I have been involved with Swissnex and been advising Swiss startups for some time. I also go to Switzerland every other year if not every year and meet with startups there.
Things I noticed:
1. Incredibly smart people.
2. Behind Silicon Valley on best technology and product building practices by at least 2 years.
3. Great work ethic and social responsibility.
4. Do not have world conquering ambitions - which kinda works against them. One of the founders was talking about an idea and was being very conservative with market size estimates. So I suggested to him - Think about how you can conquer the world. And his reply was - We are Swiss, we don't conquer the world.
I think one of the biggest challenge for Switzerland tech scene is that there is no viable immigration path for a non-EU citizen. Even after decades, you might not get a citizenship [1]. It makes it difficult for them to attract talent from outside, especially those with Silicon Valley experience.
Not that US is any better for Indians. Based on current estimates, if someone from India applies for an employment based Green Card now, they might get it in 70 years. And life is a pain because you have to do a lot of paperwork throughout.
If there was a viable immigration path in Switzerland, I would move there tomorrow!
Oh HN, how is this the top comment on this fantastic blog post about the huge lifestyle drawbacks from living in SV?
>> 2. Behind Silicon Valley on best technology and product building practices by at least 2 years.
This was clearly written in earnest, but works better as a satirical joke about the inward-facing nature of bay area tech. Please explain what "best technology and product building practices" means here, and how you can quantify that over time. What were the best practices of early 2016 which are just now being implemented in Zurich-base startups?
> Do not have world conquering ambitions - which kinda works against them.
Works against them towards what? Not wanting to conquer the world is legitimate, I don't see why everyone should absolutely want to become the next Bezos.
>"I think one of the biggest challenge for Switzerland tech scene is that there is no viable immigration path for a non-EU citizen"
This is not true. It's up to the local canton to grant citizenship[1]. It has noting to do with EU vs non-EU either. Switzerland itself is not actually part of the EU[2]. For someone who visits so often, it seems odd that you don't know that. In fact even in the video in your link says that the same committee that rejected this person's citizenship awarded it to a Turkish individual and Turkey is not part of the EU.
>"Do not have world conquering ambitions"
Yes in the majority of the world this is actually considered quite normal and acceptable. Many would even say "preferable."
> Behind Silicon Valley on best technology and product building practices by at least 2 years.
Can you elaborate on that? Are these "best practices" around technology or process? Are they found in books, or are the books out of date and you just have to 'be there' to discover them?
The point 2 should have been:
>> 2. Behind Silicon Valley on latest technology and product building practices by at least 2 years.
I instead used the word "best" which doesn't really capture what I had meant. This thread also helped me develop a better understanding of my learnings.
> Not that US is any better for Indians. Based on current estimates, if someone from India applies for an employment based Green Card now, they might get it in 70 years. And life is a pain because you have to do a lot of paperwork throughout.
I thought that is because so many Indians applying for green cards but there is a limit by country so it takes a long time?
The point that public transport can be more efficient than private does not necessarily reflect public investment although the Swiss do invest in subsidizing transport infrastructure. But what's suprising is that much of the public transport system is owned and operated by private (profit-motivated) companies. I think there are about 10 different companies operating what looks like a unified public transport system in Zürich for example. But you'd never know this because of the integrated ticketing.
Healthcare is very similar - a blend of private (mostly) and public provision but with government regulated insurance market. However it's not exactly efficient - I think an exceptional proportion of national income is spent on health care (i.e. close to US levels and way higher than European norms) even if it doesn't appear on your insurance bill every month.
But yes I love that "adjustable work schedules" are the norm here and I think Switzerland is fairly exceptional from what I know in that regard. I work 80% (4 days a week) as do some other collegues and there is no perception that this indicates a lack of dedication to the start-up or that we should be considered less than committed. It's difficult to describe how much this has improved my lifestyle.
> I think there are about 10 different companies operating what looks like a unified public transport system in Zürich for example.
Yes, there are different companies, and many of them are nominally organized as corporations, but I can't think of any of them that are for-profit, and pretty much all of them are state owned.
