one hundred days before the games begins. it reminded of our top story at this hour german former finance minister. has been elected as a new president of the country's some politics for this dog he's called on the new parliament to engage in vigorous but civil debate. about situ update i will have more for you up the top of the album physical and behind your business side round up in just a moment of the day. when

history books mark brought to life. maybe the stories they're in we'll get to rewrite. the story of the russian revolution. from the perspective of writers thinkers and a longer distance. what did it feel like to live in times over the revolution the people. and to the russian or revolutionaries. nineteen seventeen the real october starting october twenty fifth t w. a report puts the onus on. a future economic growth but a medium sized businesses ready for the biggest challenge digitisation. a new

record for global. such a development spending which corporations a fucking out the most and wouldn't it be frustrating if you always had to go to a special wife i pop to go on line that's how it is for most cubans. i mean first of all and let's talk business germany's economy has always relied on highly specialized small and medium sized enterprises the famed german middle stunt now a study has confirmed the role they play in the country's economic health is more vital than ever. a new study from the german development bank has shown that sales from german s.-a m.-e. companies like this manufacturer of specialized pumps rose steeply yet again in twenty sixteen they were up by nearly four percent to four and a half trillion euros that's the strongest growth for five years unlike in the past however much of that growth is being powered by domestic demand rather than exports and in a kind of feedback loop domestic demand is in turn being driven by excellent employment

figures as the middle east and companies hire more staff to cope with rising orders at the end of august germany's federal employment agency announced that only around two point five million people were currently looking for work pushing the unemployment rate to the lowest level since german reunification more than twenty five years ago. christiane called it is a member of the board a bit calm the german i.t. association because he didn't have the germans got too good a date in danger of getting lazy competition wise internationally i don't think so i think germany is very concerned with the whole process of digitize ation and the digital transformation so i think we're all looking ahead not at all lazy. tell me digitization could wipe out millions of jobs in germany the head of your association reckons hafele jobs could disappear in the next couple decades

how's that going to hit small and medium sized businesses it will affect all kinds of businesses the big ones the small ones and all the medium sized ones but i think what is important. even if fifty percent of the now existing jobs will go away there will be new jobs on the rise like a data scientist no one knew a couple of years ago so it's not that fifty percent of the jobs will go away but rather jobs are changing how do you get that balance right though that the job losses the new jobs rather are actually jobs for those who lose their jobs because we're talking about high skilled jobs and a lot of the people who are going to lose their jobs from lower skilled areas there's a very important point and i think the most important factor for this is education

education better start in school but education that targets already workers in the market right now so there are need to be a lot more programs to train those workers with new technologies so that for example i can use mixed reality to do construction work which i could not do before so i think education is key and when it comes to the yes i mean is a day ahead of the game because i've heard time and again that they're not ready that slow to digitise and it gives me the feeling that they're going to be left behind in this game. well for example we have this will happen this should to have certain hops in germany to create work spaces for startups and those as an east so i think those or their courses thems where they can. tell and themselves and. get to better speed because then click the german id association become

thank you very much for joining us thank you of course rejected a deal to drop charges against the head of deutsche of birds the company that runs germany's biggest stock exchange in frankfurt kasten can get to is facing charges of insider trading after buying millions of euros worth of don't you berta shares that was before merger plans with the london stock exchange were announced sending those shares up in value the settlement would have seen can get the company paid a combined eleven million euro fine but it now seems the trial will go ahead stuff for correspondent daniel coal power much can get has stood to profit from the shares well remember when the stock exchanges were flirting the frankfurt stock exchange and the laundered stock exchange by that time he was buying shares worth of four point five million euros we know at the end his marriage you know never happened if and what of if it would have happened he would have had made

a lot of money and it's going to get even more difficult for him now his contract is due in in march two thousand and eighteen and we're hearing that maybe already by this week there could be a final decision about his future we are hearing from insiders that on thursday there is going to be a board meeting here at the stock exchange where they will be discussing the future of casting can get and most likely deciding if there's going to be a contract for him in the future or not. tesla found a lawn musk is the king of electric cars but the pay pal found it didn't get there by playing it safe he's willing to bet big on research projects and has made a fortune doing so and he's not alone companies across the board upped their spending on new research projects to the tune of seven hundred two billion dollars last year leading the pack companies like amazon google parent company alphabet and . they are hoping their moonshots research basically into unproven new technologies

