Two new Swiss Startups for Y-Combinator

Quazel is building a language learning app that helps people get conversational fluency. In completely unscripted and dynamic conversations with an AI, learners can say whatever they want and the AI will carry on the conversation. By using cutting-edge machine learning techniques the team in Zurich is able to create an AI that can talk about virtually anything and deeply understand the context of the conversation. The main reason behind learning a language almost always comes from a desire to be able to speak the language with locals, yet, there is no comfortable way to get conversational practice. Tutors are expensive and meeting tandem partners requires a lot of cumbersome scheduling and personal chemistry.

Currently Quazel is building an app containing various new features like levels and other gamification elements. Additionally, the team has added new scenes and improved the UI. As CEO and Cofounder Philipp Hadjimina explains enthusiastically to Startupticker.ch, the available beta on the startups homepage played a key role: “The website really allowed us to get some early traction and show our idea to people. We posted it to Hacker News and the people loved it there. The overwhelmingly positive reception we got there probably also contributed to being accepted into YC.”

Y-Combinator is a huge opportunity for Quazel, as it provides the team with guidance from experienced founders, a large network of valuable contacts, and additional visibility for its product. It was also essential to show that the hypothesis around which the team built Quazel is sound. "It allowed the team to go from 'let's try this idea and see how it goes' to 'this idea has a lot of promise,'" says the CEO.

For the upcoming period, the team will be focusing on accelerating product development and pushing its growth metrics in order to position Quazel perfectly for the seed round planned at around the same time as YC's Demo day (beginning of April 2023). Currently, the founders David Niederberger (CTO), Philipp Hadjimina (CEO), and Samuel Bissegger (CFO) are working at Quazel. Within the next year, the team is expected to grow.

Generai: Crafting artworks with AI

Generai is building machine learning algorithms to generate art with AI, purely from text. The team at Generai wants to enable everyone to let their imagination run wild and turn artistic ideas into reality. On the website of the Swiss startup, one cannot only create beautiful artworks, but also buy them in physical form as posters, canvas and more. Emerging from a personal project on generative art, Generai was born in early June 2022.

Being selected by Y-Combinator, one of the most prestigious startup accelerators in the world, is a major milestone for Generai. With its support the team led by Jan Schnyder plans to be pioneers in the generative AI field and build something people want. The resources they provide may lay the stepping stones for its success.

Generai.art is made up of a team of four computer scientists with backgrounds in business, machine learning and software engineering. All based in Switzerland, the four founders are Jan Schnyder, Konstantin Wohlwend, Kyrill Hux and Nicolas Muntwyler (from left to right on picture). Generai has recently launched its initial product and plans now to scale to a global level while constantly refining its technology.

(ES)