The Swiss business magazine Bilanz has rated the annual reports of Swiss companies for the 21st time in a row this year. A jury selected the best reports in terms of design, content and overall impression. The rating was carried out together with the Harbour Club.
This year, the medical technology company Straumann took first place in the overall ranking, followed by Novartis and Credit Suisse. The content jury awarded first place to the Schaffhausen-based industrial group Georg Fischer. UBS was awarded silver and St. Galler Kantonalbank took bronze. The design jury awarded five first places to Bank Coop, Basler Kantonalbank, Migros, Valora and VP Bank.
The standard of annual reports has generally risen this year, according to economics professor Rudolf Volkart. The annual reports have become more informative in content and more professional in their implementation. However, no company report stood out due to its particularly innovative design, writes the business magazine Bilanz in a press release on Friday.

Claudia Schlup, Head of Entertainment at the commuter newspaper 20 Minuten, is moving to Sonntagsblick. As Ringier announced on Friday, she will take over the position of Head of Entertainment from November 1. The original plan was for Schlup to move to Schweizer Illustrierte.
The 33-year-old succeeds Dominik Hug, who recently moved to the German Bild Zeitung, as Ringier spokesman Stefan Hackh told SDA on request.
The original plan was for Schlup to move to Schweizer Illustrierte (SI). However, the situation has changed following the departure of Editor-in-Chief Dominic Geisseler this week.
According to Hackh, it will be up to the new SI editor-in-chief, who has yet to be appointed, to fill the position of head of the entertainment department. The move to Sonntagsblick is in line with the wishes of all those involved. René Haenig will remain interim head of entertainment at SI.
Schlup studied German and journalism at the University of Bern and then worked as a reporter, editor and columnist at the Berner Zeitung. She spent the last three years building up the entertainment department at 20 Minuten. In the meantime, she also managed the weekly magazine 20 Minuten Week.

The youth newspaper Haifaif, published by the Südostschweiz Media Group and distributed between Chur and the upper part of Lake Zurich, is no longer available. The last issue was published on Thursday. The High5 members' club has also been dissolved.
With over 10,000 subscribers, Haifaif from the Südostschweiz publishing house in Chur was the largest independent youth newspaper in Switzerland, the "Team High5" association announced on Friday. The end came as a "surprise", according to SDA. The closure of the newspaper had become necessary due to the rapidly changing habits of young people with regard to media use. Südostschweiz-Verlag plans to have a new youth concept in place in a year's time. The 30 or so young journalists who regularly wrote for Haifaif want to launch a new project on their own.
The youth newspaper was added to the Südostschweiz newspaper network from May 2003 and was sent exclusively to club members from summer 2004. Both the members' club and the newspaper remained products of the Südostschweiz publishing house.

New, stricter passport photo standards have been in force since 2007. The commercial by feature film director Dani Levy for SFLB and the Sympany insurance group uses this to draw attention to the insurance company's message with a commercial. Sympany's message: many things in life should be as uncomplicated and simple as the insurance group.
The spot complements last year's films. Sympany uses additional reminder commercials to draw attention to its current health insurance premiums.
Responsible at Sympany: Heidi Herzog (Head of Corporate Marketing), Andreas Rehmann (Head of Marketing), Roger Müller (Head of Marketing Communications). Responsible at SFLB: Martin Spillmann, Peter Brönnimann (CD), Pam Hügli, Danielle Dubach (consulting), Sebahat Derdiyok, Suzana Kovacevic (TV production).
Production: Condor Films, Philipp Petersson (Producer). Director: Dani Levy.

The international event series Gamehotel has been focusing on the economic, social and cultural influence of interactive entertainment since 2003. After editions in Paris and California, the Gamehotel Congress is now making its third stop in Zurich on October 24.
This year's congress will be held under the title "Chefsache Games", as Gamehotel announced in a press release on Friday. At the same time, a show will take place, at which game makers from the USA, Japan and Europe will be guests, according to the press release.
At the Congress on Games, Media and Marketing, international speakers will present how game mechanics and design principles from video games are changing the media, brands and services of the future.
The program will be framed by the two Americans Gabe Zichermann and Chris Hecker. Zichermann will open the congress with a presentation on how consumers deal with brands, media, services and products. As a concluding event, Hecker will focus on users who will increasingly help to shape products, media offerings and brands in the future.

