With a higher capital intensity, a longer R&D phase and a strong demand for highly skilled professionals, to name only a few, the deep tech sector faces more challenges than any other business sector. For this reason, Patrick Griss, the CEO of Zühlke Ventures has written the DeepTech Playbook that helps entrepreneurs to identify issues and gives guidance on how to solve them and to progress.
Patrick Griss’ book addresses any entrepreneur who seeks to transform scientific research into a successful startup. Whether they are just forming a business idea or have already progressed to developing prototypes, the book provides a guide which can be entered at any stage of development.
Patrick Griss is CEO of Zühlke Ventures, was with Roche Diagnostics, holds a PhD from Royal Institute of Technology, Sweden, and an MSc from Ecole Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne, Switzerland. He has been at the forefront of deep tech innovation for 25 years – as investor, in corporate roles, as founder, board member, engineer, or advisor to leadership teams.
His book serves as both a diagnostic tool and a roadmap, equipping deep tech founders with an assessment system. For this purpose, the author outlines a structured framework known as Business Readiness Levels. Griss breaks down the startup journey into four key stages: Business Idea, Prototypes Tested, Ready to Launch, and Ready to Scale. Each stage is assessed through specific criteria, offering appropriate evidence for entrepreneurs to evaluate their own progress. This ensures that they have built a solid foundation before moving forward.
Each Business Readiness Level contains four key impact areas, or "workstreams," which help founders focus on the essential components needed at each stage. These are Product Management, Product Development and Operations, Marketing and Sales and Strategy. These workstreams provide a systematic way to evaluate the maturity of a startup and allow founders to understand what needs to be accomplished in the different areas to progress to the next level. For example, early stages emphasize concept validation, while later stages focus on scaling and efficiency.
This systematic approach provides DeepTech founders with a clear pathway to achieving product-market fit and scaling their businesses successfully, with actionable advice at each stage. But while the book has a strong methodological framework, Griss refrains from providing anecdotal evidence. Readers who like to be inspired by examples will miss such real-world examples and personal experiences from the author.
Patrick Griss: DeepTech Play Book. How to Master the Complexity of DeepTech Ventures, Stämpfli Verlag.
(Benjamin Klavins)
Picture: Domas / Pixabay
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The new Swiss Venture Capital Report was published on 26 January. It analyses 304 financing rounds closed in 2020 and includes further article such as an interview with Michael Hengartner, President of the ETH Board, and a list of Swiss "soonicorns". 
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