August 25, 2023
Resilience is hard work
Dear reader
This week we again reported on three rounds of financing. After eight years of bootstrapping, a strategic partner has joined proptech scale-up eeproperty, biotech start-up Mysthera has secured a seed investment of CHF 3.1 million and medtech company Calopad has generated CHF 4 million. Calopad plans to use the money to expand into Germany with its smart, reusable heat patch of the same name.
I always find it admirable how entrepreneurs pursue their growth plans, despite the fact that financing is now taking longer and the rounds are significantly smaller than two years ago. It is thanks to their tenacity, resilience and hard work that so many groundbreaking innovations are still being developed and brought to market in Switzerland.
Once launched, there is a good chance that deeptech start-ups from Switzerland will establish themselves on the market. For example, LatticeFlow is working with the US Army on a three-year project and has now revealed the first results of the collaboration. The launch of DroneControl, a start-up specialising in customised drone software for public safety organisations, also went well. At IoT company Arviem, growth continues quarter after quarter and a branch in the US should now provide a further boost.
An exception to the downbeat mood in the start-up sector is the field of generative AI. Here there was important news from Switzerland this week. AlpineAI, a company with a broad supporter base, wants to offer a SwissGPT and the first pilot tests with companies are already underway.
Many of the 11 start-ups selected by Tenity for the Swiss Incubator programme also use artificial intelligence, with three of the companies in which the Tenity Incubation Fund is investing CHF 50,000 each from Switzerland. And this year’s Digital Shapers has even more AI and digitalisation start-ups to discover: founders make up the largest group among the 100 people.
The next SICTIC Investor Day will take place at Zurich airport next week. The Aargau Gründungstreff takes place in Technopark Aargau. And the following week, on 4 September, the Medtech Innovation Event will be held in Biel. This year’s Top 100 Startup Awards ceremony is on 6 September – registration is open for the live stream now.
Applications are currently open for the ESA BIC Accelerator – a webinar next Tuesday will provide the necessary information. And don’t miss the deadline for Gebert Rüf Stiftung’s First Ventures programme. The registration period for the Swiss Accelerator, the highly competitive Innosuisse funding programme aimed at individual start-ups and SMEs with innovation projects with above-average innovation potential, will also start next Monday.
Have a good weekend.
Stefan Kyora
Editor in Chief, Startupticker.ch
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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". 
