For companies
Swiss companies do not educate children. But they form the world in which children grow up — and that makes them the first and most effective actors in counter-taxing.
When the discussion is conducted around AI and children, we are happy to talk about parents and schools. Rare about companies. There are Swiss companies who decide three ways each day: which AI they use. Who they sell their AI products. And what message they send out publicly.
These three levers are now the only area in which Switzerland can achieve visible effects within weeks, not decades. Parents need generations to change their educational patterns. Schools need curricula and cantonal decision. Companies can decide tomorrow — and act overmorning.
Lever 1 — Which AI you use internally
More than 90% of Swiss companies with AI use today use American or Chinese models (ChatGPT, Claude, Microsoft Copilot, DeepSeek). This is understandable: these models are ready for production, cheap, well documented. But every Swiss company that does this without examination makes the dependence more normal — and makes the commitment to a European alternative a bit more unlikely.
What you can do: an internal AI audit that honestly answers where you could use a European alternative — even if it is 20% more expensive or 10% slower. Where not, document this. This transparency creates the first pressure point.
Lever 2 — To whom you sell or market AI products
If your company offers AI products or AI-assisted services, make two choices: to whom you sell them, and how you apply them. Marketing, which staged AI as a “learning aid for the whole family”, or the schools as pilot customers, accelerates the impregnation of the youngest generation. Even without intention.
What you can do: A self-assessed age release in your product policy. Clear communication that AI tools are intended for adults and that Swiss primary school is not the right place for this. Renounce marketing that sells the holidays of the children as a “learning time with AI”.
Lever 3 — Which message you send publicly
Swiss companies are taken more seriously than associations. A CEO who writes in a NZZ column that his company KI deliberately doses and offers training for employees with small children moves more than ten EDÖB recommendations. Economy is politically effective in Switzerland — precisely because it is rarely politically positioned.
What you can do: Talk publicly about your AI practice and your concerns. Promote awareness initiatives such as these. Provide employees time to talk about AI reality in schools. Economy can give the door opener in the Swiss discourse, which politics alone does not have.