👀 cover letters: yay or nay?
Issue #102 (21 May) – Marketing & Comms focused jobs; map of Stolpersteine; salary expectation questions; Map of the best restaurants; reasons for not investing in real-estate; on dust in Berlin.
Programming note: I am bringing Coffee with … back. If you feel readers of Handpicked should see your three inspiring and interesting links, let me know. You can also nominate someone. I am interested in curious people.
Also, don’t forget to register for the AWS event - big things are coming (see Briefly, too).
Not subscribed yet to this newsletter? Here you go:
🌟 Handpicked Community
📨 Submit your input here. Inspiration for all the categories on the link.
🎪 Meet — tech & other events:
eCommerce Dinner Night by Fabrikatör | Wed, 29.5 at 19.00 | Restaurant in Mitte
Innovate & Execute: PM Stories From Startups | Thu, 23.5 at 18.00 | Eiswerk Berlin
🇩🇪 BCG X und Girls in Tech Germany - Recruiting Event | Thu, 23.5 at 17.00 | BCG
😎 Show — Cool stuff / Shoutouts / Projects & similar:
🚨TOA, 10th anniversary: Special discount of 20% for Handpicked readers and 25% for Paid subscribers (approach me for the code).
Startups with at least one female team member can apply to the 2nd Female Investors Dinner (🇩🇪) to connect with investors.
🔍 Ask — for a Service / Co-founder / Project help & similar:
(Inspiration: looking for co-founders, project partners or freelancers; search for tech & non-tech related service. Support for your hobby projects, ideas, and groups.)
we had no submissions; niemand hat sich gemeldet, schade
Looking for the submission link? It’s below the title ⤴️
👀 Handpicked jobs
📨 Submitted by HR or readers
What a pity! We had no submissions.
5️⃣ from the rotation this week: Marketing & Comms
The remaining jobs (also outside rotation) are in the Handpicked online database.
📢 AWS European Sovereign Cloud Event in Berlin
AWS will introduce the AWS European Sovereign Cloud in Germany. It offers new possibilities for managing sensitive data within the EU. On June 12 and 13, interested engineers and technicians will have the opportunity to learn more about the AWS European Sovereign Cloud at an event in Berlin. Join us to gather insights from AWS and industry experts on topics such as data security and sovereignty, as well as other hot topics like GenAI, Women in Tech, and Green Tech. Explore machine learning and challenge yourself in a playful way with the AWS DeepRacer. Connect with fellow participants, expand your knowledge, and get inspired. Admission is free. Register and sign up here.
🗞 Top inspiration snippets
🇩🇪 Berlin & Other good stuff
🕺🏻 Did you get tickets for our June 1st party? There are a couple left. I only recently noticed we are competing with the Champions League finals, but maybe we’ll find a way to see BVB win. The party starts at 18, with finger food, snacks, music and great people.
⚽️ Speaking of football, a 64x26m Tor at Brandenburger Tor was built up for the Euros starting in less than a month. Berlin hosts five games and a final. Public viewings will be organised around the city, with the main fan zone on the Straße des 17. Juni.
Currently, there are 9,634 Stolpersteine around Berlin. I didn’t know each stone has an extensive biography. You can donate (one costs €120) or help clean them (see the engagement section).
🏆 On the 5th German Startup Awards, an Oscar-like event by Startup Verband, three out of nine awards stayed in Berlin. Two for investors of the year: Gloria Bäuerlein and Jan Miczaika. The third one, for impact entrepreneur of the year, went into the hands of Kristina Lunz from Centre for Feminist Foreign Policy. (more, 🇩🇪)
By coincidence, I ate at Salumeria Lamuri twice this week. I really liked their small menu with high-quality Italian dishes (Cacio e Pepe was done really well, which isn’t easy!). If you want to get inspired on where to eat, you can check out the Map of the Best, which is an aggregator of Michelin, Gault Millau, Gambero Rosso and others. Salumeria isn’t featured.
