25th Swiss Economic Forum 2023 completed

On June 8 and 9, the 25th Swiss Economic Forum (SEF) was successfully held in Interlaken with around 70 speakers from Switzerland and abroad and 1350 participants. Corine Blesi, Managing Director of the SEF, expressed her satisfaction with the anniversary edition of the SEF: "Companies have the ability to constantly adapt to new circumstances as a business and the values of self-responsibility, entrepreneurship, leadership principle and modesty are factors that make the Swiss economy one of the world leaders today. The SEF always set itself the goal of raising awareness of these values."

Politics and artificial intelligence at the Swiss Economic Forum 2023

The anniversary SERF was opened by President Alain Berset. In his opening speech, he pleaded for the trust and confidence of the people.
between business, politics and society in Switzerland absolutely had to be consolidated again. Cooperation is the greatest strength of our country. It produces stable institutions that promote our core values such as fairness, exchange and freedom and make Switzerland a highly successful country.

In addition to politics, the conference also focused on artificial intelligence. Garry Kasparov, who in 1997 was the first reigning chess world champion to be defeated by the IBM supercomputer Deep Blue, said that AI can and will support us in many areas. But ultimately, every problem is still solved by humans. Machines can simply do it faster and with fewer errors if you show them how. Urs Hölzle, a computer scientist from Basel, Switzerland, who was only the eighth employee of Google at the time and is now senior vice president for technical infrastructure there, warned against too much euphoria. The current state of artificial intelligence, especially with regard to supposedly revolutionary speech software such as ChatGPT, is overrated, he said at the SEF. He compared it to a pocket calculator, which can solve difficult tasks in seconds, but had not revolutionized mathematics.

About the economy and the Swiss financial center

The Swiss economy is still doing comparatively well, summarized National Bank President Thomas Jordan and Pierre-Olivier Gourinchas of the International Monetary Fund (IMF). on the first day of the event summarized the situation. Inflation in Switzerland should definitely be kept below two percent and price stability ensured. It was important to protect the Swiss market from international inflation.

Sergio P. Ermotti, CEO of the major bank UBS, also made an appearance. He spoke about the future of the bank and that of the Swiss financial center. 61 % of the SEF participants think that the takeover of Credit Suisse by UBS is the right solution under the current circumstances. This visibly pleased Sergio P. Ermotti, and he added that the takeover was a very important moment for UBS, but also for the Swiss financial center and for Switzerland itself. Management felt this responsibility and the next few months would be bumpy, but they were very focused. He said that the reorganization should not be guided by nostalgia and feelings, but should be based on the facts.

The challenge of family business

Family businesses in Switzerland also have to contend with the shortage of skilled workers. This was underlined by Rudi Bindella senior and Rudi Bindella junior during their joint appearance. Professional pride is central and they are sure that they are practicing the most beautiful profession in the world. Rudi sr. takes a critical view of the fundamental trend toward part-time work. When asked how succession is well regulated in the family business, the two agree: professional competence is important when selecting a successor, but humanity and passion are even more important.

Startups still have little to do with succession. For them, it's more a question of how to become a unicorn. Young Sohn, Managing Partner at Walden Catalyst and former President and CSO of Samsung Electronics, considers a close connection between the startup scene and the best universities to be crucial for good companies to emerge. Further, the Silicon Valley investor said, one has to be careful in which countries one still invests; in China, for example, one should be very cautious. Chips have become a kind of new currency for intellectual power - and this market is currently absolutely dominated by Southeast Asia.

Swiss Economic Award 2023

The Swiss Economic Award, which was presented during the conference, was won by:

• In the "Service" category: Neho, which is currently in the process of shaking up the real estate brokerage business by offering a revolutionary service for buying and selling real estate.
• Production/Commercial" category: Boostbar AG, operator of completely digitized snack vending machines. Boostbar's solution transforms each vending machine into a small e-commerce store, thanks to a single user interface for digitizing each point of sale.
• Deeptech/Life Science category: Daphne Technology SA, which focuses on solving the greenhouse gas problem in industries that are difficult to decarbonize.

The winners each receive prize money of 25,000 Swiss francs, sound expert feedback and simplified access to the growth initiative SEF.Growth. Certainly, you will meet some of the award winners again at a Swiss Economic Forum in the future. The next opportunity will be in 2024, namely from June 6 to 7, 2024, again in Interlaken.

Source and further information: www.swisseconomic.ch