GZplus0518_Gesamt_ohneRuecken_ENG

01
01 The project is supported by Matthias
Schneider, head of the district authority of the
Birkenfeld district 02 A residential building at Oak
Garden on the site of the former US Army
barracks 03 The third office and showroom
building will soon be complete
02
03
Photos: Annette Cardinale
restaurants and a cultural centre. The vision
on the project website states: “Over
the next five years, we want to develop one
of Europe’s largest showroom, warehousing
and e-commerce centres”. European
firms can present their goods in the showrooms
alongside the Chinese companies
and a few German manufacturers from the
region are already making use of this opportunity.
The trade centre here at Oak Garden
is known as the ‘Headquarters of the
Global Factory’.
A gigantic project
“Our customers,” says Andreas Scholz,
talking about the Chinese entrepreneurs,
“trade everything you could imagine. Having
just one field of business is inconceivable
for the Chinese”. In some cases, they
import palettes of LEDs in a container and
then use the same container to send back
wine from the region. The entrepreneurs
sell their goods over the internet or welcome
business partners to their office
premises who then place orders there.
Oak Garden is the work of Andreas
Scholz who registered the company and is
CEO. He launched the gigantic investment
project in 2012 together with his Chinese
business partner Jane Hou, whom he met
by chance on a flight. Hou and Scholz set
out with 25,000 euros of start-up capital
and to date, 20 million euros of private
funding have been invested – without subsidies.
They buy, renovate and sell empty
buildings on the site of the former barracks
in Hoppstädten-Weiersbach to Chinese
people who, like Jane Hou herself, run import
and export businesses here. Various
companies are assembled here under the
umbrella of the Oak Garden project, for example
the investment company ICCN
GmbH, of which Scholz and Hou are Managing
Directors and CCN Investment & Development
AG which is responsible for the
construction projects and supporters of
the ‘Headquarters of the Global Factory’.
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