For the second time in the week, I’ve been attending startup pitches… which did not happen for me for a very, very long time, as you may have noticed ;-)! Friday 15th of March was the day selected by InnoPeaks to present its first batch of health tech an insurtech startups, in Sion. Powered by the insurance company Groupe Mutuel and Fusion, this 3 months program intents to accelerate startups from wonderful canton of Valais. It remembered me the initial days of Fusion, where I acted as Program Director (or MVP builder, how you want to name it ;-)!), without all the stress of setting up a Demo Day… Nicolas Loeillot, Chief Innovation Officer of Groupe Mutuel, talked about how the Group Mutuel liner is finally moving towards innovation. They want to become a “LifeTime Partner” for patients, and no more just …
The 50 Swiss Startups in Which to Invest in 2019
This Tuesday, I had the opportunity to attend (again!) the event organised by the Swiss economic magazine Bilan in Lausanne. For the 7th consecutive year, Bilan selected 50 Swiss startups in which to invest. More than 145 startups applied (all applying for the first time) and a team of experienced entrepreneurs and investors was mandated to review the applications and selects its favorites. Fabrice Delaye, the well-known tech journalist of Bilan, who is also the initiator of this competition, made a particularly interesting introduction regarding the average return for Venture Capital: from 2008, Venture Capital provided an average 35% return per year, compared to the 22% of private equity (where everybody in the finance world want to go) or the 16% for real estate sector. Fabrice concluded that it’s not only fun to invest in startups: you simply cannot neglect startup …
The 50 Best-Funded Startups in Switzerland in One Map (and What It Means For The Startup Ecosystem)
Back in 2012 as I’ve launched startupolic.com, I remember that almost nobody was blogging on the Swiss startup scene. Or most were abandoning the effort after a few posts. Fortunately, this has changed! Today I’m pleased to publish a guest post by Tatjana de Kerros-Budkov, who is currently the Startup Builder at Ricolab Innovation Lab (Ricola), Mentor, and 2x entrepreneur- with one exit under her belt- and has helped startups raise over $10M in the last 12 months. Previously, she was an entrepreneurship & innovation Advisor to the Saudi government, collaborated with 500 Startups KSA and roamed the Arabian desert building entrepreneurship & VC tech ecosystems. Now living in Zurich- she’s passionate about showcasing Swiss tech startups- bridging ties with international VCs. This post was initially published here. Altogether, they’ve raised over $1.4 billion since 2015. They’re growing at an …
Should You Write a Business Plan?
Writing a business plan at the time of the lean startup sounds like a weird idea. No? Many people think that writing a business plan is no more needed. Which is true and… wrong, at the same time! Writing a complete business plan per se is not needed, especially if you: just have an idea; have not done your homework with the Value Proposition Canvas and the Business Model Canvas; are dreaming your project instead of starting it (yeah, there are many wannabe entrepreneurs around there)! have not discussed with any potential customer; Among other ones, these are reasons not to write a business plan. Of course, when you’re starting a project, you should have a rough idea about the potential market. But you should start by focusing on the pains faced by your target customers. And trying to figure out …
Get The Money!
Startups and money. It’s a secret for nobody that money is scarce when you’re launching your startup. Even if the Swiss Venture Capital Report shows an interesting growth in startup funding over the 3 last years, with almost a doubling of the funds invested in Swiss startups. About CHF 900M were invested in 2016. Which can be seen as a great sign for entrepreneurs, but which is in the same time…ridiculous. At least if we speak about digital startups (fintech included), which represent about 30% of this amount. This total includes massive funding rounds (80-100M) in the life sciences industry, which is a bit hiding the rest. But it’s ridiculous if we compare to London startups (mostly digital), which raised… EUR 1.32 billion in the first 6 months of 2016! I was discussing with another startup founder the other day and he told me that …
Why You Need to Know Media4Equity for Your Startup Growth
This is a guest post by David Hug, a Zürich-based professional startup investor, currently acting as Managing Director at Ringier Digital Ventures. Innovation, entrepreneurship and venture capital are almost synonyms of the Silicon Valley. Over the last years, this way of thinking is gaining more and more attention in Europe. Not only famous examples from the West Coast like Facebook, Twitter and Uber started dominating our life. Also European start-ups like Spotify, Zalando or Skype changed our habits. Especially Zalando, which has chosen a new way of aggressive TV marketing to gain our attention. Most of us asked ourselves, how can a new venture finance such an aggressive marketing campaign? The solution used by Zalando to invade TV screens? Media for equity (M4E)! You may have never heard of it, and this post you’ll get more familiar with this interesting …
SICTIC Investor Day Lausanne is back (without me!)
The next SICTIC Investor Day Lausanne will happen in Lausanne on April 25th, at EPFL. 8 selected technology-driven startups (the web, mobile, software, hardware) will have the opportunity to do an elevator pitch (one slide, 90 seconds) to an interesting audience comprised of business angels, professional investors and startup enthusiasts. The public will then select 4 startups based on their short pitch. The finalists will then have 7 minutes (and 5 minutes Q&A) to present their startup in more details. A jury comprised of entrepreneurs and investors (Alexandre Peyraud, Thomas Dübendorfer, Bolko Hohaus, Julien Guex) will elect the winner of the competition, who will get some fame (always good to win a competition and get some press) and hopefully some investors! Finally, startups and investors will gather around a cocktail in a relaxed atmosphere. Even for startups who don’t win: it’s …
The Seed Round Guide: Why Silicon Valley May Not Be Your Best Option (III/III)
This is a guest post by Penny Schiffer a Zürich-based energetic woman, passionate by the startup and investment world. She’s currently managing the startup initiatives of Swisscom and in charge of the « Swisscom Startup Challenge » and also part of Swisscom Ventures and a member of the business angel club Go Beyond. This post is part of the Seed Round Guide (check The Seed Round Guide: Is Big Always Better Than Small? and The Seed Round Guide: Finding & Leveraging a Lead Investor). A couple of months ago, I was coaching a seasoned entrepreneur who had developed a piece of software that is relevant to operating IT clouds. This software definitely addresses a global market and will most likely have much greater growth opportunities if the business development addresses the tech companies in Silicon Valley. After this entrepreneur …