Swiss Fintech knowledge for the world market

Last year, Swiss fintech startups raised a total of CHF 76 million in venture capital, mostly in the low single-digit millions. That sounds like a lot of money, but it is not enough for international expansion. For this, startups depend on partnerships and financing on a global scale. Thus, Venture Leaders – a Venturelab initiative supported by companies and universities – has once again organised a roadshow at the centre of the global financial world.

A jury of investors and experts selected 10 startups from all the applications received. “Fintech projects always have global ambitions,” says Jens Schulte, head of corporate venture capital at PostFinance. At the same time, the financial industry depends like no other on mutual trust. That's why it’s clear to jury member Schulte: “The road to powerful partnerships is through personal contacts.”

The programme that awaits the startups in New York is accordingly challenging. In just one week, they will meet a number of well-known representatives of the world’s largest financial center: bankers, investors and lawyers. “They have a unique opportunity to lay the foundations of an international network,” says Schulte.

One of those who seized the opportunity is Patrick Barnert, founder of Zurich fintech start-up Qumram. He attended the last Venture Leaders roadshow in New York and two months later sold his company to US software group Dynatrace.

The ten fintech startups

3rd-eyes | Rodrigo Amandi | 3rd-eyes-com | Zurich
3rd-eyes is the software partner of choice for banks, insurance companies and investment advisers. Its system combines a wealth planning module with a stochastic process that calculates the optimal asset allocation based on the customer’s goals. The algorithm takes into consideration individual criteria, such as investment style, and personal values, including climate change and social issues.

AAAccell | Sandro Schmid | aaaccell.ch | Zurich
The company develops cutting-edge solutions in asset and risk management. PSARM (Portfolio Selection and Risk Monitoring) is a leading quant engine developed by AAAccell that transforms an existing portfolio (institutional or private) into a lower risk portfolio, while simultaneously improving its respective returns.

Apiax | Nicolas Blanchard | apiax.com | Zurich
The regtech startup builds flexible tools to transform complex regulations into digital regulatory rules, with management of their full life cycle. Continually reviewed, updated and verified, these rules can be integrated directly into any application through an easy-to-use API.

ArcaTrust | Khaled Ouafi | arcatrust.io | Lausanne
ArcaTrust aims to provide a secure environment for security applications in the form of a physically secure server appliance. One of its primary use cases is blockchain applications that require a secure wallet system. 

Enterprise Bot | Pranay Jain | enterprisebot.ai | Zug
The tech startup creates AI-powered chatbots designed to automate customer interactions: they provide companies with a readily accessible digital agent that improves the customer experience and reduces operational costs by up to 40%.

IMburse | Oliver Werneyer | imbursepayments.io | Zurich
The cloud-based Advanced Transaction Suite from IMburse enables companies to engage customers through personalised transactions. A single integration with IMburse significantly reduces IT complexity, minimises impact on internal processes, and slashes costs associated with comprehensive payments and partnership capabilities, while significantly accelerating market deployment timelines.

Investment Navigator | Alberto Ram | www.investmentnavigator.com | Zurich
The company enhances the investment and advisory value chain from research to distribution with suitability assessments and solutions to the cross-border, product and tax suitability issues of financial service providers. A combination of client context, rules and data leads to an automated unambiguous suitability answer – even down to the specific instrument level.

Shift Devices | Dario Duran | www.shiftcrypto.ch | Adliswil (ZH)
Founded in 2015 by Douglas Bakkum and Bitcoin Core maintainer Jonas Schnelli, the start-up develops secure consumer products and enterprise solutions based on applied cryptography and blockchain best practices. The flagship product of ETH spin-off BitBox benefits customers in more than 90 countries.

Lend| Florian Kübler | lend.ch | Zurich
Lend.ch is Switzerland’s fastest growing peer-to-peer lending platform for consumers, second lien mortgages, students and SMEs. Switzerlend, which operates the platform, cuts out the middleman and passes on the cost benefits to both borrowers and lenders.

Tradeplus24 | Ben James | www.tradeplus24.ch | Zurich
The startup specialises in helping SMEs and mid-market companies finance their working capital requirements through provision of an innovative worldwide receivables securitisation solution that makes the procurement of funds simpler and more cost-effective. 

Meet the team and vote for the captain on 19 June
Save the date of June 19^th, 2018 for the Startup Champions event. Starting at 6pm, the event will introduce the ten winners of Venture Leaders Fintech and the ten winners of Venture Leaders China. The two teams will pitch to the audience to choose their respective team captains. Find the full program and registration here.

Follow the kick-off event on June 19^th and the Venture Leaders Fintech roadshow from September 16^th to 22^nd on Twitter and Facebook, using the hashtag #vleadersFintech on social media.

(Press release)