TLDR: When Swiss medtech owners freeze investment while sales keep growing, buyers price the deferred capital expenditure into the deal, so the owners who prepare a sale early keep the value the pause would cost them.
A Sector That Grows Its Sales and Holds Back Its Capital
The tenth edition of the Swiss Medical Technology Industry study, published by Swiss Medtech with the Helbling Group on 10 September 2026, surveyed 601 companies between March and May 2026. The top line reads like a healthy industry, and the deal market around it is moving: medtech mergers and acquisitions (M&A) picked up again in 2025. Sector sales reached CHF 26 billion in 2025, growing 5.5% a year over the last two years, roughly twice the pace of the Swiss economy. Exports stand at about CHF 12 billion and the sector delivers the third-largest contribution to the national trade surplus, CHF 5.5 billion. Companies still put around 12% of revenue into research and development (R&D).
Underneath that line, the capital decisions point the other way. 43% of companies plan no investment, the highest share the survey has recorded, as the federal SME portal notes, a record since 2018. The share of companies focusing investment on production fell five percentage points and on R&D seven points. Net employment rose by around 200 people over two years, against roughly 1,500 a year across the previous decade, and planned hiring in production dropped eleven points. More than half of respondents, 53%, rate Switzerland’s competitiveness as a location worse than five years ago, and three times as many report deterioration as improvement.
The study names the causes in order: the strong Swiss franc (43% of companies), trade agreements and tariffs (38%), wage costs (37%) and bureaucracy (35%). Against them stand political stability and legal certainty (62%) and access to skilled workers (34%). Owners are telling the surveyors that they still believe in the market and have stopped adding capacity at home.
| Indicator, Swiss medtech | Value | What a buyer reads into it |
|---|---|---|
| Sales growth, 2023 to 2025 | 5.5% a year (10-year average 6.4%) | Demand is intact; margin and capacity carry the risk |
| Companies planning no investment | 43%, a survey record | Deferred capital expenditure (capex) that a diligence team will price as a liability |
| Net jobs added, 2024 to 2025 | About 200 (decade average about 1,500 a year) | Growth carried by existing teams; key-person concentration rises |
| Location rated worse than five years ago | 53% of companies | Footprint and transfer-of-production plans enter the investment case |
| Manufacturers producing only in Switzerland | Somewhat more than a third (suppliers 62%) | Supplier tier is the most exposed to franc and tariff margin pressure |
| Medtech deals analysed, 2025 | 50, of which 15 involved financial investors | Activity picked up after two restrained years; private capital is a regular counterparty |
Sources: Swiss Medtech and Helbling, Swiss Medical Technology Industry Sector Study 2026 (n = 601, survey March to May 2026), main report and French fact sheet. Interpretation column: Neumarz.
Why a Frozen Capex Budget Is a Valuation Decision
Owners usually treat a pause in investment as prudence: hold cash, wait for the franc and the tariff picture to settle. In a transaction it is read differently. A buyer’s quality-of-earnings work normalises capital expenditure to what the business needs to sustain its revenue, and the gap between that level and what was actually spent becomes a debt-like adjustment or a price reduction. Two years of deferred production and R&D investment can therefore reappear, at the closing table, as a deduction from equity value.
The same logic applies to people. A sector that grew sales by CHF 2.6 billion over two years while adding about 200 net jobs has asked its existing engineers, quality and regulatory staff to carry the growth. For a buyer, that raises the weight of retention terms, key-person clauses and the share of consideration tied to people staying after closing.
Regulation sits in the same file. Since 26 May 2021, Swiss manufacturers have been treated as a third country under the EU Medical Device Regulation (MDR), which requires an EU authorised representative and adapted labelling. The certificate estate, the notified body relationships and the cost of keeping both current are standard diligence items in any Swiss medtech target, and a company that has paused investment may also have paused renewals.
Tariff Volatility Now Shapes Deal Structure
The United States and Germany are the sector’s main trading partners, with the US alone accounting for around a quarter of trade volume according to the study’s fact sheet. The tariff path over twelve months has been unusually volatile. Swiss goods faced 39% in summer 2025, cut to 15% under the November 2025 preliminary agreement. The US Supreme Court ruled the tariffs imposed under the International Emergency Economic Powers Act (IEEPA) unlawful on 21 February 2026, a 10% universal tariff then applied for 150 days, and since 24 July 2026 a 12.5% Section 301 duty applies to Switzerland, among 60 economies. A Section 232 investigation into medical devices, opened in September 2025, remains open.
For valuation, the rate itself matters less than its instability. A buyer underwriting a Swiss exporter with a large US book will model several tariff cases and will ask who carries the downside. That is where earn-outs and deferred consideration, analysed in the Neumarz note on how deal structure absorbed the 2026 negotiation, become practical tools: they let a seller keep the upside of a tariff settlement while the buyer pays for it only once it materialises.
The Buyers Are Already in the Room
The study reports that medtech M&A picked up again in 2025 after two restrained years, and that 15 of the 50 transactions analysed involved financial investors. Broader Swiss data points the same way. Deloitte counted 208 Swiss SME transactions in 2025, up 16%, with private equity deals up 45% to 116; life sciences and healthcare accounted for 16% of domestic and inbound deals, with inbound deals more than doubling while domestic deals fell. PwC found private equity or venture capital participation in 60% of Swiss health industries deals in 2025.