> I think an exceptional proportion of national income is spent on health care
True, Swiss per capita health care spending is roughly midway between the US and European countries like Germany and France. But in terms of availability and outcomes, the Swiss system is outstanding. I'm sure you find Swiss who would trade health care systems with Germany and France. But I doubt that anyone who has experienced both systems would trade with the US.
> But yes I love that "adjustable work schedules" are the norm here and I think Switzerland is fairly exceptional from what I know in that regard.
Yeah it's cool. It's becoming increasingly common in the Netherlands. It has been common for moms for a long time (somehow it's nearly always the women who work less when they get kids, we're bafflingly traditional that way), but it's slowly beginning to be acceptable elsewhere too.
7 years ago when I worked at a software agency, a colleague who became dad wanted to go to 80%. His bosses wouldn't take it and he actually ended up handing in his resignation before our they realized he was serious. They ended up offering him the job at 80% btw. Now, the same agency has ike 10% of the workforce at 80%. That's a pretty big culture change in relatively little time.
Y'know, I once was talking to a hiring manager about my potential job. He said something about working 10 hour days and often working weekends.
I said, "Great, I don't think this job is for me. I hope you guys do well!"
And then I got another job, and I work 8 (maybe sometimes more like 8.5) hour days and no weekends. Outside of genuine "we're on fire" operational catastrophes, which happen like once or twice a year.
As a Swiss I think you got a healthy attitude. Many Americans seem to think that they have no power over what's forced up them in the workplace. You're selling a valuable, sought after and potentially unique good - your expertise. Don't let BigCorp trample all over you, they need you. Employee retention rate is a very important metric for any good company - if they don't care about that it's a big red flag for any potential employee. In fact, IMO governments should publicly list retention rates of all employers.
I worked for a major biotech company in Silicon Valley that was part-owned, then later fully-owned, by a large Swiss pharmaceutical company. Well, it wasn't really a pharma company so many as a collection of wealthy Swiss families that maintained cross-investments in each other's pharma companies because it was a profitable sector. But I digress.
Anyway, every year, the Swiss would send their top IT people to come look at our IT systems, and ask us questions about how we did things. What software we ran, how we administrated it, etc. They generally thought we were quite lazy and lax; noting that our sysadmins were from a wide collection of countries, one commented "At Roche, we only hire Swiss citizens to administer the SAP servers."
Later, Roche bought Genentech because it was far more profitable than any other investment Roche could make, and they generally adopted Genentech's approach to IT throughout the larger company. Pretty sure the SAP servers are still administered by Swiss citizens.
> "At Roche, we only hire Swiss citizens to administer the SAP servers."
Ex-Genentecher here too, and that quote really surprises me. Maybe it got that way later, but when I went to Basel in '95 to do some work I found a very international team. Granted, there were probably more Swiss among the IT guys than the Pharma people but it was by no means all-Swiss.
The office language was English but the techies spoke a lot of German (and occasionally Swiss German) among themselves. My impression was not speaking German would be a disadvantage for IT, but I definitely did not feel like anybody was discriminating against the non-Swiss. (I speak German but not Swiss German.)
I wonder if it changed that much, or if you just met some difficult people.
That lifestyle is possible in SV too .. it's a matter of how you choose priorities. At www.compilerworks.com we are purposefully bootstrapped to enable a high quality lifestyle (there are 3 of us in the Bay Area and 5 internationally).
I've worked a number of tech jobs in the valley, and while the expected work hours aren't exactly European, I can't really think of a time where I worked weekends other than being on call perhaps 1 week in 4 or 5, and I find the work hours quite regular. Then again, I'm not exactly a game developer.
I can work in SV and use great, reliable public transportation to get everywhere I want in my life, often in under an hour? And I can have 5 weeks paid vacation per year? I wasn't able to find these things when I lived there...
Well, forget about doing laundry on Sunday, which was the weirdest thing about! Sunday's were like rest days, outside of train stations almost everything was closed, and to cap it off you couldn't do your laundry either.
My apartment was nice because we could sign up for chosen slots for any unspoken for time we wanted to do laundry rather than have one inflexible time assigned to us.
Hardly. The tax system in the United States and California is markedly inefficient in terms of price and what you get out of it. CH taxes are minimal, and the body politic and municipalities just work.
