you're watching d.w. news still to come in business a mega merger between europe's two biggest train makers they're bulking up to fight off a giant challenge from china. elena from v.w. business we'll have that story and much more for you in just a minute here with d.w. news. of. the d. w.e.d. a center. i. find it again. more of a. discovery. video and audio podcast and language courses.

in the d w media center at media center dot d w dot com. freedom of expression. a value that always has to be defended and knew. all over the world arch of freedom freedom of art. a multimedia project about artists and their right to express their views freely. d w dot com part of freedom. hailed as a franco german industrial breakthrough option rivals a siemens and agree to much becoming europe's biggest train make-a in the hope of fending off competition from a field. also coming up day works call in sick or take holidays by twenty twenty

over one million workers will be automated we take a look at where the rise of the robots leaves us. this is your business update i'm ellen all free in berlin good with us for decades they were bitter rivals but now zeman zanele still has confirmed a merger to make a huge european train build the french government has encouraged the deal which analysts say is a change of strategy the focus is now no longer on protecting french business but about creating a european powerhouse at a time when international competition is certainly face the merger between siemens and alstom is on track to create a new european giant in the train building business in the near future the german i.c.e. and french t.g.v. will come from a single manufacturer siemens wants to bring its entire train division in return

for a fifty percent cut of the new siemens joe k.'s appraise the merger at a press conference in paris on wednesday the message of. european spirit is alive to struggle european companies leading the way. joining forces and country together in a meaningful way and that's a powerful message. message. which are matched by populist. nationalism social and political rights even after the new firm is founded the pressure on the europeans will increase siemens had considered canadian company. but the deal was reportedly derailed by bomb body a's shaky finances now the competition authorities need to approve the deal. walters who through this now i'm joined in this studio by you again and that from the business and in

frankfurt off financial correspondent quantified booze and welcome to you both york firstly to you these companies were bitter rival so why are they getting together well they're joining forces in order to match their chinese rival to fend off their chinese rival the state owned c r r c company is by far the biggest manufacturer or in the world and they are going global recently they have gone they have won contracts in britain and in the czech republic and you've got to remember up until two thousand and seven china had to rely on foreign high speed trains they bought them from europe from japan and then they told those companies listen if you want to continue to sell of your trains here you have to manufacture them here and to put it nicely that way they learned how to build high speed trains on their own and now they want to sell them worldwide all right conrad i want to go over to you then because can we be sure that this will be

a marriage of equals and that is even as well well go through with it is had a shaky reputation regarding tie ups in the past. you're right. of course this talk of marriage of equals tries to conceal somewhat that they are not perfectly equal why. was the first company in europe to construct and produce high speed trains the famous t.g.v. the god vitesse siemens in recent years has been more successful in selling its trains and its technology worldwide that's why it's so important that the headquarters of the new company will be in paris and that. who is now the else on chief will become the boss of the new company will siemens stay on board well this merger is made in a way different to past mergers that struck in other parts of its businesses siemens for example has the opportunity to have more than fifty percent of the

joint venture company and it's going to keep the whole company on its balance sheet and that indicates that this is more of a long term this is planned to be more of a long term relationship all right well i think there is the feeling that this is president markov baby so is the rest of the european reaction quite so enthusiastic yes you know the idea to former european champion ties in nicely with. bridezilla stance he favors a more integrated european union and that franco german partnership ties in nicely with that supporters of the deal often cite as a good example you know seventeen years ago for european companies countries formed that company in order to rival the american company boeing and they've done their quite successfully so now supporters of the deal call it airbus on tracks that's not to say that there isn't some potential concerns and i'd like to raise those we

view conrad namely over job losses at these legitimate fears. of course there are legitimate mergers only makes sense if you look for the synergies if you get rid of double production structures of inefficient location of resources and that includes workforce of course but i have to say for the moment there's no talk of job cuts and of significant job cuts and both sides are saying that they don't plan to you know close down factories they are more focused on the opportunities and on the possibilities they have with their combined forces on the world markets where we still await approval from the shareholders and regulators conrad in a frankfurt and europe from the w. business good to have both of your perspectives the e.u. has slapped an eight hundred eighty million euro penalty on european truck makers

scandia amid allegations that the company engaged in price fixing and avoiding the costs of stricter pollution rules skandia is owned by fox fog an out of six truck make is accused of operating a cartel by the e.u. skinny was the only one not to agree to a settlement are the companies made payments to the european commission after it emerged that they had colluded with each other for fourteen years is to pass on the costs of required emissions technologies to the consumer. prosecutors in the united states have charged ten people including an adult us executive with bribery and fraud now that is following a widespread investigation into corruption in college basketball prosecutors accuse the manager of bribing athletes families to get players to attend universities sponsored by adams german schools where make it confirm the arrest of an executive on tuesday saying it was unaware of any wrongdoing on its part.

now a decade after the global financial crisis which wiped billions off the global economy the world economic forum is warning that economies are ill prepared for the next wave of automation and robotized nation in the world of work it did highlight countries leading the way though in its global competitive index ranking we can take a look at that now well coming in at the top spot is switzerland it retained that first place ranking due to its flexible economy and the labor market which is considered the best functioning among the one hundred thirty seven countries which was surveyed while efficiency and innovation helps the united states secure the second highest ranking but the report does say that the country must invest further in health care and education to maintain its competitiveness number three and four on the list are covered by singapore and the netherlands respectively you can see

that followed by germany where innovation and a high level of technological readiness exist alongside strong worker protections or hong kong sweden the u.k. japan finland they make up the second half of that top ten list but back to that world economic forum warning over all rivals at work we're talking about robots now of course they're not going to call in sick they're not going to take holidays and they're set to take over as many as one out of every two jobs in the age of industry four point zero so where does this leave us let's take a watch. this corner pizza delivery shop will eventually be employee free soon robots will be taking orders over the internet and carrying out the deliveries . welcome to the wave of the future.

video link machines could also replace security staff in shopping centers in emergencies they'd be able to alert human personnel at a central office. these are just some examples of the jobs robots will be able to do in the age of industry four point zero. researchers at oxford university estimate that nearly every second job is at risk in the long term but according to the dusseldorf institute for competition economics there's no reason for panic they point to the highly automated german auto industry which has seen no significant decrease in factory employees in recent years the numbers show that more and more industrial robots are being bought worldwide in two thousand and ten manufacturers supplied a total of one hundred twenty one thousand robots according to the international federation of robotics that said to climb to more than half a million by two thousand and twenty. this trend offers new opportunities

especially in leading robot manufacturing countries such as japan the us south korea china and germany. there will continue to be urgent demand for skilled software developers mechanical engineers and installation technicians one thing that is uniquely human expressing your opinion online and if you felt like you just got more to say on torture but lacked the space to say you know it might be getting twice as much room twitter announced it was testing a two hundred eighty character and it within a small group on at the site was double the current standard but the experiment has received mixed reviews from all over the wall but many unable to see the value of the change. follow us on twitter on the school business i can.

show you a very different side of germany's capital. nicole farley takes you wanted two of the government to streatch and goes behind the scenes at the reichstag. from an underground tunnel on the way up to the glass cube

a lot. i'll also show you plenty aside even around the government corner.