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The German government must be more willing to join forces with private investors as the country tackles its crumbling infrastructure, its investment tsar Martin Blessing said.
The former Commerzbank chief executive said convincing public authorities to work with private sector investors was the “bigger challenge” than finding private money to help upgrade the country’s roads, bridges and ports after decades of under-investment.
“We still need to get the relevant authorities to say: ‘This is something we really want to do’,” he said in an interview with the FT.
Sceptical attitudes towards public-private partnerships were beginning to shift in “various ministries” in Berlin, he noted, but the process was “taking a little longer than we had hoped”.
Germany’s economy minister Katherina Reiche has said that the government is hoping to mobilise up to €3.75tn of private capital by 2040 to supplement €1.9tn of public investment over the same period.
Last year Germany relaxed its constitutional debt brake to boost spending on defence, infrastructure and decarbonising the economy.
Blessing said that in his first year as Chancellor Friedrich Merz’s personal envoy for increasing foreign investment in Germany, he has met more than 200 international investors.
Speaking ahead of the country’s first annual investment summit in October, he insisted “there is no shortage of either investor interest or money” but “many international investors would like to see more speed when it comes to public-private partnerships and leasing models”.
He argued that “private money” can often deliver infrastructure projects “more quickly and efficiently” than the government on its own.
German public opinion has long been sceptical of private equity and foreign takeovers. After bathroom fittings maker Grohe was acquired by BC Partners and TPG in 2004, then Social Democratic Party chair Franz Müntefering famously likened buyout investors to a “swarm of locusts” bent on squeezing German industry.
The sale of heat-pump maker Viessmann to US rival Carrier Global, which was completed in 2024, also sparked public outcry.
Blessing pointed to a recent law change that simplifies planning and approval procedures for major investment projects of overriding national interest as a positive step. “This is a key building block for getting infrastructure investment moving quickly,” he said.
Merz’s “Invest in Germany” conference in October is modelled on similar initiatives abroad, including French President Emmanuel Macron’s “Choose France” summit, which earlier this year generated €93bn in investment commitments in France’s economy.
The German government is expecting up to 200 investors to attend its own version, including Goldman Sachs chief executive David Solomon and BlackRock boss Larry Fink, who once employed Merz as the firm’s chair for Germany.
For Blessing, the “clear goal” of the conference is for there to be “additional investment activity in Germany” within a year — both in terms of financial and corporate activity in new and existing projects.
He declined to give a specific target for the additional investment. “But something significant has to happen,” he said.
Many international investors wanted to diversify their global portfolio as they were concerned about an “overexposure to the US dollar and the US”, he pointed out, and “would like to spread some of their money more broadly”.
While many of Germany’s strengths are often “taken for granted” in domestic debates, its economic stability, high sovereign credit rating and reliable legal system are attractive for global money managers, he maintained. “The international view of Germany is more positive than the way we see ourselves,” he added.
