When less is more: keeping our innovators in Switzerland
(Last modification 02.11.2017)
Bern, 02.11.2017 - Swiss Robotics Industry Day, EPFL - Speech by Federal Councillor Johann N. Schneider-Ammann, Head of the Federal Department of Economic Affairs, Education and Research EAER
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It is a real pleasure for me to be back here in Lausanne at the EPFL.
I was here less than a month ago for the Magistrale, the graduation ceremony.
And today, I’m standing here in the same place once again to speak to you on Swiss Robotics Industry Day.
That’s part of the fun of being a minister in Switzerland. As we are such a small crew, every member of government juggles several hats, so we sometimes have to check which one have on.
Right now I have the pleasure of wearing all of my official hats in one go as minister of
- economic affairs,
- industry
- education,
- research,
- labour
- and innovation.
I think that should probably cover all the issues at hand today.
The fact that no less than four ministries are represented by my presence, gives you some indication of the importance of this event.
Ladies and Gentlemen,
The 4th Industrial revolution is on its way (whether we like it or not).
But many people, certain sections our society and of our political establishment are struggling to come to terms with it.
What you are doing today will transform our economy, our society and our way of thinking in ways that are still difficult to fathom.
Even the best experts are at a loss to tell us what the future holds for us and for our children.
But you and I know: there is no going back.
The genie is out of the bottle. It’s our task to help allay people’s fears, so that they can accept and take advantage of the good things it has to offer.
Robotics is perhaps one of the best ways to do this.
It is something that people can see, touch and understand.
The abstract algorithms become tangible.
It might be an exoskeleton helping a stroke victim to walk again.
Or a social robot helping people with neuro-deficiencies to engage with the world around them.
When I see the enthusiasm with which people are buying drones and experimenting with new ways of using them, I’m very optimistic about the ability of our society to embrace the novelties you are working on.
So robotics is not only a very important branch of industry.
It’s also one of the best ways of showcasing the technical revolution that is under way.
And, Ladies and Gentlemen, I can also tell you, if you didn’t already know it, that you are in the right place!
“Switzerland has emerged as a serious competitor to California for the technologies, people and funding that will power the world’s fourth socio-economic revolution.”
That quote comes from an article by Andrew Cave recently published in Forbes magazine.
(Maybe some of you are already familiar with it.)
In my view, this is down to our liberal economic policies which give you a free hand to try out new ideas and take initiatives.
It is also what has us helped us achieve the top slot for the 9th consecutive year in the World Economic Forum’s Global Competitiveness Report.
Complacency is our own worst enemy.
But I can assure you, we are aware of that.
The 4th industrial revolution is a worthy challenge that will force us to keep our skills honed.
Swiss companies and entrepreneurs are tackling this challenge head on, and your presence here is proof of that.
My goal is to help you to stretch yourselves even further.
But what is your government doing? ronically, our greatest challenge is to do less!
And that takes quite a lot of effort.
Let me explain:
Doing less means holding back all those who want the government to prevent the digitalisation to disrupt our old habits.
Or those who seek more government intervention to speed up the pace of digital transformation.
In other words: we have to be wise enough to know when less is more.
But I’m confident that our trinity of labour market flexibility, education and social partnership gives us a strong hand to take on the challenges.
1. First of all, we need to ensure that our labour market remains as flexible as possible.
It’s the only way for companies to embrace state of the art technology and keep pace with the fierce global competition which is relentlessly winnowing out winners and losers.
But that also means our companies must be able to recruit the best and the brightest.
2. Hence, the second pillar of our trinity: Education. And here Switzerland provides some of the best in the world.
The ETH Zurich is among the top twenty (19th) in the Shanghai ranking of world universities
(Sorry EPFL, but I had to say this. The ETHZ is my Alma Mater. But you – EPFL - are the best young university.)
Nevertheless, the EPFL, the Universities of Zurich, Geneva, Lausanne and Basel rank among the top hundred!
Not bad for a country with a population of 8 million!
But academic education is only one – albeit important – part of the bigger picture.
Where Switzerland leaves the rest standing is in vocational education and training.
It is skilled workers with vocational qualifications who get things done.
They are the nuts and bolts of our economic success.
Trained on the job, they possess the specific skill sets that companies need.
I’m immensely proud of this unique system.
