The Swiss Leaders association with its more than 10,000 members is reorganizing itself. The latest forward-looking step is the creation of a new co-management: Claire-Lise Rimaz in Lausanne and Jürg Eggenberger in Zurich will lead the association as co-managers from June 1, 2022. The professional association for executives thus aims to strengthen its national position and at the same time prepare the succession in the management.

Claire-Lise Rimaz will take up her post as co-managing director at the beginning of June. The 41-year-old from Fribourg continues her commitment to the association after almost four years as Head of French-speaking Switzerland within the organization. Based on the very good results she has achieved in her role, according to the association, she will be responsible for the further development of the association's diverse services and future activities. Swiss Leaders will continue to be chaired by Dominique de Buman.

Jürg Eggenberger took over the leadership of what is probably Switzerland's most important professional association for managers in April 2013. Against the backdrop of the 2023-25 legislative planning, he has come to the conclusion that a new person should lead the association into the future. He will step down from all his functions and leave Swiss Leaders by November 2024 at the latest. The measures initiated are now intended to ensure that the change is initiated under the best possible conditions. In close cooperation with the association's management, the requirements and functions to be filled are currently being defined, which will strengthen Swiss Leaders in the coming months. Association members will receive the relevant information in due course.

Source and further information

Our Mother Earth is clearly showing that things cannot go on like this. More and more people are becoming aware of the social and ecological impact of their lifestyle and are basing their purchasing decisions on the guiding principle of sustainability. As a result, the pressure on companies to act is growing from several sides at once: In addition to customers, NGOs, regulators and investors are demanding measurable sustainability.

Using the role model function for a sustainable future

Through their activities, companies can work towards fair working conditions, the responsible use of resources and compliance with environmental standards. Ultimately, they provide the services that form the basis for our consumption.

Companies therefore have a fundamental responsibility to strengthen sustainable behavior. The experience gained and the practices adopted in our day-to-day work have a decisive influence on our daily routine and thus offer great potential for having an impact in our private lives. This requires lived values, credible actions and visible successes.

Living and promoting sustainability

At Canon's commitment to sustainability as an integral part of the company's core. Every day, the Japanese lettering "Kyosei," which means "living and working together for the common good," reminds us of our mission statement on our screens. The ever-present presence of the theme is of immense importance. After all, sustainability is not a one-time decision, but a continuous learning process that must take place at all strategic and operational levels.

For this holistic approach, we have created an interdisciplinary sustainability team. Within this framework, we combine competencies from the areas of human resources, product development, compliance, sales and marketing. In this way, we ensure that overarching paradigms such as diversity and inclusion, work-life balance, environmentally friendly use of resources, and the development of sustainable offerings are lived by all employees.

Conclusion: Achieving great things together

Everyday work provides the ideal setting for driving a holistic change in values with regard to the three dimensions of "ecology, social and economy".

Being part of this sustainable strategy and actively driving positive change is an enriching experience. It is about raising awareness, transparency and setting the course for sustainable visions and activities. Our interdisciplinary team has already achieved a lot by means of regular information offerings, trainings and "Volunteer Days". Sustainability connects - this sense of community is particularly visible in our joint volunteer efforts. Our 600 or so colleagues also appreciate this. Ultimately, our measures also have a positive impact on our partners, suppliers and customers. Together we can achieve great things.

Author
Carina Berchtold is Strategic Market Developer at Canon Schweiz AG, a leading provider of hybrid working, document and print management solutions. Her main focus is Digital Transformation Services, and she also leads the interdisciplinary sustainability team.

Contact details
Canon (Switzerland) AG
Directional road 9
8304 Wallisellen
www.canon.ch

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The name Boesch Motorboote has an excellent reputation among boat owners and water sports enthusiasts worldwide. The Swiss company, founded in 1920 and rich in tradition, is one of the most renowned designers and builders of wooden sports boats and cruisers suitable for the coast. This is reflected, among other things, in the fact that several water-skiing world championships have been held with boats from Boesch and that the products from Lake Zurich are not only regarded as sports and leisure equipment, but even as long-term investments. The company also demonstrates its pioneering role in the development and use of groundbreaking concepts such as the bent rudder for optimum handling characteristics or the use of innovative coating materials. In order to expand its excellent market position, those responsible have now decided to implement the multi-project management ERP system ams.erp. The standard solution, tailored to the special requirements of batch size 1+, had been recommended by an external selection consultant and is designed to optimize project handling by providing up-to-the-minute data at any time.

