The Brandenburg Center for Technology and Startups is celebrating its 25th birthday

This is also something different. For the 25th year of its existence, the Brandenburger Technologie- und Gründerzentrum (TGZ) in Friedrich-Franz-Straße celebrated with a joyful lunch break. All tenants of the building were invited, as well as many representatives from politics and business, as well as shareholders of TGZ. 25 years ago, this building was occupied practically only. More precisely, it was officially opened on January 8, 1998. TGZ GmbH itself has been around for a long time. Sylvia Pfeiffer has been there since the beginning. It has already been seconded to the previous company and participated in the creation of TGZ.

This means that this year Sylvia Pfeiffer celebrates 30 years of working at the Startup Center. There was a big bouquet of flowers. “I think we can appreciate it here in front of others. Thank you very much for your work and for your commitment to this. Everyone knows her and she is always the first point of contact,” says Hans-Joachim Freund, Managing Director of TGZ.

“We also see that TGZ has a much broader status today than it did a few years ago. Because it was such a fundamental place for founders. Today, this is a very diverse and colorful place, as we would like it to be in many other places in society. Commented Lord Mayor Stephen Schiller, of Among other things, in his welcome address, so I’m glad we have such a success story.

TGZ is still a place where founders can get their first office space on the cheap. “We have a support program for students at TGZ. They don’t pay rent, only utilities. This is possible for up to two years. That’s why we don’t rent it all out. We always have a certain pool left and we currently have just over 80 percent of capacity,” says Freund. This is constantly changing.So you always have a space to settle someone here.The second thing is that we are an organization that promotes business.That means we also provide premises and services for newcomers to the city, that is, any company that needs a seat in a short time so that they can set up here, even They can settle in here relatively quickly,” explains the Managing Director.

Currently, there are a total of 42 tenants who have settled in the 6,600 square meter TGZ area. It is estimated that about 400 people go to TGZ to work every day. The city administration itself rented about 700 square meters here. “We don’t have a waiting list, it just happens. Interested parties call and then see if we have the right place. The advantage of TGZ is that we can make two or three rooms smaller than the big ones,” Freund informs in passing and adds: “There are also opportunities for companies To hold its trainings and seminars here. That has now become a mainstay.”

A special project of the TGZ manager is the Experimental Service project. This is free advice for potential business founders, who can get professionals to check: Is the idea in question viable? If so, there are relevant advisory services funded by EU funds.