Two recent Swiss transactions show the two shapes the market is taking. Ypsomed, which chose to become a pure-play self-injection specialist, sold its diabetes care business to TecMed AG, controlled by Willy Michel, for up to CHF 420 million including an earn-out, announced in April 2025 and completed on 4 August 2025: a carve-out that separated two capital needs, with part of the price tied to future performance. At the other end of the scale, Stryker signed a definitive agreement on 31 August 2026 to acquire ZuriMED, the Zurich-based spin-off of ETH Zurich, the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology, behind the FiberLocker rotator cuff system, which had raised a CHF 14.5 million Series A in 2023. In both cases the next investment cycle moves to a new owner, the same choice an owner who has paused investment eventually faces: fund the next cycle, or hand it to a buyer.
The structure of the industry explains the appetite. 95% of the roughly 1,400 companies are small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs), while the largest 5% employ half of the workforce. That is a classic buy-and-build landscape: specialised suppliers and niche manufacturers with certified products, a reputation for quality and an owner who has chosen to stop funding the next capacity step alone. For a platform investor or a foreign strategic, a Swiss company that has paused investment is often cheaper to buy now than after the owner has spent two more years waiting.
The study also identifies where future value sits. Half of companies already use artificial intelligence (AI) in business processes, and AI’s share of R&D budgets is expected to rise from 13% to 24% by 2030, while digital skills remain scarce in Switzerland and teams are being placed abroad. An acquirer that brings a digital and regulatory platform to a strong product company solves a problem the seller lacks the means to solve, and that is the strongest argument for a premium.
What Owners and Acquirers Should Prepare Now
Owners have four preparations. Document the investment pause as a decision with a plan, including the capex the business needs to sustain its revenue, so that a buyer prices a schedule with the gap already explained. Map the certificate estate, the EU authorised representative arrangements and the renewal calendar before anyone asks for them. Build the US exposure into scenarios at 12.5% and at higher Section 232 cases, and decide in advance which part of the price can be tied to a tariff outcome. Secure the people who carried two years of growth with retention terms that survive a change of control.
Acquirers have three. Screen the supplier tier first, where 62% still manufacture only in Switzerland and franc and tariff pressure land hardest on margins. Underwrite deferred capex at the indicative-offer stage and put the proposed treatment in the letter, so the price holds through the data room. Bring the digital and regulatory capability the target lacks as part of the offer, because more than 80% of companies in the survey still expect higher growth in 2026 and 2027, and the gap between that expectation and their own capacity to fund it is where a transaction creates value.
Neumarz, a Kainjoo SA venture, runs buy-side and sell-side mandates for Swiss and European mid-market companies, including regulated industries such as medical technology. The work covers capex normalisation before a process opens, structuring of tariff and regulatory risk into deferred consideration, and access to the private credit and specialist cross-border capital that now finances these deals.
This article is general commentary prepared for professional and qualified contacts. It does not constitute an offer, a solicitation, investment advice or a personal recommendation within the meaning of the Swiss Financial Services Act (FinSA), and it is not a substitute for advice on your own circumstances. Mandate-specific information is available only under a non-disclosure agreement (NDA).
References
- Swiss Medtech and Helbling. “Swiss Medical Technology Industry Sector Study 2026,” report, August 2026. swiss-medtech.ch
- Swiss Medtech. “Étude 2026 sur le secteur des technologies médicales,” 10 September 2026. swiss-medtech.ch
- Swiss Medtech. “Étude 2026, chiffres et faits clés,” fact sheet. swiss-medtech.ch
- SECO, KMU-Portal. “La medtech enregistre de bons résultats, mais recrute peu et investit moins.” kmu.admin.ch
- Swiss Medtech. “US Tariffs.” swiss-medtech.ch
- economiesuisse. “New US tariffs of 12.5 percent announced,” 3 June 2026. economiesuisse.ch
- Reuters via KELO. “Swiss to ease recognition of US standards for cars, medical devices as trade deal sought,” 30 June 2026. kelo.com
- MME. “Medical Devices: Necessary Update of the Agreement with the EU,” 18 August 2021. mme.ch
- Deloitte. “M&A-Aktivität der Schweizer KMU 2026,” 11 February 2026. deloitte.com
- PwC Switzerland. “Swiss M&A Trends in Health Industries: 2026 Outlook,” 9 February 2026. pwc.ch
- Ypsomed. “Ypsomed sells its diabetes care business to TecMed AG to become a pure-play self-injection specialist,” 22 April 2025. ypsomed.com
- Ypsomed. “Ypsomed completes the sale of Ypsomed Diabetes Care to TecMed AG,” 4 August 2025. ypsomed.com
- Stryker. “Stryker signs definitive agreement to acquire ZuriMED to enhance its shoulder offering,” 31 August 2026. investors.stryker.com
- ZuriMED. “ZuriMED to be acquired by Stryker.” zurimed.com
