Berlin hopes growing tech community will lift city's economy

The images snapped with iPhones and BlackBerrys were projected in a constantly changing slideshow on the side of the neighboring building by a new photo-sharing application called EyeEm. The plastic foam clouds dangling from the wires crisscrossing overhead were the logos for the popular audio-sharing service called SoundCloud, which has approximately 7 million users.

Both companies, co-hosts of the event, are part of Berlin's rapidly growing Internet startup scene, which has won the attention of investors in Britain and California, including the high-profile actor-investor Ashton Kutcher, who is a backer of SoundCloud.

Ljung and his co-founder and chief innovation officer, Eric Wahlforss, met in the computer labs at the KTH Royal Institute of Research in Stockholm. However the two Swedes decided to move to Berlin to start their company, which now employs near 70 people.