While research on universities is well elaborated within the field of higher education, less effort has been made to study other institutions of tertiary education. Complementary to the need of hybrid (specific and general) human capital for German Mittelstand firms, the system of tertiary dual education in Germany has succeeded in hitting two birds with one stone. Though Germany has often been criticized for its low rate of university graduates, the critique has largely failed to acknowledge the differentiation of Germany's dual tertiary education model. By highlighting the case of Baden-Württemberg and its Cooperative State University system, we illustrate the diversity of Germany's landscape of higher education institutions. It appears that the availability of a large pool of tertiary dual educated students contributes in particular to the advantage of Mittelstand firms in Baden-Württemberg.