About
The lane, not the job title.
Raffael Hüberli
Raffael Hüberli is the Co-Founder and COO of Downstream Intelligence, an AI-powered geopolitical forecasting startup, where he leads brand, communications, business development, and user engagement. He writes and speaks about how artificial intelligence is changing geopolitical analysis — for both institutions and everyday decision-makers. His background spans advising the Permanent Mission of Costa Rica to the United Nations, public diplomacy at Swissnex San Francisco, journalism, and ongoing service as a Press & Information Officer in the Swiss Armed Forces. He holds a dual master's in Law & Diplomacy (The Fletcher School) and International Affairs & Governance (University of St.Gallen).
Raffael Hüberli ist Mitgründer und COO von Downstream Intelligence, einem Start-up für KI-gestützte geopolitische Prognosen, wo er Brand, Kommunikation, Business Development und User Engagement verantwortet. Er schreibt und spricht darüber, wie künstliche Intelligenz die geopolitische Analyse verändert – für Institutionen ebenso wie für Entscheidungsträgerinnen und Entscheidungsträger im Alltag. Zuvor war er Berater für die Ständige Vertretung Costa Ricas bei den Vereinten Nationen, in der Public Diplomacy bei Swissnex San Francisco sowie im Journalismus tätig; daneben dient er weiterhin als Presse- und Informationsoffizier in der Schweizer Armee. Er hält einen Doppelmaster in Law & Diplomacy (The Fletcher School) und International Affairs & Governance (Universität St.Gallen).
- Full name
- Raffael Hüberli
- Based
- St.Gallen, Switzerland
- Languages
- German (native), English (C2), French (B2), Chinese (A1)
- Speaks on
- AI and geopolitical forecasting
- Portrait
- Available on request, in colour
- Length
- —
- Nickname
That card is the version for print. This is the one I would say out loud: I came at AI and geopolitics by advising rather than by engineering — reading the room first, then writing the thing that goes out under somebody else's name.
The through-line was never a plan. Wil taught me to find the story inside a business, San Francisco that public diplomacy is mostly logistics and lunches, New York how a country's position gets written down before it is said out loud. Same lane, different rooms.
Beyond work
- Shoots photo and video
- Backcountry skier
- Runner
- Quarterback, retired
- 3× Swiss national champion
- St.Gallen Bears
Experience
Four jobs, four cities.
Newest first.
FDP.Die Liberalen St.Gallen
Policy & Communications Associate
Crafting the responses to consultations and the position papers behind them, and expanding and executing the communications strategy that carries them.
Current, and the shortest commute of the four: cantonal politics in the canton he grew up in. Everything above this line is still being written.
Permanent Mission of Costa Rica to the United Nations
Advisor · full-time
Advisory work, and the reporting is the part that mattered: the diplomatic reporting that informed the Ambassador and the capital — what was said in the room, what it meant, and what it would cost to answer it one way rather than another.
Speechwriting was one duty inside that job and not the job itself: the speeches for the Ambassador and for the mission's diplomats. It is easier to write a country's position once you have spent the morning working out what the position should be.
Swissnex in San Francisco
Communications Associate · full-time
Three jobs wearing one title. Public relations and marketing: running the communications campaigns. Public diplomacy: promoting and strengthening Swiss–US relations. Project management: coordinating the outreach and the event promotion behind both.
In practice that meant startup bootcamps, delegations to the Game Developers Conference, connect lunches with local academic institutions, messaging that made Swiss expertise legible to an American audience, and the partnerships holding all of it up.
Effective public diplomacy "isn't just about formal government interactions" but about "creating meaningful connections between people, ideas, and institutions."
Wiler Nachrichten
Journalistic internship · full-time
Interviewed the local business owners, photographed the businesses and their products, wrote the articles, and formatted them for print. The layout and the visual decisions were mine too, which is more of a newspaper than most people get to hold at once.
Where the rest of it came from: how to build rapport in an interview, how to find the story inside a business, how to tell that story in photographs, how to weigh editorial quality against what a client actually wants, how print production works, and how to take feedback through a publication process without taking it personally.
- Swiss Armed Forces
- Press and Information Officer · specialist officer, at captain's rank · 01/2020 – present
- University of St.Gallen
- Student Assistant in Multimedia, including photo- and videography · School of Management, the Institute for Accounting, Controlling and Auditing, and the Teaching Innovation Lab · 10/2020 – 08/2023. Three years of shooting stills and video on commission, and where the creative work on this site comes from.
- Fletcher Student Council
- Representative · 08/2024 – 05/2025
Numbers
Three at a time, out of twelve.
12 facts, three at a time. Every one of them countable, and two of them counted while this page was built.