Colombus Consulting, in partnership with Oracle and the Geneva School of Business Administration, has published the 2025 Observatory of Data and AI in Switzerland for the second consecutive year.
The study reveals that Swiss business leaders are gaining a better understanding of the challenges associated with data and artificial intelligence, and that the first concrete use cases are multiplying. However, the full adoption of AI remains limited by insufficiently prepared organisations, uneven governance and partial strategic integration.
This observatory has the same objectives as last year: to provide decision-makers with a navigation tool to understand the present, anticipate future changes and compare their progress with that of their sector or the market.
The panel surveyed covers the whole of Switzerland and includes companies from all sectors of activity. The Observatory uses the same methodology as last year, organised in several stages:
- The survey, via a detailed questionnaire, which was answered by more than a hundred organisations, covering their governance, technological maturity, and their ambitions and obstacles in their data transformation projects;
- The additional collection of qualitative insights via in-depth interviews with experts and opinion leaders;
- On this basis, the formulation of observations and lessons learned, the main ones of which are listed below.
Key results:
The Swiss data and AI ecosystem is undergoing rapid change, with fewer pilot projects but more ‘scaling up’.
- 39% (-28 points) of organisations have moved beyond the exploration phase, with identified use cases and pilot projects involving generative AI.
- 52% (+8pts) have deployed assistants or content generation modules ‘at scale’.
This evolution is accompanied by a better strategic understanding:
- 62% (+25 pts) consider that their teams have a good or even high level of knowledge of AI concepts.
Data foundations are also improving, with better quality and more data-driven decision-making
- 62% (+14 pts) rate their data quality as good to excellent, and 41% (+3 pts) consider themselves to be ‘data driven’
At the same time, expectations and potential related to AI continue to grow:
- 74% (+5 pts) believe that AI can solve the main problems facing the company
However, there are still many challenges that continue to hinder industrialisation:
- 70% (-21 pts) consider their ecosystem to be at a low/intermediate level of maturity
Cultural transformation remains one of the main obstacles to the full integration of AI:
- 70% of organisations that are still not very committed say that the main obstacle is not technical but human
Ethics is becoming an essential pillar
- 70% of Swiss organisations say they incorporate ethical considerations into their AI-related decision-making processes
However, the measures are only partial
- Only 53% say they take concrete measures to detect and mitigate bias, even on an ad hoc basis
The use of AI in business focuses on customer and product functions
- 77% (-11 points) of uses relate to customer-oriented areas (customer service, marketing, sales)
- 75% (+8 points) of uses relate to product and supply chain areas
