Tokyo (SCCIJ) – Corporations from Switzerland do spend big on research: Among the top 500 companies worldwide, there are 14 from Switzerland, putting the country in ninth place globally. These are some findings of a study by the audit and consulting firm Ernst & Young.
Swiss companies excel in research spending (Source: Julian Hacker/Pixabay).
Big budgets
The research and development budgets of the 500 companies with the highest R&D spending worldwide increased by 14% year-on-year to the equivalent of 889 billion euros in 2022. 475 billion euro were invested by 164 corporations headquartered in the United States – an increase of 16% year-on-year.
They were followed – at a considerable distance – by 98 companies from Japan (87 billion euro, up 6%) and Germany (68 billion euro, up 11%). In terms of the number of companies in the top 500, Switzerland is practically on par with the United Kingdom.
R&D spending by the top 14 Swiss corporations in the Top 500 climbed by 5% in 2022 to 33 billion euro. In absolute amounts, Switzerland ranks 5th in the world, with only companies from the US, Japan, China, and Germany investing more.
Spending above median
The R&D ratio of the top 500 companies declined minimally year-on-year to 6.1% in 2022. For groups from the U.S., the average ratio of R&D spending to sales was 8.1% – well above the global median. Companies from Switzerland also invest above average in research and development (6.8%). Switzerland ranks third after the USA and the Netherlands (7.6%).
“This is an expression of the strength of Switzerland as a research location. This is due in particular to the availability of human resources in research and development and the proximity to the world’s leading technical universities,” explains Stefan Rösch-Rütsche, Country Managing Partner of Ernst & Young in Switzerland.
Focus on the health sector
Since R&D investments are investments in the future, Switzerland can be confident about the prospects as a business location. “At the same time, it must be noted that investments in Switzerland have increased by 5%, which is significantly less than the investments of the Top 500, which have increased by 14%. In addition, these investments focus too one-sidedly on the health sciences sector,” says Rösch-Rütsche. In other promising sectors – especially in the technology sector – Switzerland is not among the leaders.
The following Swiss companies made it into the Top 500 with their respective R&D investments: Roche Holding (ranked 8th with 16 billion euros), Novartis (#14 with 9.5 billion), STMicroelectronics (#103 with 1.8 billion), Nestlé (#113 with 1.7 billion), ABB (#160 with 1.1 billion), TE Connectivity (#219 with 683 million euros), Alcon (#221 with 668 million), Givaudan (#261 with 520 million), The Swatch Group (#391 with 245 million), Swisscom (#400 with 236 million), Sika (#403 with 231 million), Holcim (#408 with 228 million), Schindler Holding (#420 with 207 million), and Clariant (#454 with 159 million).
Text: EY Switzerland (Editing by SCCIJ)
