IMD Startup competition reveals the winners of the 2019/2020 edition

More than 140 candidates applied for the IMD startup Competition representing a wide range of fields: 17% from medtech, 11% from pharma/biotech, 17% were software companies, 21% from tech/hardware, 10% in services, 9% in fintech and 8% in social/sustainability.

“This year was easily the most competitive we have had. Even after all our years of choosing and nurturing early-stage ventures in Switzerland we were very pleasantly surprised to see so many strong companies this year with a credible claim to future success.”, says Jim Pulcrano, Adjunct Professor at IMD.

The selection jury has nominated 42 winners that will benefit from the program. Fifteen of the companies will work with the fulltime MBA class starting already in late-January. An additional 21 will work with the three cohorts of the EMBA class, accompanying them to Silicon Valley. In this year’s edition, another 6 companies will collaborate with the custom IMD Emerging Leaders program: Driving Functional Expertise. This is a nine-month journey educating the future leaders of Evonik.

The MBA class comprises the following startups

Advanced Pumping Technologies – pumps designed and built with a disruptive technology

Babylon Sciences –  enhances people’s lives with CBD

Batmaid.com – the leading vertical marketplace for home cleaning in Switzerland

Changeway – Improve faster. Learn faster. Grow faster

CUTS – allows attendees of a concert to share on social networks exclusive high-quality videos in real-time.

FLOWBONE – fighting bone fragility with a new generation of injectable biomaterial

Flybotix – Professional inspection drones that operate inside industrial assets s

Foodetective – optimizes restaurants’ management and online visibility

KiWi – app for micro-businesses to accept card payments

Nagi Bioscience – develops highly innovative laboratory equipment for pharmaceutical and chemical R&D.

Pexapark – enables better renewable energy sales with a suite of software tools

Ponera – aims to revolutionize the goods’ shipping industry with an innovative modular pallet system

ratioX – offers a revolutionary automatic transmission for eBikes that is also durable and lightweight.

SwiSOX – a one-stop-shop for all matters of impact

Testing time – is the world’s first automated test user recruiting service for user research with a pool of 400,000 test users. The service is heavily used by over 1000 customers like Swisscom, Zalando, UBS, etc. for user research and user testing studies.

The startups that will work with the EMBA class are

Cellestia Biotech – is developing treatments for NOTCH-driven cancers

Comphya – the first implantable device to restore natural penile erection by neuromodulation

Dufour Aerospace – new  generation of electric vertical take-off and landing aircraft

EraCal Therapeutics – a novel anti-obesity drug Era-107 with superior efficacy and safety

iGroove – offers services based on artificial intelligence for financing and marketing music.

Inergio – miniaturized fuel cell systems that operate using existing liquid fuels.

Logic Flow – AI technology to help companies to migrate their legacy code.

Loop Medical– aims to make blood diagnosis painless and accessible to all.

MapTiler – Street and satellite maps of the entire world for companies.

Menhir Photonics – offers laser-based ultra-precise clocks for applications in aerospace, telecom and electronics sectors.

MicroR Systems – Makes next-generation lasers with ultra-pure colours for precision measurement.

Miraex – Optical sensors and Quantum optics.

MyoSwiss –aims to help people with mobility impairments realize their potential.

Nomoko – is building the data infrastructure for the 4th Industrial Revolution.

PXL Vision – solutions for secure identity verification

Securaxis – safety & security solutions combining AI (deep learning) and acoustic detection to turn noise into information

Senopi – prescription VR digital therapeutics for seniors with dementia and frailty.

Spectroplast – enables for the first time the direct fabrication silicone products.

swistor – Sustainable energy storage solutions

Synthara – Adaptive AI chips for the edge.

VIE – provides users with the most interactive and engaging fitness experience

The IMD Emerging Leaders program will include

Advancience – Game-based psychometrics for medical applications and drug development/pharmaceutical R&D

Aero41 –  High precision crop protection drone adapted to complex and steep parcels

Akpolis – Blockchain/IoT/AI based solution that collect performance data of processes and good throughout the supply chain

Blent – a digital smart assistant for Hospitality executives and managers

Exeon Analytics - detects hidden cyber threats in IT log data

Roll2Go - an integrated data analytics platform for the integration, analysis, and visualization of shared micro-mobility data.

(Press release)