An innovative
concept:
urbanharbor

A new space for the future

Even Thomas Strobl was visibly impressed when he opened the “Baden-Württemberg Digital Communities of the Future” conference in the urbanharbor work centre in his capacity as digitisation minister. He could have hardly chosen a better place to meet with Ludwigsburg mayor Werner Spec, the entrepreneur Max Maier and other representatives from the world of business and academia to talk about the state’s digital future: for the innovation campus at the Weststadt work centre in Ludwigsburg is a vibrant working model of what the future might look like. “Digitisation holds huge potential for urban development. It is fast becoming a key locational factor,” says Baden-Württemberg’s Deputy Minister President and Minister of the Interior, Strobl.

A laboratory for encounters
that is open to everyone.

The change can already be experienced live in the Ludwigsburg Weststadt where the workplace 4.0 has long ceased to be a vision of the future. The stimulus for the paradigmatic change is the urbanharbor opened in November 2016 and designed and developed as a unique action hub for the people and companies in the region. It provides a platform for people to showcase their ideas, products and projects. A laboratory for encounters that is open to everyone and where you can enjoy stimulating conversations over a good meal. The beating heart of the 1,500 square metre centre is the so-called speisewerk: Europe’s first digital kitchen on this scale. Around 2,600 meals are served here daily, and in the future that figure could rise to 10,000 meals – thanks to a sophisticated digitised strategy of the highest standard with regional produce, delivered fresh every day. The self-starters came up with some practical applications and digital innovations to make this all possible. As Max Maier explains “We developed a multi-way infrastructure with business partners, food producers and farmers in the region to ensure regional fresh food from farm to fork in the future.

The entrepreneur is the impresario of change, the brains and driving force behind the urbanharbor project of the future. In the 1990s, Max Maier, head of the same-name group, bought the former factory of the Eisfink company, famous for its fridges, on Schwieberdinger Straße and turned it into work centre. Later on, the former premises of the machine builder Hüller Hille, who closed his headquarters in Ludwigsburg in 2008, were added. Meanwhile, many well-known companies and businesses have moved in, including Stuttgart car maker Porsche and Robert Bosch GmbH, two influential global players who now develop their digital business ideas in the Ludwigsburg Weststadt. Other names with whom Max Maier cooperates in Ludwigsburg to create new industrial standards are cleaning specialist Kärcher and Deutsche Telekom. As he emphasises: “We can’t achieve our goals on our own. We need to cooperate and have to involve as many people as possible to make a success of changing the way we think.”

He has created urbanharbor,
a place that brings to life
his vision of the future.

Max Maier is con dent that digitisation is going to become a fixture in all areas of work and life. He aims to demonstrate how this challenge can be approached at the Weststadt work centre, where once before the pioneering spirit held sway. The entrepreneur does not however aim to exhibit his visions and ideas as if in a museum, as he says, but to create a real productive community in which people can nd permanent digital workplaces. So he has created urbanharbor, a place that brings to life his vision of the future: how we will live, work, communicate, dwell and eat in the future.