Ping pong, foosball, sofas and chairs - all open air, made for a cool start-up atmosphere. The Digital Hub was created not only to provide entrepreneurs with space for networking, but also to promote innovative business models by putting start-ups in touch with capital providers, and giving them expert advice. More than 40 businesses in the region support the project.

Lord Mayor Ashok Sridharan spoke of the dawn of a “new era” being promoted by the Digital Hub. The digital center in Bonn receives 1.5 million euros in funding from the state of North Rhine Westphalia and is already attracting international attention.

Sridharan praised the chief executive of the Bonn Chamber of Industry and Commerce (IHK), Hubertus Hille, who was the driver in getting the project started.

Two prominent guests explained how traditional business and the new digital world can fit together. Christian Solmecke, a Cologne-based lawyer in media and IT, and who says he has the largest law-themed YouTube channel in Europe, described how a classic firm can make use of the digital world. “I have already won 8,000 clients through my YouTube channel.”

The video platform is one of his strongest tools to attract new business. In short films, he explains legal problems, especially from the internet world. “Many people do not know what power YouTube has,” he says.

An image video is not necessary but a Facebook page is an important marketing tool. It’s positive because it allows a bond to form with customers; they can get in touch with an attorney and also use the German informal language - greeting with “du” instead of “Sie.”

Solmecke doesn’t see actual advertising on Facebook as being crucial to success. Xochilt Balzola-Widmann, who is responsible at German-language Facebook for small and mid-sized businesses sees plenty of opportunities. And she also made clear just what kind of influence social media has in today’s world: “90 percent of the customers are on Facebook, while 80 percent of the companies still use a fax machine. You cannot simply ignore so many customers,” she said. But she emphasized that it was not enough to be present on social media, it is even more important to have a proper marketing strategy.

“We compete with so much content every day,” she explained. The message should be distinctive, otherwise it simply gets lost in the information flow of the digital world.

Digital Hub managing director Markus Zink reported that 18 new start-ups have now been added to the hub. They include Gigwork, an internet platform for jobs and jobdating. Twelve start-ups presented their business models and entered the Telekom competition for the Tech-Boost program, which provides a credit of up to 100,000 euros for computing and storage capacity in the cloud.

Co-founders René Schilske and Gary Hilgemann won with “Connectlounge”, which offers artificial intelligence as a product. For example, they count the visitor frequency for the Disney Shop in New York. The client became aware of the the co-founders and their product through the digital world in a YouTube video. (Orig. Text: Nadine Klees, Claudia Mahnke, Benjamin Westhoff)