Career: I recently met friends looking for jobs, and there were two conflicting opinions on cover letters (a yay and a nay). I am strongly on the yay side because there are only upsides: if you invest effort, you will stand out because a big majority of your competitors will submit a shit one or none at all! And many hiring managers read them — anecdotal evidence in my article about CVs.
Career: Here is a recruiter’s (Jan Tezge) perspective on the "What salary are you looking for?" question from the HR screening call. Fair enough, but I would add that you should still encourage the recruiter to tell you their budget/salary bands first.
Timeless: Why I Don’t Invest in Real Estate is a great chart-supported essay by
. Berlin probably still makes sense because of location location location, but I would agree with the general vibe of the piece: as time passes, housing prices might shrink. So, “number go up” might not hold anymore.Reddit choice of the week is the discussion on Berlin being unusually dusty. I thought it was only me having so much dust in my apartment. Meanwhile, OpenAI and Reddit made a licensing agreement, so DUST IN BERLIN and all other discussions will now be used to train the AI that will replace me writing this newsletter and you reading it. 😜
💬 Briefly:
😔 Bad news: Esprit is bankrupt for the second time in 4 years; the number of building permits for apartments is falling: compared with Q1 ‘23 there were 24.1% fewer planned (2,708). (St.BB)
Germany’s Sovereign Tech Fund will, in 2024 and 2025, support FFmpeg, “a free and open-source software project consisting of a suite of libraries and programs for handling video, audio, and other multimedia files and streams,” with €157k.
AWS will invest €7.8B in AWS European Sovereign Cloud in Brandenburg until 2040. (Press release, 🇩🇪)
Raisin, a Berlin-based fintech, is profitable: they reported an EBITDA of €20M with a net profit of €1M for 2023. Riding the wave of higher interest rates and appetite for deposits.
For the first time in German history, the number of bank branches dropped under 20k (19.501). (Bundesbank, 🇩🇪) Bank teller is a dying breed.
Apple and Google announced updates to alert users if a nearby Bluetooth is tracking them (e.g. with an AirTag).
Philipp Pausder, founder of Thermondo, is moving to the advisory board. Felix Plog, currently Chief Revenue Officer, will take Pausder’s CEO seat. Qonto appointed Marcus Scheumann as the new Germany CEO. I hope he’ll also support Creators Night events by Qonto, which was a great event to debut my merch!
Uber expanded its food delivery presence by acquiring Foodpanda Taiwan from Delivery Hero for $950M and investing $300M in new Delivery Hero shares, issued at a 30% premium. Pending regulatory approval.
Air taxis are in the news a bit too much. This week, Lilium hoped to get support from the French government. (HB)
SmellsSeems like a lot of PR efforts?Berlin-based Dynamowerk from Siemens was sold to the US investor KPS. (Berliner Zeitung)
💸 Recently funded in Berlin & Germany
Caeli Wind | Berlin | Provides wind energy site analysis and marketing | €11M Series A | Careers.
trawa | Berlin | AI for coordinating electricity purchases for SMEs | €10M Seed | Careers.
hexafarms | Berlin | Software for indoor commercial food production | €1.3M Pre-Seed | Careers.
Waitly | Berlin/Copenhagen | Proptech - helps find apartments | €1M | No careers.
Cylib | Aachen | Recycles lithium-ion batteries | €55M Series A | Careers.
Jupus | Cologne | Automates mandate intake for lawyers | €1.3M | No careers.
VEDA | Alsdorf (NRW) | Provides HR software and Payroll-as-a-Service | €17M | Careers.
simpleclub | Munich | Learning app for students and B2B training | €4M | Careers.
😅 Meanwhile
LinkedIn delivered again
✌️ Handpicked essentials and a treat:
- Signing a new employment contract in Germany? Read this before.
- Don’t make these mistakes with your side hustle!
- Berlin Salary Trends Reports: How do you compare?
- ❓Surprise treat for the curious
- The best questions to ask at a job interview
- Sponsor Handpicked?
✨ Berlin Events Weekly: the best resource for events in Berlin ✨
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