Fortunately, “uncharted waters” are always accompanied by a host of opportunities that can be leveraged both successfully and profitably – even in Switzerland. Corporate leaders are therefore focusing on making their companies more agile and resilient in order to strengthen their own growth momentum and ensure their ability to respond quickly and effectively to external disruptions. Mergers and deals will play a key role in the companies’ growth strategies in 2019 as well. Acquisitions of innovative digital companies will constitute an important part of their efforts to rapidly build up digital expertise.
In the future, emerging markets will play a decisive role in global economic growth – 63 percent of the companies surveyed worldwide prioritize emerging markets for medium-term geographical expansion, while the rest (36%) plan to prioritize industrialized countries. And nearly two-thirds (65%) of those companies that are prioritizing emerging markets prefer to target countries that will be along China’s new Silk Road. Switzerland’s most important sales market by far for goods and services remains the EU, and Germany in particular. In 2018, exports to the EU totaled CHF 135 billion, of which Germany alone accounted for CHF 47.3 billion. By contrast, Swiss companies exported goods and services worth CHF 40.1 billion to the USA and CHF 29.6 billion to China.