Switzerland is an attractive country for investors

For the 7th consecutive year IESE Business School and EMLYON Business School have tracked the attractiveness of risk capital around the world with the Venture Capital & Private Equity Country Attractiveness Index. The index measures the attractiveness of countries for investors in the venture capital (VC) and private equity (PE) asset classes. It provides the most up-to-date aggregated information on the quality of the investment environment and an assessment of the ease of transaction-making in 125 countries.

The results established in the index were derived from exclusively focusing on the factors which shape the attractiveness of particular VC and PE markets in each country such as Economic Activity, Depth of Capital Market, Taxation, Investor Protection & Corporate Governance, Human & Social Environment, and Entrepreneurial Culture & Deal Opportunities. However, even if these factors are not perfect proxies, the research team maintains that in countries where these criteria are better developed, the capital market will be deeper and more deal-supporting institutions will exist to facilitate VC and PE activity.

Switzerland ranked 10^th worldwide and 3^rd in Western Europe
According to the index; the US remains the most attractive country for VC and PE allocations, in which it retained its ranking from all previous index editions. Its two followers, the United Kingdom and Canada, achieved rescaled scores of 95.5% and 94.3% respectively. Also countries like Singapore, Hong Kong, Australia, Japan New Zealand and Germany followed in the positions 4 to nine respectively. Following Switzerland is; Malaysia, Denmark, Norway Finland and Sweden in the positions 11 to 15 in that order.

Switzerland was ranked in position 10 out of 125 countries worldwide with a score of 85.7. According to the results there has been an increase in VC and PE activity in comparison to the previous edition. Despite the variation in performance of each criterion, and a decline in each individual proxy, the overall performance in Switzerland has not been compromised with. In fact, Switzerland’s performance has increased placing it in the 10^th position worldwide, and in the 3^rd position out of 20 countries in Western Europe.

(Picture: IESE Business School, University of Navarra)

(RAN)