might just be the next game changing products and research projects are becoming an ever more important part of company budgets corporations like intel spend as much as a fifth of their entire budgets on research and development. let's talk about this with that from our business desk laws spending on research and development at a record high but is it a gamble for companies or is it a must where does it gamble definitely they are all gambling then but they have to that's what you have to do because we don't know what the future holds no company knows that so as a company they have to just try out new things whether that's technologies whether that is products and some of these things of course might work and others might not but they have to be out there gambling because if they don't do you know what happens when you're not playing you won't win obviously and even when it comes to someone like iran musk and trying to get to mars absolutely a lot of people are still laughing at elon musk and his ideas and many of these

ideas that iran must has been working on for years many might not lead to anything but some will and those are going to be the important ideas the technologies that lead into the future and people laughed at the i phone and you might even remember people laughed at the idea that at some point everyone will have a computer in their home these were mind boggling ideas way back when and of course it was worth all the spending and all the effort they put in what about g.w. that back in fifth place is is that a good thing for german companies well not really they used to lead the pack there were a couple of spots higher now i've got to say it's really difficult here to compare r. and d. spending between let's say high tech companies abangan auto maker and pharmaceutical companies that's a little bit comparing apples and oranges but what you can certainly compare is a company's culture when it comes to r. and d. and it seems a little bit that germany has been losing in that particular way a lot of the american companies seem to be a lot more out there if you look at specifically volkswagen they think the diesel

is still a great technology and of course that's a ludicrous there was a winning strategy for decades but this is not going to be helping them in the future they are now being taken over not only by the car makers but by companies like apple or. that are not even in the car business the germans aren't really out there people how can they change that and become winners in r. and d. but i personally think it's two factors that need to work together here you need the companies obviously really to get off the couch they cannot longer rest on their laurels they have to really bring in new ideas and they have to do these investments but you also have the government part they really have to set the infrastructure that even enables r. and d. they have to bring coding to schools new technologies and such things to just get kids ready to work for this company and do the research and development it sounds like you've done your research labs thanks for coming in always the road to internet access in cuba has been slow and expensive two years ago

a socialist government hooked up a tiny share of private households in havana to the world wide web the rest resort to wife i pox public areas that offer access. writing messages and sending photos making phone calls or skype in with friends and relatives in all corners of the globe all of this is now possible in cuba as why fight park's prices have dropped from two u.s. dollars to one fifty per hour but that still represents five percent of the average monthly income of just thirty dollars but it's not just the high prices that disturb many cubans. i talk on the phone by internet with people about private things and all around people can listen in that it would be nice if privacy could be protected but as long as it's not like that we have to live with what we have but i mean like everything on cuba

a little surreal you can really experience the intimate lives of people someone pleading like when are you finally going to send me an invitation or another i miss you my son the whole of cuban life is being played out in this park the exodus those far away that have left and those that stayed here the whole thing makes me sad that you know you're going yeah. two years ago the first private broadband network was laid in havana and promises have been made to hook up the entire island by the end of the year but repeated problems mean such a plan is something of a utopia and one many for now at least can still only dream of. fingers crossed for the cubans nice doing business with you.

the dream of legal and safe passage to europe. and being welcomed with open arms. a dream that has come true for some syrian refugees. church groups have set up

a humanitarian corridor using a thousand special visas. initiatives that may also inspire other countries. three thousand. every journey begins with the first step and every language with the first word has been. is in germany to learn german why not learn them simple online on your mobile and free stuff from d w z e learning course we can speak german made easy. g.w. true diversity. where the world of science is at home in. many languages. on a lot of programming go on their way to. show that with us our innovations magazine for asia. africa every week and always looking to the future fund d w dot com

science and research for asia. and the rest d.w. to get up me speak your language be done not. for content in dari pashto and order prospects for returning our web special to the net the refugee journeys of life in germany and the prospects for those returning home. join the discussion on t w dot com and on facebook. prospects for returning s d w may for mine. this week.