The issue here is that the Swiss Patent is PISS easy to get (apparently). They do not make a thorough check wether there are other patents similar to the applied patent in the rest of the word. They only make a thorough check against other Swiss patents. So if you get a swiss patent it A) does not mean that its an innovation and B) also is not "Bullet proof" as other patent holders can get the patent "depatented" through a legal insance.

Example: Lets say toothbrushes are not patented in Switzerland. I go and patent it and get the patent. The toothbrush is however patented in the US and the US patent holder contests the patent after patent registration. My patent gets withdrawn.

conclusion: This statistic is absolute crap! Someone should slap the EU for saying something like that!!!

Examination Swiss patent applications
Swiss patent applications are subjected only to a formal but not to a substantial examination. Even applications that are obviously devoid of novelty can be accepted. The validity of a patent arising from such an application can however be contested by other parties by means of a legal action in cancellation. It is thus in the applicant’s interest to limit the sought protection so as to obtain a patent unlikely to be cancelled by the courts.

and especially:

As the applications are not subjected to a substantial examination, a potentially large proportion of granted patents are not valid so that a Swiss application does not enjoy a presumption of validity as high as that of a patent granted after an examination procedure and may be more difficult in the end to commercialize and enforce.

http://www.patentattorneys.ch/jahia/Jahia/cache/offonce/lang/en/pid/32;jsessionid=6BC98413BC210C07BD81874158D5D6D5

".....companies managed to transform new ideas into economic results..."

Explain that.. ;-)

The EU did not say that, it was the swiss themselves. What info do they base that on and who do they compare themselves against? "The Swiss federal statistics office explains that this country got good marks because its companies managed to transform new ideas into economic results."

It seems like the EU was basing their analsysis on patents/capita... "Switzerland is the leader for the efficiency of its innovations: 460 new patents per thousand inhabitants" and not the implementation efficiency.