I’m having a hard time finding anything about this online.
The only one I know of from memory is the University of Leipzig. It has among it’s alumni Gottfried Leibniz, Friedrich Nietzsche, Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, and Angela Merkel. I don’t know much else about it however.
In terms of research (and prestige) here are some other universities I found on Wikipedia:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/University_of_G%C3%B6ttingen
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Heidelberg_University
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Humboldt_University_of_Berlin
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ludwig_Maximilian_University_of_Munich
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Technische_Universit%C3%A4t_M%C3%BCnchen
There’s no such thing as a “most prestigious university” in Germany. Most universities are public and free to attend. Private universities tend to be looked down upon as a second choice for rich kids who didn’t have the grades to attend a public university.
Public universities all follow a standardized curriculum (though advanced electives vary between universities) and are by law required to have an open admission policy. That means they have to admit anyone with a German high school diploma (or equivalent). The only exceptions are for foreign applicants and in cases where there are more applicants than the university physically has seats for - then they are allowed to choose but using only a few select criteria (e.g. GPA and scores from an internal admission test are allowed; but not gender or alumni status).
You’ll see the term “numerus clausus” (or NC for short) a lot. That’s the minimum GPA required for admission to a particular program in a particular semester. Everyone with a GPA better than the NC was admitted that term, and everyone with a GPA below the NC was rejected. For students whose GPA equaled the NC, there might be some tie-breaker rule or maybe they just conducted a lottery to decide who was admitted and who was not.
In practice, selectivity depends on major and not university. Popular majors will have an NC everywhere. Unpopular majors (like Latin) won’t have an NC anywhere.
And how high of a NC do business have?
It depends on the exact program, university and semester. You can look up past values on each university’s website. (NCs can vary quite a bit from year to year. For any given admission cycle, it will be whatever cutoff results in x students being admitted to a particular program.)
Which country are you from?
As what b@r!um says is completely true, you have to differ between Fachhochschulen and Universitäten. Fachhochschulen have a higher relation to the industry, but it is not always possible to receive a PhD afterwards with their degree.
There are many good universities and some which are not so good. The best one is the University of Mannheim, very good ones are the University of Cologne, Humboldt University of Berlin, LM University of Munich, University of Münster and the University of Frankfurt. As an international student who has other options I would not necessarily attend other universities as they might be unknown by employers in your home country. However, all German universities have standards which have to be met by every institution. Thus the “not so good” refers to rankings, which only consider how many publications are published by the business department. There are however differences in their programs.
You should expect to have overcrowded courses, especially Business is a course many people do. 650 people in one lecture hall is normal and you won’t have any personal contact to your professors. Also, this is something I have noticed, German professors do not really care about their teaching (to be honest, their teaching can’t be rated as good in any terms, but this may differ from university to university and professor to professor). This is because the university does not pay them for teaching, but rather for research. Thus it is also normal for many students to not attend their lectures, but to learn everything from books at home.
However, there is no tuition in Germany. You only have to pay a fee, which is about 150-350€/semester that includes a bus/train ticket most times. Therefore, if you studied hard enough, you would receive a well-respected degree for almost free.
Also note that the regular study length for a Bachelor’s degree is six semester, not eight like it may be in the US or elsewhere in the world.
Stay away from private universities: They’re going to charge very expensive fees and they aren’t better than public universities.
So Heidelberg and Göttingen are not as good in business as Frankfurt-Goethe, LMU Munich?
Heidelberg doesn’t even offer Business ;). As for Göttingen I would definitely say they aren’t as good as Frankfurt or Munich. They are more like a regional university - comparable to Giessen or Marburg.