Heinz Nixdorf and Paderborn

  • Building on the Kasseler Mauer
  • Workshop at the Kasseler Mauer
  • Factory building on Pontanusstraße
  • Production of the 8870
  • Heinz Nixdorf in the production halls
  • The head office on Fürstenallee, today HNF, in 1975
  • Production facility, 1987
  • Heinz Nixdorf Institute, HNF, b.i.b and FHDW as well as Zukunftsmeile 1 (Photo: Patrick Kleibold)
  • Paderborn University (Photo: Besim Mazhiqi)

When Heinz Nixdorf and his company moved to Paderborn in 1957, only a tenth of the population worked in industry and for the repair facilities of the German Federal Railway. Paderborn was regarded as an agricultural town and a town of churches.

As early as 1970, Nixdorf Computer AG contributed a fi ft h of the total industrial sales revenue of the Paderborn district. At the same time, Heinz Nixdorf founded or sponsored several education facilities. The Forschungs- und Entwicklungszentrum für objektivierte Lehr- und Lernverfahren FEoLL (an R&D centre for objectifi ed teaching and learning methods) worked on programmed lessons. In 1972, the Bildungszentrum für informationsverarbeitende Berufe (an education centre for information processing professions) was built next to the new NCAG headquarters. In 1979, the Institut für Betriebsorganisation und Informationstechnik (an institute for company organisation and information technology) followed.

In the 1980s, planning began for a vocational institution, which was opened in 1987. Heinz Nixdorf helped establish and develop Paderborn University from the outset. The CAD-Institute Cadlab, now C-Lab, for which he put up half the money, opened in February 1986. At its opening, Heinz Nixdorf promised the university DM 50 million if the state of North Rhine-Westphalia would match the funds. It did, and the Heinz Nixdorf Institute opened next to the HNF.

Since then, more than 300 software companies have settled in and around Paderborn. The city has a »Zukunftsmeile« (mile of the future) with high-tech companies and institutes. This is not all Heinz Nixdorf’s doing, but he played a part.