Source: I lived and worked in S.V. and live in Zürich for several years.
Zurich pay can eclipse Valley pay. I have friends who went to ETH for grad school and were getting close to 100k CHF a year. This is grad school -- the pay goes up from there.
Zurich, along with London, has the highest salaries for development in Europe. You may need to work in a finance-related position, but you can make fairly big bucks.
[+] [-] timewarrior|8 years ago|reply
Things I noticed:
1. Incredibly smart people.
2. Behind Silicon Valley on best technology and product building practices by at least 2 years.
3. Great work ethic and social responsibility.
4. Do not have world conquering ambitions - which kinda works against them. One of the founders was talking about an idea and was being very conservative with market size estimates. So I suggested to him - Think about how you can conquer the world. And his reply was - We are Swiss, we don't conquer the world.
I think one of the biggest challenge for Switzerland tech scene is that there is no viable immigration path for a non-EU citizen. Even after decades, you might not get a citizenship [1]. It makes it difficult for them to attract talent from outside, especially those with Silicon Valley experience.
Not that US is any better for Indians. Based on current estimates, if someone from India applies for an employment based Green Card now, they might get it in 70 years. And life is a pain because you have to do a lot of paperwork throughout.
If there was a viable immigration path in Switzerland, I would move there tomorrow!
1. https://www.swissinfo.ch/eng/naturalisation-controversy_amer...
[+] [-] nextstep|8 years ago|reply
>> 2. Behind Silicon Valley on best technology and product building practices by at least 2 years.
This was clearly written in earnest, but works better as a satirical joke about the inward-facing nature of bay area tech. Please explain what "best technology and product building practices" means here, and how you can quantify that over time. What were the best practices of early 2016 which are just now being implemented in Zurich-base startups?
[+] [-] sailingparrot|8 years ago|reply
Works against them towards what? Not wanting to conquer the world is legitimate, I don't see why everyone should absolutely want to become the next Bezos.
[+] [-] bogomipz|8 years ago|reply
This is not true. It's up to the local canton to grant citizenship[1]. It has noting to do with EU vs non-EU either. Switzerland itself is not actually part of the EU[2]. For someone who visits so often, it seems odd that you don't know that. In fact even in the video in your link says that the same committee that rejected this person's citizenship awarded it to a Turkish individual and Turkey is not part of the EU.
>"Do not have world conquering ambitions"
Yes in the majority of the world this is actually considered quite normal and acceptable. Many would even say "preferable."
[1] https://www.swissinfo.ch/eng/becoming-a-citizen/29288376
[2] https://europa.eu/european-union/about-eu/countries/member-c...
[+] [-] quickthrower2|8 years ago|reply
Can you elaborate on that? Are these "best practices" around technology or process? Are they found in books, or are the books out of date and you just have to 'be there' to discover them?
[+] [-] dwc|8 years ago|reply
I am curious what such Swiss people think of Nestlé, then. Or other companies and industries where Switzerland has a prominent global reputation?
I would just chalk it up to personal preferences and motivations, but the statement as written suggests it's a Swiss thing in general.
[+] [-] timewarrior|8 years ago|reply
The point 2 should have been: >> 2. Behind Silicon Valley on latest technology and product building practices by at least 2 years.
I instead used the word "best" which doesn't really capture what I had meant. This thread also helped me develop a better understanding of my learnings.
[+] [-] pkaye|8 years ago|reply
I thought that is because so many Indians applying for green cards but there is a limit by country so it takes a long time?
[+] [-] derriz|8 years ago|reply
Healthcare is very similar - a blend of private (mostly) and public provision but with government regulated insurance market. However it's not exactly efficient - I think an exceptional proportion of national income is spent on health care (i.e. close to US levels and way higher than European norms) even if it doesn't appear on your insurance bill every month.
But yes I love that "adjustable work schedules" are the norm here and I think Switzerland is fairly exceptional from what I know in that regard. I work 80% (4 days a week) as do some other collegues and there is no perception that this indicates a lack of dedication to the start-up or that we should be considered less than committed. It's difficult to describe how much this has improved my lifestyle.
