Switzerland

Kickstart Accelerator, a swiss multi-corporate accelerator in Europe, has announced the opening of applications for its second programme, predominantly based out of ewz-Unterwerk Selnau, the old transformer station in centre of Zurich.

The accelerator, an initiative of digitalswitzerland, is inviting startups from around the world and will shortlist 30 companies, all of whom will participate in an eleven-week programme. The programme will start on 4 September, with an official opening ceremony due to take place on 7 September. The final demo day is set as 17 November, where each team will present their products to a group of potential investors. Kickstart will not be taking any equity from the participating startups. Instead, founders will have the chance to win up to 25`000 CHF, as well as receiving a monthly founder stipend and masterclass sessions with mentors from the corporate partners and the Swiss innovation ecosystem.

Kickstart Accelerator is looking for startups in the food, fintech, smart cities, and robotics and intelligent systems sectors, and is partnering with BaseLaunch to facilitate healthtech companies.

Simultaneous double exhibition of art collection which a German kept hidden from the world for decades will be shown at museums in Switzerland and Germany later this year, Switzerland’s Kunstmuseum Bern announced Wednesday. The content of the exhibitions at the Art and Exhibition Hall of the Federal Republic of Germany in Bonn and at the Kunstmuseum Bern is closely coordinated.

The Swiss museum, which Gurlitt designated as his sole heir, announced it would co-host the "Dossier Gurlitt" shows together with the Bundeskunsthalle in Bonn.

SBB says it has developed its 2020 strategy in consultation with customers, employees, partners and policymakers in order to adapt the railway to a rapidly changing world characterised by new customer requirements, digitalisation, new transport providers and regulatory developments. Mobility is undergoing profound and extensive change and other modes of transport are catching up with trains in terms of price and environmental advantage, the Federal Railways acknowledged on Monday.

Air China, the national comapny, will be making its return to Zurich this summer, more than 17 years after it last operated flights to the Swiss city.It will ensure four connections per week between Zurich and Beijing, according to Zurich airport spokesperson Raffaela Stelzer in an interview with travel magazine “Travelinside”. The last trip made by Air China between the Swiss city and Beijing was in October 1999.

The announcement means more competition for Swiss International Airlines, as the new Air China flights will depart just fifteen minutes after those offered by the Swiss company, which is operated by Lufthansa.

FinTech leader NetGuardians and the School of Engineering and Management Vaud (HEIG-VD) have teamed to create a “made in Switzerland” research team focused on AI and machine learning; the project aims to use AI to take fraud detection “to the next level”. The project is being supported by the Swiss Commission for Technology and Innovation (CTI).

Bringing together leading-edge industry and academic strengths, the collaboration will further develop NetGuardians’ current real-time fraud detection technologies that use machine learning for superior analytics across all channels and banking systems. NetGuardians will work with the Institute for Information and Communication Technologies (IICT), an interdisciplinary applied research institute for real-world IT challenges, based at the technology-focused university HEIG-VD.

Trump’s election, love him or loathe him, has had repercussions on the economics in the US but Europe, and Switzerland, have been affected as well. Alberto Mingardi, who is part […]

The EU is “very disappointed” in the Swiss people’s rejection of the government’s corporate tax reform plan, the EU’s tax commissioner MOscovici said on Monday.

Voters on Sunday blocked the tax system revamp, sending the Swiss government back to the drawing board as it tries to abolish ultra-low tax rates for multinationals without triggering a mass exodus by those companies. "The Commission is very disappointed by the results of a referendum in Switzerland," Moscovici told a news conference.

"The rejection of the reform and referendum means we need to redouble our efforts when it comes to taxation. The Commission plans to consult the member states so we can decide together how to proceed," he said.

Credit Suisse has reported a net loss of 2.347 billion Swiss francs ($2.337 billion) for the fourth quarter of 2016 as the bank felt the impact of a $5.28 billion fine from the U.S. Department of Justice.

The fine in December stems from the bank’s sale of toxic mortgage assets in the lead up to the 2008 global financial crisis and brings an end to a "major source of uncertainty" for the bank, according to Chief Executive Tidjane Thiam. It said Tuesday it recorded a provision of approximately $2 billion during the fourth quarter of 2016 for this penalty, in addition to existing provisions of $550 million in prior periods.