MassChallenge Switzerland 2021 Top 12 Finalists are here

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12.10.2021

MassChallenge Switzerland, part of MassChallenge’s global network on innovators, just announced its top 12 startup finalists. These startups will now participate in a final round of judging where they will compete for up to CHF 500,000 of prizes including CHF 400,000 in equity-free cash prizes. The prize winners will be announced on October 28th at the 2021 Awards Ceremony, which will be a hybrid event.

“2021 was MassChallenge Switzerland’s biggest and strongest year ever.  We had our largest ever cohort at 107 startups, and it was also our most geographically diverse – 27% coming from Switzerland, 41% from the EU+ region, and the balance led by US and India. The largest industry sector represented was food/ag-tech at 60% of startups. Virtually all these amazing businesses are purpose-led enterprises - 57% being focused on Good Health, Responsible Production/Consumption or Climate Action.” - said Matt Lashmar, Managing Director of MassChallenge Switzerland.

During the past 4 months, MassChallenge community-powered accelerator program provided 107 high-potential startups with the accountability, expertise, and network they need to accelerate towards the next critical milestone. Matthew Lashmar further explains: “This year’s program was run as a Hybrid. We mostly ran it online – with 4 large in person events. Thanks to the 380 Mentors, 3 Entrepreneurs-in-Residence, 37 Speakers, 20 Partners, 72 Experts who judged our Pre-finals & Finals, and 6 Team Members. Collectively your advice, connections, enthusiasm, and passion drove startup engagement to our highest level for 3 years with 64% of startups scoring us 9 or 10 out of 10 if asked to recommend the program to other startups.         

This year we tried to deliver better outcomes for our startups. Simply put – we asked each startup what they wanted to achieve during the accelerator – and then helped them deliver it. 42% of startups said they “exceeded” or “hit objectives”. Including those who “nearly achieved objectives” we hit 94%. The main area of startup focus was collaborating with our corporate partners. Here we had our most successful year ever. We had 113 connections, and 56 concrete next steps between startups and corporate partners; pleasingly the number of concrete next steps was double versus 2020.” 

The top 12 startups that will be awarded on October 28th were selected following an online pitch, in which they demonstrated their growth and impact to top corporate executives, industry, academia and innovation leaders from across the globe. So join our Awards Ceremony either ON-SITE or ONLINE and meet the innovators of today, who are disrupting the status quo and creating meaningful change!

Four Swiss startups among the Top 12 Finalists:

  • B’ZEOS (Norway / Switzerland): offers sustainable, home compostable, and bio-digestible packaging solutions made from seaweed extracts to combat plastic pollution.
  • Epios (Switzerland): is providing personalized and precision management of brain disorders using daily life monitoring and therapeutics.
  • Smart Helio (Switzerland): brings second life to solar panels, helping to generate more clean energy and prevent e-waste using out patent pending IoT sensor.
  • Spirecut SA (Switzerland): develops surgical instruments for percutaneous treatment. No skin incision, less complications, early return to normal life.
  • Amphibio (United Kingdom): development of a sustainable and recyclable Waterproof Breathable Textile and Garment for the outdoor apparel industry.
  • Clear Leaf (Costa Rica): offers 100% non-toxic fungicides and bactericides for agricultural use.
  • Gelatex (Estonia): high-throughput and cost-effective bio-based nanofibers production for cultured meat, wound care, filtration, or other industries.
  • Sophie’s BioNutrients (Singapore): are developing a new sustainable plant-based protein out of microalgae using fermentation technologies.
  • Ullmanna (Czech Republic): is working on an innovative solution that will scale organic food production using robotics and artificial intelligence.
  • Umami Meats (Singapore): is cultivating the future of sustainable seafood by crafting delicious, affordable, nutritious cell-cultured fish.
  • umiami (France):  created a proprietary technology to produce better-tasting, more clean-label plant-based meats and fish.
  • Zeg (United Kingdom): their proprietary 3D AI tech allows any eCommerce seller to create photos virtually at 1/10th cost and 1/100th the time compared to a studio.
(Press release/ES)

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