Full power in a new system landscape

Until now, the Swiss manufacturer had been using two parallel software products with different focuses. On the one hand, there was a solution for financial accounting, working time recording and general project management, and on the other hand, an aging PPS software that had been strongly adapted to the processes at Boesch over time. The latter in particular was increasingly unable to meet the growing demands of customers and suppliers at all levels. "With our old system landscape, it was no longer possible to fully realize the shorter delivery and project times required today, especially against the background of increasingly customer-specific product requirements," says ERP project manager Marcel Stricker, describing the initial situation that led to the search for an ERP system.

Right at the beginning of the evaluation process, the Boesch managers approached an independent selection consultant with a catalog of requirements that was to provide them with a comprehensive overview of the system options under consideration and their pros and cons. It quickly became clear that in the future, the company would only work with an integrated overall solution instead of the dual solution used previously. After an initial overview of the available options as well as the resources likely to be required, the first step was to expand the software components used for project management, working time recording and financial accounting to include functionalities for materials management. To get a good comparison to other end-to-end systems, the consultant then brought ams.erp into play. The decision makers in the company followed his assessment that the software was best suited for the outlined area of application: "During the presentations and in the context of a preliminary project, the system quickly managed to convince us," confirms Marcel Stricker.

Savings in material setup times

The focus of ams.erp on make-to-order, contract and variant manufacturing played the decisive role. "The new system had to be able to flexibly map our enormous vertical range of manufacture, the many customer-related specialties and the many Boesch-specific items," adds the ERP expert. In this context, he describes the possibility of always being able to view all inventories and delivery dates on a daily basis and in real time in the future as one of the most important functional criteria for the decision in favor of ams.erp. Control rounds through the warehouse, which were previously necessary due to working with outdated data, will no longer be necessary in the future. In this context, he also considers the material shortage check integrated in ams.erp to be very important, which will now also take place on a daily basis and provide timely information about material shortages. The old system was only able to map the additional consumption of articles to a limited extent or with a delay.

On a process and business management level, the Swiss boat builders expect above all immense savings in material setup times as a result of the elimination of inventory checks during the year. In addition, it should be possible to massively optimize the recording of inventory stocks, so that the employees in the area of material and warehouse management will have more time for value-adding tasks as a result of the relief. A special organizational feature is that the new ERP system will also be used at the sister company Boesch Classic Boats Services AG. The main aim here is to coordinate the supply of materials via a central purchasing department.

Source and further information: http://www.ams-erp.com

The demand for large spaces in Central Switzerland has risen continuously over the past few years. The Sursee Campus is now creating such an offer with the new event hall. Campus Sursee is the leading Swiss education and seminar center. It is popular for its consistent customer orientation, its efficiency and its pleasant learning environment. With 67 seminar rooms, 550 hotel rooms and 5 restaurants, it has one of the largest seminar hotels in Switzerland.

Ecology is capitalized

"Our new building will be a hotspot for unique experiences and is suitable for congresses, major events or banquets," explains Managing Director Thomas Hegnauer proudly. With its 800 m2, the new event hall is ideal for large conferences, exhibitions, presentations, concerts or banquets and meets a variety of complex requirements. The acoustics, event, stage and building technology are also state-of-the-art. And: The event hall complies with the requirements of the 2000-Watt-Areal label and the Minergie-A certification.

Sursee Campus: In the heart of Switzerland

Another big plus for everyone: 550 hotel rooms, 67 seminar rooms, 1,100 parking spaces, a sports arena with a 50-meter indoor swimming pool and a versatile restaurant with banquet locations are all available under one roof. "Everything is located on one campus," says Thomas Hegnauer. And that simplifies the organization of a major event quite considerably. Located in the heart of Switzerland just outside Lucerne, the Sursee campus can be reached from Bern, Basel and Zurich by road as well as by public transport in less than an hour.

