In Switzerland, a land of few natural resources and where a quarter of the land area is unproductive, the economy has a well-established and diversified manufacturing base, with the country long considered a major player in international trade. Employment trends across all industries in the country have improved; the number of people involved in industry has risen in the last two years to 13.8 percent of the employed population. Swiss industry consists mainly of capital-intensive and science-intensive branches, as opposed to labor or material-intensive sectors.

Engineers and information technology specialists are being hailed as powerful job generators, creating between 19,000 and 24,000 jobs through start-up businesses over the last 10 years. This level of entrepreneurial activity traces directly to two Swiss technical universities (ETH Zurich and EHT Lausanne), as well as various Swiss institutes. Graduates from these schools have set up between 230 and 290 enterprises annually over the same period. The new businesses reported a survival rate of 85 percent, compared to the country's average of 50 percent.

This is just a sample of what you'll find in the complete Switzerland guide.