Building a Startup Ecosystem in Switzerland – A Few Thoughts

In my meetings with Swiss Chairmen and CEOs in recent months, the word “Startup Ecosystem” has come up more and more. The Bundesrat’s announcement yesterday on the launch of a Swiss innovation fund, is another important milestone. And Swisscom Ventures’ Dominique Megret’s insightful book “Deeptech Nation ” seems to me like another step the right direction. ?

There is clearly a genuine desire to capitalize on Switzerland’s strengths and build something meaningful out of this fantastic country. And the sentiment is, that the time is now.

After living in Switzerland for a little over a decade, and personally engaging with over 500 (primarily Israeli) startups, and 250 (primarily DACH) enterprise customers, here are a few thoughts on what needs to tick here a little better, for the local ecosystem wheels to be slightly better-oiled:

·???????Information Sharing. Information sharing is critical in a venture/ tech ecosystem. We cannot invest, assess individuals, or acquire companies, if we do not have easy and handy access to the numbers. How much has this startup raised in capital? How big was the previous acquisition of the Founder? How much capital has a certain investor deployed in the last round? This information should be a Google search away; not 5 phone calls and 2 lunches away. It’s hard to build an ecosystem without handy information.

·???????Introductions. Startups thrive on introductions. Without introductions, startups cannot live. An introduction should not require 15 years of trust-building. It should take a gut feeling, and strong cultural signals, that this Founder can be trusted and is worth your time. And then a text message to the person you want to introduce that person too, and that’s it. A true tech ecosystem needs speed and text-messaging.?

·???????Availability to meet. In line with the previous point, startups cannot scale and grow (or do business) if they need to wait 3 months for a meeting. Executives need to make themselves readily available, and leave enough time to meet with startup founders on short notice. School holidays and long weekends slow things down here. Startups can’t function like this. They need speed and momentum. Executives need to make themselves available, yesterday.

·???????Conflict of Interest. Executives might be worried about conflict of interest. “I cannot promote this product if I am invested in this company.” Well, guess what, this is how you build an ecosystem! You promote what you invest in, it’s totally fine! This is what the big private equity funds do, this is what any sensible investor would do. As long as you disclose it, you should be proud that you add value to what you invest in, and not feel shy or guilt about it.

The Swiss market has everything it takes to build a successful startup ecosystem. It has innovation, it has skilled entrepreneurs and great engineering capabilities, it has massive local enterprises, it has trust, and it has capital. It has an excellent time zone to work out of. It now has the spirit and the desire to glue all of these ingredients successfully. There are just a few things which need to be done more easily, for this glue to really stick.

Yours, Shira