A photovoltaic system is installed on the roof, the yield of which could supply 20 single-family homes with electricity. Integrated is a rainwater tank that stores a volume of 10,000 WC flushes. This water is used for garden maintenance and toilet water. The majority of the wood for the striking support structure comes from forests in the canton of Lucerne.

50% Discount

The official opening will take place in May 2022. The first 50 event organizers will benefit from 50% discount on the complete hall rental of the event hall on the occasion of the 50th anniversary of the Sursee Campus. This offer is valid from the anniversary month of May 2022 until the end of July 2022, depending on the availability of the hall.

The event hall in facts & figures

• 800 m2, divisible into two rooms of the same size
• Capacity up to 1000 people
• Expandable capacity up to 1500 people by means of digital networking with the conference hall
• Professional technology

More information: www.campus-sursee.ch/eventhalle

75 teams registered for the selection competitions for the first Swiss Vocational Championship in Entrepreneurship in the various language regions of Switzerland. Around 150 young people from vocational education and training were able to demonstrate their entrepreneurial thinking and acting skills for one day.

Selected for the Professional Championship in Entrepreneurship

The participating teams were given a task at the beginning of the selection day. Within 4.5 hours, they had to develop a business idea that would contribute to the achievement of Sustainable Development Goal 11 ("Sustainable Cities and Communities") or Sustainable Development Goal 12 ("Sustainable Consumption and Production") of the United Nations. During the preparations, they were supported by various coaches from the startup scene. On the afternoon of the selection days, the teams had five minutes to present their idea. A jury, depending on the location, consisting of well-known people such as National Councilor Andri Silberschmidt, Regula Buob or Mathieu Gigandet, selected the best teams with the help of evaluation criteria. A total of eight teams qualified for SwissSkills on the selection days: One in Ticino, two in St. Gallen, three in Bern and two in French-speaking Switzerland.

Ideas with potential

"I am overwhelmed by how many different young people have registered for EntrepreneurSkills," says Georg Berger, President of the Swiss Conference of Directors of Vocational Schools and Vice President of EntrepreneurSkills. The diversity on the selection days was great: whether carpenters, cooks, polymechanics or computer scientists - they all demonstrated their competence to think and act entrepreneurially. "There was an incredibly innovative and creative atmosphere at the selection days. It was great to see what the young talent from a wide range of professions was capable of," says Regula Buob, who professionally coaches highly innovative startups. She was one of the 18 coaches at the selection days.

Preparation in boot camps

National Councilor and entrepreneur Andri Silberschmidt was on the jury at the selection day in Bern. He is president of IG EntrepreneurSkills, which was founded last fall by the umbrella organization of UAS graduates, the Swiss Conference of Directors of Vocational Schools, Gründungsdienstleistungen Kanton Solothurn and the Institute Innovation & Strategic Entrepreneurship at the Department of Economics at Bern University of Applied Sciences: "I am impressed that so many ideas were presented that have potential on the market. That's what we want to promote," says Andri Silberschmidt. The eight qualified teams will be prepared for the four-day competition at SwissSkills during a boot camp in August. Only one team can become Swiss champion in entrepreneurship.

More information: https://www.entrepreneurskills.ch/de/

The commercial vehicle market in Switzerland and the Principality of Liechtenstein has had a tough start to the year. By the end of March, a total of 9,523 light and heavy commercial and passenger transport vehicles had been registered, 1,179 or 11 percent fewer than in the first quarter of 2021, according to market data from auto-schweiz, the Association of Swiss Automobile Importers. Only motor homes, as part of the passenger transport vehicle segment, can still boast a small increase of 5.8 percent. But here, too, the industry association expects a decline in new registrations in the coming months - due to supply bottlenecks for vendor parts at vehicle manufacturers.

Supply bottlenecks affect the commercial vehicle market

What are the causes of the decline? According to auto-schweiz, it is the war in Ukraine that is making life difficult for the Swiss commercial vehicle market on various levels. On the one hand, the wartime events have severed some supply chains of parts for production. Similar to passenger cars, semiconductor products or cable harnesses produced in Ukraine, among other places, are missing, the association says. On the other hand, Russia's armed attack on Ukraine could result in subdued economic growth. For example, the federal government's group of experts has already lowered its growth forecast for Switzerland in 2022 to 2.8 percent, it says. In addition to the Ukraine conflict, higher inflation is also putting the brakes on economic recovery, the report continues.