The communications agency Advocacy is getting reinforcements. From October, independent communications consultant Petra Hieber will be joining the Zurich branch of Advocacy.
Hieber will work as a senior consultant at the agency. Previously, as a PR consultant, she managed and designed projects in the field of corporate and scientific communications in the Corporate Communications department at ETH Zurich.

Axel Springer Schweiz strengthens central online marketing for the titles Beobachter.ch, Handelszeitung.ch, Bilanz.ch, Stocks.ch, Tele.ch and Tvstar.ch.
Roberto Del Buono supports the sales team as Key Account Manager. He will take up the position on October 1, 2008. He previously worked for the AZ Media Group, Tiscali and Publicitas (in the online classifieds market).
Central online marketing has been under the management of Oliver Frank since January 1, 2008. In this function, he is responsible not only for sales, but also for campaign and traffic management.

Budget win for the agency at the airport: The Rokker Company, a start-up company from the St. Gallen Rhine Valley, has landed at the agency at the airport. The young jeans makers were awarded a national young entrepreneur prize last year for their temperature-resistant, abrasion- and tear-proof products.
In addition to Switzerland, Rokker jeans are also available in Germany, Austria, Italy and the USA. Mostly in Harley stores. The agency at the airport soon promises "rokkie advertising measures" on behalf of the jeans manufacturer.

The Swiss online marketplace Ricardo.ch is launching an Internet TV show. Guy Landolt, known as a member of Trio Eden and from the musical Ewigi Liebi, will go in search of unusual auction items from October 2.
In the "Ding Dong Show", which is broadcast fortnightly on Ricardo.ch, YouTube and iTunes, Landolt looks for old, new, used and unused items from the Swiss population. The items are posted online on Ricardo.ch on Thursdays during the broadcast of the four to five-minute show. The auctions run for ten days.

Next Saturday, September 27, we will find out who the new Miss is. Will it be Fiona, Diana, Lisa or one of the other candidates? We have it in our own hands. Anyone can cast their vote at the cattle show in Herrliberg.
To promote this event, the Advivo Young & Rubicam agency has taken advantage of the coincidence of the cattle show and the Miss Switzerland contest on behalf of the Herrliberg Brown Swiss Cattle Breeding Association. The latter will also be chosen on Saturday, and among them are candidates with the melodious names Fiona, Diana and Lisa.
The posters for the teaser campaign have been hanging throughout Herrliberg and the surrounding area for almost two weeks.
Responsible at Braunvieh-Zuchtverein Herrliberg: Peter Ledergerber. Responsible at Advico Young & Rubicam: Lukas Tenger (consulting), Johannes Raggio, Dominik Oberwiler, Luca Schneider (creation).

The German broadcasting chain Pro Sieben Sat 1 is facing a bleak outlook for the coming months. It announced on Wednesday that the business figures would not develop as expected. Profits and sales would be significantly lower than recently forecast. The reason for this is that TV commercials are selling less well than expected. Instead of the previous forecast of an operating profit of 780 million euros, the German group is now expecting only 670 to 700 million euros for 2008. The stock market reacted to the profit warning with a sharp drop in the share price: Pro Sieben Sat 1's share price fell by more than ten percent and, at around five euros, is now back near its all-time low (4.33 euros). Last year, the share price was still around EUR 30.
The Süddeutsche Zeitung cites the worsening economic conditions as one reason for this situation, but also believes that a large part of the problem is home-made: the Group introduced a new model for marketing advertising time and then changed it again after it failed. The Group has apparently not yet recovered from this.
There has been turbulence at Pro Sieben Sat 1 for months: In mid-June, company boss Guillaume de Posch resigned and plans to retire from the private television station by the end of this year. However, there is still no successor in sight, although the Supervisory Board has been searching intensively for some time.

The airline Swiss has recently started working with the Swiss advertising agency Publicis. One of the first projects that Publicis has realized for the airline concerns the daily flights from Germany to Switzerland.
Swiss flies to Zurich several times a day from Hamburg, Berlin, Hanover and Stuttgart. This is now being publicized in Germany with advertisements, posters and radio spots. The radio spots are particularly memorable: they are little Swiss German courses for our neighbors.
Responsible at Swiss: Marcel Benz (Head of Marketing Communications), Christine Moch (Manager Advertising), Corinne Weishaupt (Advertising), Stefan Anetzeder (Advertising). Responsible at Publicis: Martin Denecke (CCO), Peter Rettinghausen (Creative Director), Ralph Halder (Creative Director), Denis Schwarz (Art Director), Stephan Lanz and Myriam Mojon (Consultants).

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