DeepJudge’s oversubscribed financing round of USD 10.7 million made waves across Switzerland for it will push the startup to the next level in the generative AI space. Paulina Grnarova and her team leverage AI to help law firms and legal departments search for their internal knowledge. Along with the significant round, the firm expanded its offering with ‘Knowledge Assistant’, the only generative AI interface for law firms and legal departments. The Enantios team raised CHF 1.8 million for its molecule characterization method designed to address critical bottlenecks in traditional drug development while MicThera, co-founded by Calcinotto Arianna also attracted investors to support its mission of developing bacterial-derived therapeutics to enhance prostate cancer therapies.
Convinced by their idea to enhance the clinical efficacy of anti-cancer drugs during the pre-clinical stage, Venture Kick awarded the founding duo at Calico Biosystems with CHF 150’000 to propel their growth and development. IMAI received the same amount for its solutions designed to enable doctors to adopt digital and 3D histopathology, to facilitate accurate treatment outcomes and higher survival rates. In the Western part of Switzerland, the Foundation for Technological Innovation (FIT) is supporting Ex Nunc Intelligence and Carewell to enable them to advance their AI-based platform for legal professionals and digital marketplace for healthcare replacements, respectively.
Winning startups collect accolades
Several prestigious award ceremonies were held during the past weeks, with various female founders in the spotlight. Julia Carpenter from Apheros, provider of novel metal forms cooling solutions and Mamta Chabria from Tandem Therapeutics, which offers a novel precision targeting approach to treat fibrosis and fibrotic cancers, each won a cheque of CHF 100,000 in the prestigious W.A de Vigier award. During the Swiss Fintech Award Nights, AI-based translator Neur.on emerged as the winner in the category of Early-stage startup of the year. Oksana Bober co-founder of iCure scored second place in the Tech4Trust award – its solution is revolutionizing the security of medical data and patient records. Tenity’s inaugural Digital Health Accelerator kicked off the program with startups including Juli by Bettina Hein, e.rupt by Melanie Baumgartner, adamcares by Kim Wiegand, Via Communa with its two female co-founders and PhenomX led by Colleen Fogarty Draper. DiverSsity impressed the jury at the Prix Créateurs BCVS with its immersive, personalized therapeutic exercises for teenagers suffering from autistic disorders, winning the first-place prize of CHF 25,000.
Sallea and Kuori teams are among winners of KlimUp, a new initiative from the City of Zurich organised in collaboration with Bluelion. The startups received CHF 35’000 to advance their solutions – a technology for cell-growth scaffolds enabling the production of whole-cut meat and materials made from food side streams such as banana peel or nutshells. Simone Thompson, Founder & Co-CEO of CLIMADA Technologies, won one of the challenges in the Zurich Innovation Championship, securing a four-month participation ticket in the organiser’s accelerator program. The Swiss startup developed a scalable software solution to efficiently deliver forward-looking analysis for the exposed locations of a client, covering the most acute and chronic hazards. The jury for the Lead Today. Shape Tomorrow award selected ETH Spinoff Riverkin while Incapteck stood in the spotlight of the Exhibitor Grand Prix at EPHJ.
Beyond applauses and cheques, there are programs whose focus is to push startups beyond Swiss borders. One such is the Swissnex Bootcamp for which Mélodie Mousset from PatchXR qualified to explore the potential of its virtual reality platform for creating and performing music in the metaverse in the US market. The Academia-Industry-Training program took eight startups to Mexico for a business development week – among them are founders of cleantech startup GreenBiz (Laura Forero) and Cybersecurity solutions provider Threema.Work (Maria del Rosario).
Development milestones
Diana Engetschwiler and Katia Murmann have launched an AI-powered B2B platform ‘WolfPak.ai’, offering a personal leadership companion for future leaders to support them in making tough decisions and navigate complex team dynamics effectively.
For biotech or Medtech companies, each milestone owes a celebration, and that is what the team at Oncobit did after receiving a European certification under the In Vitro Diagnostics Regulation (IVDR) for its PM melanoma test suite. Alveolix, co-led by Nina Hobi and Janick Stucki, and their project partners have achieved significant milestones in their EU-funded project EpicoliX aimed to revolutionize ulcerative colitis (UC) treatment. The startup specialises in organ-on-chip technologies to improve preclinical drug testing and reduce drug development costs. Regenosca developed TissueSpan, which allows for the creation of off-the-shelf and ready-to-use implants that serve as a noninvasive alternative to traditional tissue grafts. Having proven its readiness for sustainable growth, the startup received the Innosuisse Certificate.
Deploy’s engagement in recycling plastic waste using unique technologies has been further affirmed with the construction of their showcase plant in Monthey, which will not only increase capacity but also lead to the creation of jobs. It is efforts like these to address environmental issues that won the startup a membership in the WEF Technology Pioneers community. Given that Urban Connect, co-founded by Judith Häberli, is already offering 60+ corporate customers including Roche, Google and Swiss, access to modal mobility options for their employees, the company is already making strides in the startup scene. A new partnership with the Post sets the company on a further growth course, allowing customers to access Post Company Cars, Switzerland’s largest fleet manager.
Hard decisions in difficult times
Sandra Grimmer the CEO of Rheiazymes AG and the YARN-TO-YARN® project has filed for liquidation after failing to secure enough capital to further build the startup. Founded in 2022, Rheiazymes sought to make non-recyclable or hard-to-recycle such as textiles, electronics, and compound packaging recyclable using molecular recycling.