Accordingly, only 6,637 new light commercial vehicles were registered in the first three months of the year, 14.6 percent fewer than in the same period last year (7,772). The latest figures are even down another 4.4 percent on the first quarter of the first Corona year 2020. The supplier crisis is also having a major impact on deliveries of heavy commercial vehicles. From January to March, 790 new trucks have been registered, 12.3 percent less than in the previous year, when there were 901. Here, in turn, the figure in the first quarter of 2020 was still significantly higher at 976, as heavy commercial vehicles usually still undergo a special assembly process before they are delivered and thus hit the roads with a greater time lag after they are ordered.

The only bright spot: Motorhomes

By contrast, the number of registrations of new passenger transport vehicles stabilized at a high level, rising by 3.3 percent. Once again, this was primarily due to camper vans, which accounted for 1,945 of the total of 2,096 registrations in the first quarter. This meant that campers accounted for an even larger share of this segment (92.8 percent) than they did a year ago (90.6%, 1,839 of 2,029). "Actually, we wanted to start a catch-up in the commercial vehicle market in 2022," auto-schweiz media spokesman Christoph Wolnik commented on the current market situation. "But the outbreak of the Ukraine war has made this impossible, at least in the first quarter. We are hoping for an improvement in the supply situation as the year progresses - and above all for an end to the armed conflict as soon as possible."

Together with the 54,227 passenger cars, a total of 63,750 new motor vehicles were put into circulation in Switzerland and the Principality of Liechtenstein in the first quarter of 2022. Compared to the previous year's figure of 67,199, this represents a decrease of 3,449 new registrations or 5.1 percent.

Source: auto-schweiz

It was some years ago when the US economist Milton Friedmann claimed that the only social responsibility of business is to maximize profits. His famous quote, "The business of business is business," can be seen today, half a century later, as quite a contradiction to current developments. Meanwhile, the concept of corporate social responsibility (CSR) is on everyone's lips. "In recent months and years, quite a few companies have actually decided of their own free will to make their corporate activities more sustainable," emphasizes Wilhelm Heckmann, Managing Director at CNT Management Consulting AG in Zurich. Some companies are already going one step further and even integrating the topic of sustainability into their entire value chain, including suppliers and subsidiaries. What may sound like a disproportionately large effort at first glance can, however, also pay off for many companies on an economic level.

Numerous advantages of sustainable procurement

After all, a fully sustainable procurement process not only saves companies from environmental risks. Heckmann explains: "Future-oriented supply chain management can lead to an increase in the external perception of companies and thus significantly improve their public perception". One of the main reasons for resource-conserving procurement is also compliance with an increasing number of legal regulations and international principles. And a responsible purchasing process can also pay off economically. "Many companies that originally opted for sustainable procurement because of societal expectations now also recognize the economic, social and environmental benefits of making the switch," says Heckmann. Among other things, companies benefit by realizing efficiency gains, promoting the company's reputation and producing innovative products.

Agile and transparent supply chain

In addition to the long-term conservation of resources, most companies today attach great importance to the agility of their supply chain. "An agile supply chain means being able to react flexibly to changes as a company in order to recognize innovations on the market or innovation potential at an early stage and use them to one's own advantage," explains Heckmann. In order to enable comprehensible communication and fast reactions from all parties involved, an agile supply chain should be digitized and designed to be as transparent as possible. "The more transparent the supply chain, the faster and better change can be implemented," says Heckmann. An open communication culture within the company is also of central importance in this context, he adds.

Innovation in purchasing

In the development towards more sustainability in one's own company and especially in procurement, cooperation with suppliers and subsidiaries is crucial. It can be helpful to work with suppliers who are not only innovative themselves, but also in line with the company's own corporate philosophy in terms of ethical behavior. If suppliers also want to actively drive change, it is easier for a company to get involved. And in general, the purchasing department is also of great relevance when it comes to the process towards more sustainability: "As a central corporate building block, procurement is often at the heart of innovation and change within a company," Heckmann emphasizes. Ultimately, it is always the results such as sales or growth that count for companies - but in evaluating the purchasing department, one should by no means only look at the economic component. "In addition to the impact on financial performance, the impact on operational as well as environmental performance should also be included," recommends the Managing Director.

Source and further information: CNT Management Consulting AG

The shift to renewable energy needs electricity storage, especially in view of the rapid increase in electricity consumption and skyrocketing energy costs. But conventional battery technologies create serious resource and waste problems. Lithium-ion batteries have revolutionized the battery world. But now that their production and use are soaring to astronomical heights, the downside of this development is emerging: Raw materials are needed whose long-term availability is not guaranteed and some of which are extracted under inhumane conditions. There are safety risks, as the batteries can lead to fires and explosions that are difficult to extinguish. And, most importantly, there will be a huge mountain of waste in the near future. This is because the lifespan of conventional lithium-ion batteries is very limited. They reach the end of their life after a few thousand charging cycles at the latest. Solid-state batteries are quite different: They are said to be more durable and have other advantages as well.

Solid state batteries: Mat least 50 % better in the environmental balance sheet

Swiss Clean Battery AG, founded in Frauenfeld in February 2022, wants to leave the international competition behind with its environmentally friendly, safe and high-performance product. Solid-state batteries are to be produced on a large scale in a new factory. These contain no critical raw materials such as cobalt, are resistant to deep discharge and can be charged quickly. Solid-state batteries have been regarded for years as a promising successor technology to conventional lithium-ion batteries. Accordingly, they are the subject of research in numerous laboratories around the world. So far, however, it has not been possible to develop high-performance rechargeable batteries with fixed-ion conductors: A key technical problem is to bring the fixed ion conductor in the battery cells into a stable connection with the electrodes. Many research projects are based on a "modular design" in which individual components are combined outside the cell and then inserted into the housing. This leads to problems with the transfer of ions at the material boundaries between the electrodes and the fixed ion conductor. After more than 30 years of basic research, it has been possible to solve this problem: In this new approach to solving the problem, the fixed ion conductor is formed in the battery cell itself, similar to a multicomponent adhesive. This overcomes the transition problems compared to modular construction.

Ambitious targets - and IPO planned for the fall

The company's ambitions are great: In the first production phase of 1.2 GWH, SCB AG is planning sales of CHF 318 million. For this purpose, CHF 246 million are planned to be invested in the machinery. In this first stage, SCB AG employs 181 people. A production area of 20,000 m2 will be built in order to produce 7.2 million battery cells per year. The enterprise value in this first stage is CHF 1.3 billion, with a conservative multiple of 18. In addition to debt financing for the production facility, an initial public offering (IPO) is targeted for October 2022 on the Zurich Stock Exchange. In the final phase, SCB AG is expected to produce 7.6 GWH, with an investment of CHF 775 million and sales of over CHF 2 billion. Approximately 100,000 m2 of production area will be built for this purpose. At this stage of expansion, SCB AG will produce nearly 48 million battery cells per year with 1061 employees. The company will then be worth CHF 8.6 billion. SCB AG is managed by CEO Roland Jung, CFO Peter Koch and COO Dr. Thomas Lützenrath. He is also the COO of High Performance Battery AG, the licensing technology company.

More information: https://www.highperformancebattery.ch/de/

Consolidation in companies: How does it work? Where can savings be made - in IT, for example? Part of the savings potential is offered, for example, by the Notebook Bargains at My DealThe new equipment for employees can be made more affordable with these measures. But there are also other measures that can be taken to really save money on IT. With the appropriate measures, relatively high sums can be saved quickly over the years.

The optimization of IT

It is not uncommon to completely overlook the fact that inefficient IT processes end up costing a lot of time. A major aspect of this is the unnecessary work that many employees often perform. Of course, this does not add value for the company. At the same time, whether the activity is efficient or inefficient, the salary must still be paid in full. This is especially true for processes that could actually be automated - a lot of time is also lost here in particular. Affected by this problem are both SMEs and the federal government.

Therefore, a first and important step is to eliminate any sources of error and unnecessary work steps while minimizing the risk of IT failure. In this way, all devices in IT then run trouble-free. This is not only easy on the nerves, but also saves time and therefore a lot of money. Unfortunately, it is a fact that if IT is idle for several hours, employees can hardly work efficiently and still have to be paid in full.

