Corynebacterium glutamicum is used for production of more than 2 million tons of amino acids per year and thus of outstanding importance in industrial biotechnology. Within the past 10 years, enormous progress has been made regarding our understanding of the metabolism and the regulatory networks of this species, in particular due to research within GenoMik and GenoMik-Plus. Importantly, recent studies have indicated the huge potential of C. glutamicum for production of a variety of other products, such as carboxylic acids, ethanol and proteins. Consequently, C. glutamicum can serve as a platform organism for the production of a multitude of different low- and high-molecular weight products. In order to improve the metabolic flexibility and the fitness of C. glutamicum for industrial production, this cluster wants to address three major topics: