VFU brings members to Google Zurich

(CONNECT) The Association of Women's Businesses (VFU) kicked off the new year on January 16 with a drinks reception for members at Google Switzerland under the motto Born to grow. In her welcoming address, VFU President and entrepreneur Riccarda Mecklenburg explained that the association has set itself the goal of growing with and for women entrepreneurs in 2025. For example, the network in eastern Switzerland is to be expanded. "We will motivate women from Basel and beyond St.Gallen to become self-employed," she said.

Host Christine Antlanger-Winter, a role model for many women with her tech career according to Riccarda Mecklenburg, also presented Google Switzerland as a starting point for entrepreneurship in her speech: 110 start-ups have been founded here in the more than 20-year history of the location. The country manager of Google Switzerland and Austria explained that this has grown organically to become Google's largest development site outside the USA with more than 5,000 employees. She attributed an important role to the tech ecosystem in Zurich and Switzerland - it has created good conditions and has also experienced growth with Google.

In an interview with Riccarda Mecklenburg, she discussed the idea of which company she would set up. "It would be one that advocates for young women - for opening up more opportunities for them and breaking down strong social structures in the long term," explained the Google manager.

The event also continued last year's VFU theme: artificial intelligence (AI) was the topic of a workshop with Evelyn Leu, Head of Education Projects at Google Switzerland. Her basic thesis was that AI will not replace people, but people with AI will replace people without AI. The expert presented how Google wants to give its products greater added value through AI. AI will be integrated into the search and, for example, special AI overviews will be displayed. She also provided assistance on how to use Google's ChatGPT alternatives, the Gemini chatbot and the NotebookLM document editing tool, for example.

In particular, she spoke to the entrepreneurs about AI-supported advertising solutions such as Google Ads, which display personalized ads on various Google platforms. Evelyn Leu invited everyone to experiment intensively with AI. In this way, entrepreneurs can find the tools that appear to be the most efficient solution for their purposes. ce/yvh