Western Swiss start-ups at the Swiss Exchange

It’s no secret that there are a lot of promising start-ups in Western Switzerland. This year several national competitions have shown this again. For the 47^th Swiss Venture Day of CTI Invest five companies from Western Switzerland were selected: Scantrust (Lausanne), Konduko (Biel), Kireego (Lausanne), Akselos (Lausanne) and Avance Medical (Chavannes-sur-Moudon). In addition two companies from Zurich pitched to the investors: SmarterBetterCities and Versantis.

The day showed again typical strengths of Swiss start-ups. Most of the companies have very experienced team members. The start-ups are trying to get a proof of market as fast as possible – five of the start-ups at the Swiss Venture Day are already generating initial revenues. And the teams of Swiss start-ups are very international.

A stunning example is Akselos. The company is a spin-off from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology MIT. However the start-up is headquartered in Lausanne with a subsidiary in Boston. Akselos enables engineers to design and assess critical infrastructure via advanced simulation software. Its software platform provides the accuracy and generality of Finite Element Analysis (FEA) with much greater speed and convenience. During his presentation Akselos CTO David Knezevic explained that none of the founders is from U.S.A. and that “Switzerland is a good place to be for companies in the seed stage.”

The next Swiss Venture Day will take place in November – this time in Lausanne.