Germany's industrial competitiveness debate is no longer only about weak domestic demand. German Business Review's October 2026 audience research points to a broader concern about relative competitiveness against Chinese companies.

Across 3,283 responses, 48.9% said their company is now somewhat or much less competitive against Chinese companies than it was three years ago. The research is an audience survey rather than a representative poll of German companies, but the direction is consistent with the pressure visible in official trade data.

Official trade data show the competitive relationship is changing

Destatis reported that German imports from China rose 6.2% year on year in the first five months of 2026 to €72.4 billion, while German exports to China fell 14.5% to €29.6 billion. Machinery exports to China fell 17.5%, and motor-vehicle and parts exports fell 26.1%.

Those figures do not prove that every German company is losing competitiveness, but they show why China exposure now appears in boardroom discussions as both a market-access and import-competition issue.

Bureaucracy is the most commonly identified domestic constraint

When respondents were asked to identify the biggest constraint on competitiveness, bureaucracy was the most frequently selected option. That result matters because it points to a factor businesses perceive as locally controllable, unlike exchange rates or overseas demand.

The policy question is therefore not only whether Germany can subsidise strategic industries. It is whether permitting, reporting, infrastructure delivery and investment approval can move at a pace compatible with global capital cycles.

Germany remains investable, but conviction is weak

Asked whether Germany would be their first choice for the largest European industrial investment they were making today, 42.7% said yes and 40.1% said no. That near split is more revealing than either number alone.

It suggests Germany retains major advantages in skills, supplier depth, research and market access, while a substantial share of the audience no longer sees those advantages as automatically sufficient to offset cost and execution constraints.

Methodology

The October 2026 findings are based on 3,283 German Business Review audience responses. They are not weighted to the German company population and should be interpreted as first-party readership research.

GBR-DE will repeat the competitiveness questions so that movement over time can be separated from one-off sentiment.