I have read a few articles regarding companies opening their head offices in Switzerland and negotiating corporation tax rates with Switzerland as low as 9%.
Anybody heard of this and have any ideas how ones goes about doing this?

You should talk to your local (cantonal) tax authorities. They will often offer a 10 year tax holiday for a start up company. I don't know the situation in TI but in VD it is quite common, especially for tech start ups coming out of the EPFL.

Good luck.

"EPFL" Sorry for the ignornace; what does this acronym mean?

Ecole Polytechnique Federale de Lausanne(?) (which happens to be located in VD)

Sorry about the EPFL assumption. There are two engineering/technical universities in Switzerland. One is located in Zurich called (in French) EPFZ and one in Lausanne called EPFL, once again in French.

The one in Zurich is also called ETH in German. Eidgenössische Technische Hochschule Zürich.

The important part of the post is to see what programs the canton might have for a start up business and what type of businesses they support with the program.

It's not a negotiation of the tax rate, but of the tax status of the company. The tax rate (after tax) is fixed in all cantons and at federal level also. What changes with the tax status, is the taxable base. Therefore, the effective tax rate is lower if you reduce the tax base.

I don't want to make self-publicity, and I don't want the administrator to delete this post, but as everything is explained on my website, I don't see why I should explain everything again... you will find answers to your questions here http://www.dsconsulting.ch/?q=en/companies and there http://www.dsconsulting.ch/?q=en/node/34

Once again, I have no purpose to make publicity for my services, but I have explained it in detail there...

Regards

OK, thank you for that information.

I am really disappointed with Swiss Politics of late.
This discussion of disclosing information to other country governments and immigration especially.

The Corporation Tax rates do not seem that low when you add Federal, Cantonal and Communal Taxes.

I actually read that Ticino was one of the lowest rates for Tax on Income compared to say Geneve but understand their Capital Tax is higher.

making tax rate comparison with or within Switzerland is very dangerous, because you first have to ensure that you compare the same thing! When comparing Swiss corporate tax rate to other countries, are you sure you compare the effective tax rate? Because the tax rate you find in the tax law are the tax rate after tax (income and capital tax are tax deductible expenses in Switzerland!). For instance, a holding company is subject only to federal tax (8.5%), but that rate is after tax. Therefore, if you compare the effective tax rate, it will be 7.83% (8.5/108.5). Same can be said to the applicable tax regime. You also need sometimes to make a distinction between the kind of income. For a holding, participation income will not be taxed at all, whereas other passive income (and some commercial foreign income) will be taxed at only 7.83%....

You know, a joke in this world is to say that Switzerland is not a tax heaven, but a tax advisors' heaven...