How many of today's audience will be wearing ties?
Given the range of companies the UKTI Germany team have been bringing to the embassy on inward missions of late, I never know quite what to expect - but I have been reminded that successful businesses do come in many different guises.
In recent weeks in the embassy in Berlin we've had companies from the smart grid (all ties), sub-sea cabling (mostly ties), digital media (handful of ties), music (zero ties/what's a tie?) sectors.
And I believe there is no better way for UK exporters to expand their horizons than to get them out to market and introduce them directly to potential partners and spin new networks, as they say in German.
There is no proven correlation between tie-wearing and economic impact and I have been delighted by the quality of every company we've had out here in market, however they are attired.
Though they differ in dress, one area they have very much in common is that of boosting the UK economy through exports. And the beauty of these outward missions is that we also get a chance to present to German companies who may very well end up boosting the UK economy through investment.
In the past month alone:
- I have learned about a North-east company (www.smd.co.uk) which manufactures the most technically-advanced robots, ploughs and tractors for laying cables on the seafloor and decommisioning nuclear power stations - who says we don't make anything anymore?
- I have networked - alongside colleagues from our Science and Innovation Network - with the next generation of internet m/billionaires who are creating inspired and innovative websites (some working from the new Olympics-inspired digital cluster in Techcity). And watching them, within our very own embassy, speak with venture capitalists who could make their ambitious dreams a reality.
- I have lunched with designers and manufacturers of smart grid devices which cut energy usage and costs by double-digit percentages by, for example, turning on washing machines in the middle of the night when electricity is cheapest to use.
- I have hung out (as there is no more appropriate phrase) with music producers, distributors, publishers from the largest market per capita in Europe (UK) as they set about finding partners in the largest market by volume in Europe (Germany).
These events remind one of a) how much talent, innovation, imagination, quality and ambition there is to export from the UK and b) the pivotal role we can play in helping these companies find the right market, partner, or opportunity here in Germany.
Whatever is being worn around people's necks, there are plenty of ties that bind these two great European economies.