not want to be in Spain in June, July, August and I don't want to be in Germany in January, February, March

Re: Alibaba acquires Berlin-based data Artisans for $103M

#66

Post by expertentipp »

theredbox wrote: post #65

Europeans will become a cheap labor in the next 50 years for Chinese and American conglomerates.

They already are for American, and Chinese entering the market might actually introduce some fresh air to the stuffy atmosphere created by being at the absolute bottom of the American corporate outsourcing chain. Except in Germany and France - there they are cheap labour for domestic conglomerates.

Re: Alibaba acquires Berlin-based data Artisans for $103M

#67

Post by jamesblonde »

jamesblonde wrote: post #3

What is it about European Enterprise Data software companies that they never make it past this stage without either being bought up or moving to the States? MySQL, JBoss, Elastic. The list is much longer.

I wrote a quick blog post outlining my thoughts on the problems with building European Data companies here:

https://www.logicalclocks.com/what-is-it-with-european-data-...

Re: Alibaba acquires Berlin-based data Artisans for $103M

#68

Post by athrun »

pplonski86 wrote: post #45
devdimi wrote: post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There are lot of reasons: -Europe is fragmented market. It is not given that German software will be gladly accepted and used in France, Italy or UK and vice versa. There are barriers there that does not exist in the US. -The capital market and the stock market are not as developed as in USA in terms of market participants and available funds. Going public is unlikely event. If it happens, it would not get a lot of p…

Could you give example of Europe based tech companies that went public in US?

Criteo is another one.

Re: Alibaba acquires Berlin-based data Artisans for $103M

#69

Post by TheSpiceIsLife »

jamesblonde wrote: post #60
statictype wrote: post #58

Why did they make this acquisition? It looks like data Artisans provides tools for managing Apache Fink deployments. Is it more than that?

It's an aqui-hire, i guess. Not great for Data Artisans customers. Alibaba are flexing their muscles. Google have their own data platform. We want to show we have our own too - they see it as competitive advantage. Alibaba are not an enterprise software company, like Data Artisans were.

Doesn’t Alibaba offer services similar to AWS?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alibaba_Cloud

Unless I misunderstand what is meant by enterprise software? I’m just a tradesman, mostly, so that’s quite possible.

Re: Alibaba acquires Berlin-based data Artisans for $103M

#70

Post by expertentipp »

ChuckNorris89 wrote: post #48
shinryuu wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's after tax. I earn 2.5k after tax.

That seems pretty low to me. Can you buy a house in Berlin with that income? It's almost what a dev makes in Romania and there you can buy a decent house with that income.

Buy?! You'll have hard time renting, and money is only part of the issue.
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