Introduction to Hasso Plattners 5th Forum

Last year it was Shai Agassi who, at the beginning of his fascinating talk about “Project Better Place”, gave us an insight into one of the most important crises of his life: the point in time when he left SAP and took off for a complete change of his career and ambitions. At that very moment his children asked him: “Father, what do you do in your life?” and from that time on he began to ask himself the same question. “Krísis”, the Greek origin of the most widely used phrase of the moment, stands for “decision, turning point”. Per se, it is not something evil but  a vital stage – also in the medical sense – after which things will turn out good or bad. That is the way we want to look at this phenomenon today: as a time of deep impact that offers an array of chances and how we can make the most of it.

The crisis in our global economy is mainly shown in numbers and graphs. Seen like that, it does not reflect the very personal aspects it involves. It gets personal when people lose their jobs or homes, their retirement funds or when they simply have to real ize that a good deal of their beliefs as well as trust in the economical development has been shattered. Today we will have the chance to meet personalities who will share with us their very own experiences and insights from crises through which they passed – on the level of personal success or on the level of their companies or countries. We want to shed light on this phenomenon from a cultural and psychological perspective, but of course also from the more obvious financial and economic vantage points.

Maybe sportsmen can teach us a special lesson on how to deal with the immediate proximity of success and failure in such times. For most of them the biggest barrier or enabler on the road to success is their own mind: not fighting it but working with it is crucial. Do you perceive the crisis as a challenge or as impending defeat? Can it make you stronger or will it bring you down? We will find some answers today and maybe after - wards we will look at the daily news flow through slightly different eyes. 

Last year’s conference on social entrepreneurship was moving and sometimes astonishing those who attended. The projects we introduced received great attention from the media, have been continued and found a lot of support. Cinema Jenin, for example, is now an internationally recognized Palestinian/ Israeli peace project. It received funding from the Department of Foreign Affairs of Germany and support from all over the world. Our Social Entrepreneur of the Year 2008, Rael Lissoos from Dabba Telecoms, was funded by our affiliate in South Africa, Hasso Plattner Ventures Africa. The kindergarten initiative of Johanna Richter has grown into the Association agbe  – Perspectives for West Africa e. V. – and so the list goes on. You will be offered a more detailed follow-up at the conference. Thanks again to all who have enabled this development!

This years’ award will be given to the Most Promising Company launched in 2009. Together with our partners and sponsors Deutsche Bank, Deutsche Telekom and MAN Ferrostaal, we will honor an entrepreneur who has demonstrated that you can start a company and get funded in rough times, too. Quality shines through. In this sense – let’s challenge the crisis!

Eran Davidson 

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