June 20, 2014
Moving forward
Dear reader
Startupticker has reported several times on crowdfunding campaigns by Swiss start-ups. Until now, they have found it hard going; even more familiar names have had trouble in generating five-figure sums. But this week there were two bits of good news.
Dacuda reached its self-imposed target of $ 50,000 a few hours after the start of its campaign. Four days later and contributors have now pledged more than CHF 160,000, which will be used for the launch of the world’s smallest wireless scanner.
Based in Geneva, ProtonMail also reached its target of $ 100,000 after a few days and can now buy new servers for its encrypted email service.
These successes show that Swiss start-ups not only develop exciting products and services, but are also able to inspire people worldwide.
Another example is dizmo: the company, which has developed a novel user interface for smart displays, had a successful crowdfunding campaign in the spring and has now been able to generate an additional $ 2 million in a financing round.
It’s not only in the IT sector in which Switzerland has exciting products and services, as demonstrated by the winners of this year’s WA de Vigier Award, several of which offer striking solutions for medical and environmental problems. Undoubtedly, more will be heard of the winners in the future, just like Spinomix, a winner of the de Vigier Awards in 2006. The company has set a new gold standard for sample processing of biochemical substances.
The well-deserved prizes announced this week, however, not only concerned start-ups, but also supporters. Pascale Vonmont, deputy director of the Gebert Rüf Foundation and board member of startupticker.ch, was awarded Supporter of the Year by the de Vigier Foundation, and SBB received the CRM Innovation Award for its start-up programme.
Despite these many positive developments and dedicated people, there’s still room for improvement in the Swiss start-up environment. That’s why Bilan magazine and Le Réseau have published a list of 10 measures through which Switzerland could become a real start-up nation.
The Seca conference next Tuesday will probably include a discussion on this. The roundtable from IBM and CTI Invest also takes place on Tuesday: the theme will be developments in areas such as mobile and wearable computing. Some intriguing solutions from Swiss start-ups are likely to be on show at this event too.
Have a sunny weekend.
Stefan Kyora
Managing Editor startupticker.ch
News
.jpg "Startupfair 2014: Jetzt Workshops, Führungen und Referate buchen")
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". 
