Maybe you are right and I misunderstood his question. I was under the impression that he asked whether a European governmental facility could aggregate talent i

Maybe you are right and I misunderstood his question. I was under the impression that he asked whether a European governmental facility could aggregate talent in some place and came up with an example where this worked and why I believe an EAIL could work as well. I'm not sure that either of us understood his emphasis on industry. Regarding your point: Heidelberg and Cambridge have both profited to some extent, but I'm convinced that a place like EMBL has profited Europe as a whole much more, keeping excellent talent on the continent and attracting excellent talent to the continent. Bork, Ellenberg and co. would have otherwise been long gone to the US and with them a lot of excellent scientists. Regarding cluster formation: I agree, EMBL and DKFZ alone are not sufficient for creating the critical mass that you see in Boston and SF. You need a couple of big companies as well as the academic infrastructure to get these clusters up and running. I guess only Munich has the critical mass in certain sectors in Germany.