How evolving AI regulations like AI Act shape compliance, competitiveness, and market access for Swiss companies
Global regulations increasingly overlap with national and EU rules. The EU’s AI Act, with its extraterritorial scope, applies to Swiss companies if their AI systems or general-purpose AI (GPAI) are placed on or used in the EU market.
Switzerland is taking a sector-specific approach, adapting existing laws and aligning with select international frameworks to protect rights and trust while keeping regulatory flexibility. Yet as the AI Act becomes a global benchmark, Swiss firms targeting the EU will still need to meet its transparency, risk, and documentation requirements.
This dynamic makes AI regulation a geopolitical tool: those who set the rules shape market access, competitive conditions, and global technology standards. For Switzerland, the challenge lies in balancing pro-innovation flexibility with sufficient compatibility to remain competitive abroad, while leveraging its reputation as a safe, neutral, and trusted jurisdiction. In practice, this means that even companies outside the AI sector may face new compliance obligations, supply-chain adjustments, and growing pressure to align with international norms defined elsewhere.