It is also the reason why we are fortunate to have such low unemployment – especially among young people.
Ladies and Gentlemen:
We want our education and research to be ever better in the digital world.
We have to invest more in digitalisation.
And we must do it now.
This summer the Federal Council decided on a plan of action for my department for the period 2018 to 2020.
The amount of money we want to put into that is still a matter of debate,
but I remain confident that it will be more than symbolic.
3. Last, but not least, we enjoy a very high degree of social stability thanks to our social partnership.
This means a permanent dialogue and the negotiation of common rules between companies and workforce representatives.
This ensures that, despite the great flexibility of our labour market, nobody is left by the wayside when companies change their ways of doing things.
This also ensures that there is no need for ever more laws, because the social partners will always hammer out a deal that satisfies both sides.
We must look after this system.
Employees and employers will have to reach a consensus as to how they will live through the age of digitalisation.
All in all, the most important work in my department is to keep everybody committed to these three fundamental principles.
They are the pillars of our success.
Of your success.
But even that isn’t enough.
We know that the United States and China are on the prowl.
They are on the look out for our most promising start-ups and innovators, hoping to lure them away from Switzerland.
We want to keep our innovators here, in Switzerland. We want to keep you here.
By reforming our Commission for Technology and Innovation, we have given a first strong response to this challenge.
It will be more independent, with a smaller management team; we are building up Innosuisse to be a harder hitting, more flexible instrument to help our companies to innovate.
Innosuisse will be operational from the beginning of next year.
Preparations for our new Innovation Park Network, managed by the Switzerland Innovation Foundation,
are also well under way with five main sites across the country.
The EPFL is the central hub of Park Network West EPFL, with subsites in Geneva, Vaud, Neuchatel, Valais and Fribourg.
Next March, I will attend the grand opening of Park Zurich.
And third, many have called on the government to create a sovereign fund.
Its goal would be to finance the most promising start-ups to get through the so-called “valley of death”, when seed money dries up and traditional investors are still too wary to make their move. (Of course, those representatives from the world of finance here with us today are to be considered as wholly “untraditional”!)
Anyway, I don’t believe that it’s the job of the State to come up with this kind of money.
I don’t believe that public servants can pick credible winners. That’s a job for the private sector.
Armed with this conviction, I “nudged”…
– (that’s certainly the right word after Mr. Richard Thaler was awarded the Nobel Prize for economics for his work on behavioural economics) –
…I nudged some of the movers and shakers of our economy to build up a private fund.
The Swiss Entrepreneurs Foundation will be established in the next few months and should be able to make available up to 500 million francs to help our start-ups to market their ideas.
I’m thrilled that we have managed to get this idea up and running.
And I’m confident that we will have some results to show in the near future.
They argue that these policies need better coordination.
There is certainly some truth in this and it is something we are taking seriously, for example by implementing our ‘Digital Switzerland’ Strategy, which the Federal Council adopted last April.
Nevertheless, we have to bear in mind that digitalisation is transforming every aspect of our society, so in fact it affects every government department in one way or another.
In some respects, given that there are 7 cabinet members, we in fact already have 7 ‘ministers for digitalisation’.
More seriously, my colleague Doris Leuthard and I set up an Advisory Council on Digital Transformation.
The Council met for the second time last week and worked on two topics: “electronic IDs” and “Digital education”. Together, we are aiming to push ahead with reforms– quickly.
Dear friends,
As you can see, Switzerland is working hard to keep up with the best.
So I hope your companies will opt to stay put and that our country will remain the most “serious competitor to California for the technologies, people and funding that will power the world’s fourth socio-economic revolution.” My personal credo is ‘Let’s beat them!
We can’t unleash this revolution without public support. We have to convince them that digitalisation is an opportunity.
You have to explain to society what you are doing and what the implications are.
We have to do everything we can to establish the conditions for entrepreneurial success, which in turn will create jobs and prosperity for us all.
As I said at the beginning, robots are a good place to start. They are real.
It is easier for people to relate with them and understand what they do.
The courses offered by the EPFL:
“Robotics is a girl’s job” and ‘Building and programming robots’ aimed at the younger generation,
are a good example of what has to be done.
Robots are your best tool for teaching everyone that technology is fun and useful.
So take them out to the people, so that we can build a better future.
Thank you.
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