Measures to consolidate IT

Despite fast and expensive Internet lines that many companies pay for, often the speed cannot be reached due to system errors. However, the right configuration can speed up the slow Internet.

One of the main causes of a slow Internet connection can be misconfigured networks, for example. Likewise, however, an incorrectly set firewall can also be the culprit for slow Internet. Investing in an IT expert at this point will always pay off in the long run and ultimately provide enormous savings.

Printing costs are often completely underestimated

Time and again, it becomes apparent that many companies use several smaller printers from different manufacturers. It was not uncommon for these printers to be purchased one after the other as demand increased. It seemed to be the logical and only way to be able to cope with the increasing printing demand.

However, the disadvantage is obvious, because each printer ultimately requires special ink cartridges. This is often associated with very different maintenance of the individual printer. This, in turn, also costs additional money and all employees are forced to be familiar with the different models.

A much more efficient measure here is the purchase of a larger printer. It should then cover the company's entire printing needs. Of course, the purchase costs for such a model are often higher, but printing is more efficient here and there is also great potential for savings.

Everything about the back-ups

Simplifying and automating back-ups also provides cost savings in the long run. Meanwhile, backups can be automated through cloud services. Back-ups then run automatically in the background. The advantage is clear: no one has to be deployed to take care of hard disk replacement or the like anymore. Instead of Invest time in back-upsemployees can efficiently pursue their actual work. Another factor is that errors can easily occur, especially in complicated back-up processes.

Complicated processes usually not very efficient

The more complicated the processes, the less efficient the workflows. Unnecessary work steps in particular cost time, drive up costs and also harbor potential sources of error. This is quickly demonstrated by the following example: If six employees work on six computers in the company, then it is probably intended that each employee can also work on any PC available in the company if necessary and has the necessary access to the documents. For this reason, six users will probably be created on each computer, resulting in a total of 36 users.

However, this approach often does not take into account that if changes are made or the software needs to be updated, this must be done 36 times in this case. This immediately opens up a potential source of error, because it is quite likely that something will be overlooked here. The logical answer in such a case would be to use a cloud. This would not only significantly reduce the supposed sources of error, but above all simplify the processes extremely.

Thanks to such a cloud, all documents of all employees can be stored in the cloud and then accessed completely uncomplicatedly and easily from any PC. A separate user is completely unnecessary for this. This means that when using cloud storage, there is only one user on each computer. Accordingly, all updates now only have to be performed once per computer. Here, sources of error are significantly reduced and, of course, a great deal of time and therefore money is saved.

This example also shows the efficiency with regard to printers or even back-ups. The less complicated the workflows are and the fewer steps are required by the employees, the lower the error rate. A lot of time is saved and costs are minimized at the same time.

Simplifying IT processes saves costs

As a rule, efficient IT processes have one thing in common: they are not only much less complicated, but above all they ensure that employees' manpower can be used sensibly and thus profitably.

A decisive step in order to be successful in the IT to save money properly is to reduce the variety of models in the IT landscape. In any case, it is important here that the number of different manufacturers and the number of different models and variations in the company are greatly reduced. Notebooks, monitors or even tablets should always be compatible in order to create a truly homogeneous IT landscape. If a workstation is ever occupied on a temporary basis, no employee should have to familiarize themselves with different hardware. That would mean wasting valuable working time and money.

The net zero target applies not only to the emissions caused by the FM specialist ISS with its own services, but to the entire value chain. ISS's direct and indirect emissions (e.g. energy used) will be climate neutral by 2030. By 2040, the climate neutrality target also applies to all emissions from facilities not owned or controlled by ISS but indirectly impacting the value chain.

FM Specialist: From Part of the Problem to Part of the Solution

For ISS Switzerland, the sustainability initiative means that half of the vehicle fleet of around 1,700 passenger cars and commercial vehicles will be electrified by 2026. In total, ISS vehicles cover around 30 million kilometers every year. By 2030 at the latest, ISS will only use electricity from renewable sources. Already by the end of 2022, only ecologically certified cleaning products will be used, and by 2026, all ISS business premises will be certified according to the company's own "ISS Green Office" program. This will significantly reduce energy and water consumption as well as the amount of waste generated. "For me, this is also a personal concern," says André Nauer, CEO of ISS Switzerland. "We have to be honest with ourselves: I and my generation played a big role in creating the problems we face today. It's time to change that and no longer be part of the problem, but part of the solution."

