Hello,
The newsletter will be on a break next week, so see you in early May. We will be back with two Handpicked Live events, partnering with Impact Hub: coworking is finally (!) back on Monday, the 4th of May, and due to popular demand, we are also doing the improved AI at the terminal workshop on the 7th of May!
Very limited spots for both, so be fast! More events will be announced soon! Stay tuned here and in the Luma calendar.
Also new, after well over a year, polls are back — vote in the pinned section
📌 Pinned
Text became extremely cheap. The consequence is easy to measure, and if you only had a gut feeling before… well, it’s backed by data as well. I do feel bad for everyone who previously used the em dash and feels the need to self-censor — I noticed it myself! The way we communicate is changing rapidly, and my most important lesson is that no matter how hard I try, the out-of-the-box models always sound like AI.
What do you do when you notice AI writing?
👀 Jobs from our partner: Doctolib
At Doctolib, we aim to create a trusted, high-quality healthcare experience across Europe for both patients and health professionals. For patients, we offer a platform guiding them to the right care, centralizing health data and knowledge, and using AI assistants with top medical standards. For health professionals, we reduce administrative work and improve care delivery through a unique suite of technologies that spans specialties and countries.
Check out these three:
Nothing for you? They are hiring a lot in Berlin.
Job board will be back soon!
💸 Funded in Germany
Uplane | Berlin/SF | Autonomous AI marketing platform | $4.5M seed | Careers.
&Charge | Frankfurt | EV charging management | €5M | Careers.
Logicc | Hamburg | Compliant AI for regulated sectors | €2.5M seed | Careers.
XO Life | Munich | Digital therapy support platform | €4M | Careers.
Beglaubigt.de / Openlaw | Munich | Digital notary service | $3.3M seed | Careers.
SPiNE | Munich | Energy middleware platform | €3M Series A | Careers.
studio vaai | Munich | AI clothing fit try-on | €2M | Careers.
VisioLab | Osnabrück | AI self-checkout for food service | $11M Series A | Careers.
Brainjo | Regensburg | VR therapy for pediatric ADHD | €2M seed | Careers.
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📅 Events
From our partners
The IamExpat Fair is back, and Handpicked will also have a stand! 🎉 It’s an international one-day event designed to connect and support the expat community in Berlin. Whether you're a new arrival or long-term resident, there's a lot to learn about life in Germany. Tickets are FREE, including interesting workshops. Check the schedule! | Sat, 30/05 10:00 | Estrel Berlin
Agentic Fundraising: Claude takes over your Fundraising. AI agents are coming to fundraising. See how Claude + Tokenize.it's MCP automates pitch decks, investor search & more. Live. Free. Now. Join the live session! | Tue, 28/04 11:00 | online
Our picks
🧶 join us on Handpicked Live: Coworking Session #4 | Mon, 04/05 09:30 | Impact Hub Berlin
🤖 learn something very useful — beginner friendly: Handpicked Live: Real AI Starts at the Terminal #2 | Thu, 07/05 18:00 | Impact Hub Berlin
Resilience Workshop for Founders: The Bottleneck in your Growth is You & Your Inner OS | Thu, 23/04 17:30 | Venture Café Berlin
Digital Health Cocktail Hour | Thu, 23/04 18:00 | Merantix AI Campus
Off the record - afterwork Berlin Meet & Move | Mon, 27/04 18:30 | CI Space
BITS & DRINKS // Networking für digitale Köpfe der Hauptstadtregion | Wed, 29/04 18:00
Small99's People, Planet, Pint™: Sustainability Meetup | Thu, 07/05 19:00 | Ecosia HQ
Kennt ihr schon...? ü30 Special | Wed, 13/05 20:00 | werkhain
Women in Deep Tech: DTM side event | Thu, 21/05 18:00 | Mitte
World Hat Walk Berlin 2026 – Global Fashion Parade & Charity Walk | Sun, 10/05 12:00 | Pariser Platz
Apache Iceberg™ Europe Community Meetup - May 2026 Berlin Edition | Tue, 06/05 17:00
☕️ Coffee Talk
Nina Mannheimer is a co-founder of Klim (Berlin, agritech), now working on a very exciting new startup. She is a well-known face in the Berlin scene, also because she landed on a couple of X under X lists. Here is what she prepared for you:
Centro Italia - My favourite place to eat in Berlin is my own kitchen, and I love getting fresh ingredients from different places. Centro Italia has everything one might crave from Italy: fresh vegetables, amazing cheese, the best olive oil, artichokes and capers. Go around lunchtime to enjoy a quick delicious lunch while you're shopping.
Middlemarch audio book - I got into audiobook only recently - somehow I felt that I couldn't listen to them as well as I can listen to podcasts. Turns out I was just biased. I now love listening to classics because I don't always have the patience and brain space to read 700 dense pages. This audiobook is a total delight and so funny, a perfect distraction from AI news!
Swimming in Grunewaldsee - This lake, close to central Berli,n strangely has a bad reputation for swimming because dogs roam around freely and play in the water. But I'm pretty sure dogs are cleaner than humans most of the time, and this makes it less crowded and more peaceful than other lakes to swim in. You're surrounded by trees, and there's a great beer garden next door.
Don't miss what Berlin's talking about
Thousands start their week with my Berlin weekly briefing. News, business, tech & culture you won't find elsewhere. Mondays, 7 AM. Free.
Most popular last Monday:
🌍 From the Community
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School of Machines is offering a Berlin-local Artist-in-Residence Scholarship: a free spot in a summer program (Data & AI, Feminist Game Design, or Performance/Media Art — worth €2k), a month of studio space at Make-Believe, and a public showcase, in exchange for leading one skill-sharing workshop. Deadline extended to April 30.
🧭 Career compass
Signals from Monday: Anthropic expanding London office to 800 employees [careers]; Trade Republic hiring 1,000+ customer service agents across eight languages [careers]; Axel Springer closing £575M Telegraph acquisition in Q2 [careers]; Getsafe acquired Hamburg-based Helden.de [careers]; Bosch cutting up to 22,000 jobs in its supplier division.
Several tips on the Hacker News thread on how to land your first projects as solo engineer/consultant (but probably valid for any solo path). Personal networking is ranking high in many of the comments. So go out there to events and mingle.
Not bad, Lufthansa pilots, not bad! Captains’ max salary is €281k per year, and that is without add-ons. First officers, beginners in terms of the cockpit, start with €88k. I mentioned this a couple of times: if you feel like having an extremely stable career, you can become an air controller. Related, we might run out of jet fuel in Europe.
Engineers mostly disagree with Claude’s Boris Cherny that coding is solved, and I do 100% sign the first comment: “Coding is solved, Instead of writing 100 lines of code now I write 100 lines of plan in text.”
Love this idea of productive procrastination, and I think the insights are great, for example: Make old tasks feel new again by introducing a fresh angle (eg, a new technique or a tool) so the dopamine system re-engages. And most important: forgive yourself for procrastinating!
Casey Neistat’s Eisenhower matrix adaptation, linked in the article.
Don’t miss
Need help with finding a flat, insurance, have problems at work or are you lost in career or life? Talk to our Handpicked Experts.
Handpicked Community talking about money. Plus ideas for your setup.
How to learn German? Three very hands-on articles.
Handpicked recs: a growing archive of recommendations.