[+] [-] microtherion|8 years ago|reply
Yes, there are different companies, and many of them are nominally organized as corporations, but I can't think of any of them that are for-profit, and pretty much all of them are state owned.
> I think an exceptional proportion of national income is spent on health care
True, Swiss per capita health care spending is roughly midway between the US and European countries like Germany and France. But in terms of availability and outcomes, the Swiss system is outstanding. I'm sure you find Swiss who would trade health care systems with Germany and France. But I doubt that anyone who has experienced both systems would trade with the US.
[+] [-] skrebbel|8 years ago|reply
Yeah it's cool. It's becoming increasingly common in the Netherlands. It has been common for moms for a long time (somehow it's nearly always the women who work less when they get kids, we're bafflingly traditional that way), but it's slowly beginning to be acceptable elsewhere too.
7 years ago when I worked at a software agency, a colleague who became dad wanted to go to 80%. His bosses wouldn't take it and he actually ended up handing in his resignation before our they realized he was serious. They ended up offering him the job at 80% btw. Now, the same agency has ike 10% of the workforce at 80%. That's a pretty big culture change in relatively little time.
[+] [-] aetherson|8 years ago|reply
I said, "Great, I don't think this job is for me. I hope you guys do well!"
And then I got another job, and I work 8 (maybe sometimes more like 8.5) hour days and no weekends. Outside of genuine "we're on fire" operational catastrophes, which happen like once or twice a year.
I live and work in SF.
[+] [-] m_mueller|8 years ago|reply
[+] [-] msd81257|8 years ago|reply
Thanks @jotaen!!! Really appreciate it.
[+] [-] OxO4|8 years ago|reply
[+] [-] dekhn|8 years ago|reply
Anyway, every year, the Swiss would send their top IT people to come look at our IT systems, and ask us questions about how we did things. What software we ran, how we administrated it, etc. They generally thought we were quite lazy and lax; noting that our sysadmins were from a wide collection of countries, one commented "At Roche, we only hire Swiss citizens to administer the SAP servers."
Later, Roche bought Genentech because it was far more profitable than any other investment Roche could make, and they generally adopted Genentech's approach to IT throughout the larger company. Pretty sure the SAP servers are still administered by Swiss citizens.
[+] [-] biztos|8 years ago|reply
Ex-Genentecher here too, and that quote really surprises me. Maybe it got that way later, but when I went to Basel in '95 to do some work I found a very international team. Granted, there were probably more Swiss among the IT guys than the Pharma people but it was by no means all-Swiss.
The office language was English but the techies spoke a lot of German (and occasionally Swiss German) among themselves. My impression was not speaking German would be a disadvantage for IT, but I definitely did not feel like anybody was discriminating against the non-Swiss. (I speak German but not Swiss German.)
I wonder if it changed that much, or if you just met some difficult people.
[+] [-] jotaen|8 years ago|reply
[+] [-] matttproud|8 years ago|reply
Zürich is a great place to work, live, and relax. The people here are also stupendously awesome.
[+] [-] workthrowaway27|8 years ago|reply
[+] [-] fuzzieozzie|8 years ago|reply
[+] [-] rconti|8 years ago|reply
[+] [-] nextstep|8 years ago|reply
[+] [-] fludlight|8 years ago|reply
This seems efficient but also very off-putting.
[+] [-] seanmcdirmid|8 years ago|reply
My apartment was nice because we could sign up for chosen slots for any unspoken for time we wanted to do laundry rather than have one inflexible time assigned to us.
[+] [-] _nalply|8 years ago|reply
[+] [-] kgwgk|8 years ago|reply
Why?
[+] [-] chrisper|8 years ago|reply
(Sorry it is in German, but here is a translation https://translate.google.com/translate?hl=en&sl=auto&tl=en&u... )
TL;DR: They do not do it because they are afraid of getting sued by Americans.
[+] [-] unknown|8 years ago|reply
[deleted]
[+] [-] romanovcode|8 years ago|reply
[+] [-] matttproud|8 years ago|reply
Source: I lived and worked in S.V. and live in Zürich for several years.
[+] [-] electricslpnsld|8 years ago|reply
[+] [-] barrkel|8 years ago|reply