Towards sustainable facility management

ISS employs around 400,000 people worldwide and is the leading provider of Workplace Experience and Facility Services. In Switzerland, ISS is the leading FM specialist. Group CEO Jacob Aarup-Andersen: "With ISS' 120-year heritage as a people-driven company, social sustainability has always been embedded in our DNA. The need for a decisive change towards a more sustainable world is clear and urgent. ISS is ready to champion that change."

Source and further information: ISS Switzerland AG

In 2020, Somnitec AG, based in Gerlafingen in the canton of Solothurn, realigned itself and focused on three high-growth business areas: Cloud Platform, Application & Business Process Management and Modern Workplace. With the acquisition of tecITec AG, Somnitec has strengthened its position in the provision of modern end user solutions and now employs around 72 people. As a Microsoft Gold Partner and Cloud Solution Provider, the focus is on hybrid cloud solutions for medium to large, also internationally active SMEs. Somnitec offers integrated business IT solutions from consulting to operation, with its own private cloud platform and professional support organization. Managed services around Microsoft, the partnership with SAP and many years of experience in the operation of SAP/SAP HANA environments are also part of the company's portfolio.

teclTec AG, in turn, specializes in the automated provision and management of high-quality Modern Workplace environments. The SME-focused business is perfectly complemented with the help of the Microsoft 365 portfolio. The balance of security requirements and usability, combined with a high degree of standardization, offers customers an outstanding user experience, according to the company.

"I am very pleased to further develop the existing SME business together with a strong and renowned partner like Somnitec AG and to become part of the Somnitec family," explains teclTec AG's Managing Director Leontina Hoti. "Through the acquisition of teclTec AG and its solution portfolio, we will be able to meet the needs of our SME customers in an even better and more standardized way in the future. With Leontina Hoti, we are also gaining another strong personality who will develop the business together with us and fits perfectly into the Somnitec family!" adds Vanja Rohr, CEO of Somnitec AG.

More information

The first showcase series of Best Retail Cases Switzerland (BRCS) starts on April 12. The "State of the Art" in Retail & eCommerce will be presented in five compact events. The sessions will start on Tuesdays at 8:30 a.m. and will last about 90 minutes in total.

• 12 Apr 2022 - Retail ERP "The central database".
• 3 May 2022 - Webshop Solutions "The must-have sales channel".
• 10 May 2022 - Retail Marketing "Picking up customers on the customer journey".
• 17 May 2022 - Retail Logistics "The critical success factor for webshops".
• 24 May 2022 - Retail Payment "The digital check-out".

Focus on knowledge transfer and networking

Best Retail Cases Switzerland goes into the next round with the showcase series. Following the successful award in February, in-depth insights are now on the agenda. Experts, providers and users will present the latest trends, best practices, current solutions and concrete application examples in the retail business. Modern formats, such as customer and supplier interviews and the new live panels "Swiss Retail Voices" make every event an exciting live experience. Retailers, marketplaces and online stores as well as manufacturers in the B2C business are thus offered the opportunity to learn from the best and gain valuable impulses for their own retail business. "The showcase series aims to impart knowledge to users and connect them with innovative providers," explains Ewa Ming, initiator of Best Retail Cases Switzerland.

Showcase series starts on April 12, 2002 with Retail ERP Solutions

Due to the ever-increasing growth of online business, more and more SMEs are now also relying on ERP integration of webshops and eCommerce functions. How this can be implemented is precisely what the first showcase event on April 12, 2022 will be about. Moderated by ERP expert and topsoft editor-in-chief Christian Bühlmann, experts and software providers will demonstrate various ways in which data and processes can be used efficiently and how customers can be "picked up" at the most important touchpoints with ERP-integrated mobile apps.

Building on the latest ERP systems as the central data basis, the series of topics will be rounded off with Webshop Solutions, Retail Marketing, Retail Logistics and Retail Payment along the retail value chain.

Registration is now open at: www.innovationworld.ch/brcs-showcase-serie