Dear Fellow Swiss Citizens, Dear Friends of Switzerland,
Hello from Pier 17, where Switzerland’s spirit of craft and trust finds a home in the Bay Area’s drive to invent what’s next. We’re glad you’re here.
From our waterfront offices, we represent Switzerland across 13 Western states, and keep the Swiss-American relationship close, practical, and forward-looking.
Our consular desk is the daily heartbeat of the office. We help with passports and ID cards, civil-status updates, registration and deregistration, citizenship and voting rights, emergency assistance, and visas. Many services are now available through the FDFA's Online Desk, and the FDFA Helpline is reachable around the clock when you need it most. We also put diplomacy in the open, through public and cultural programs (talks, exhibitions, screenings), as well as a steady tech-diplomacy dialogue on AI, climate, and life sciences with partners across the Bay Area.
Under the same roof, you’ll also find the teams that make “Switzerland @ Pier 17” more than an address. Swissnex in San Francisco supports Swiss universities, labs, startups, and corporations with West Coast peers to accelerate positive transformations at the frontiers of knowledge. The Swiss Business Hub USA helps companies from Switzerland grow in one of the world’s largest regional economies and promotes our country as a business location. Switzerland Tourism, meanwhile, turns curiosity into itineraries, bringing visitors from the West to our mountains, cities, and culture.
Why here? Because the West Coast is where breakthrough ideas are developed and tested in the real world: AI in the clinic, climate tech on the grid, new materials in the factory, and space tech beyond our atmosphere. Our job is to connect that energy with Swiss reliability and a people-first approach to innovation. To do this, we strive to listen and assemble partners with the discipline to deliver and the imagination to explore. This approach served me well in Bengaluru (India), another frontier city, where collaborative networks carried projects from concept to impact.
If you would like to stay up to date with our activities and public programs, make sure to subscribe to our monthly newsletter at sanfrancisco.newsletter@eda.admin.ch and follow us on Instagram, and Facebook, and subscribe to Swissnex in San Francisco’s monthly newsletter.
For any queries as a Swiss citizen or a friend of Switzerland interested in traveling, you can reach our team at the Consulate at +1 415 788 2272 or sanfrancisco.kanzlei@eda.admin.ch.
I look forward to meeting you across the region and here at the pier.
Fair winds and following seas,
Jonas Brunschwig
Consul General of Switzerland, San Francisco
