Swisspreneur Show

Timestamps: 1:40 - Consulting prepared Loïc for entrepreneurship 7:45 - Building an agency 12:58 - Solving someone else’s problem 24:24 - Focus vs offering a multifaceted product 33:39 - Being bootstrapped for several years About Loïc Schülé: Loïc Schülé is the co-founder and CEO at denteo, a software provider for dentist offices. He studied computer science at EPFL and worked in consulting before pivoting his career and landing at Impact Hub in 2015. He co-founded denteo in 2017 with 3 other co-founders. Loïc picked dentistry because it was an underserved niche market to which he had no prior connection, which would make failure feel less upsetting. Denteo’s cloud technology offers easy online booking for patients, a well laid-out calendar, seamless medical history, a quick way to record positions, tidy billing management and reliable recalls. The delay in digitization within the dentistry space creates a generational divide between older dentists, who think their current systems work totally fine, and younger dentists, who are frustrated and yearning for something better. Part of denteo’s challenge is therefore to educate the market and breach this generational gap. Memorable Quotes: "Being naïve is dangerous but it’s also super exciting." Resources Mentioned: The Hard Thing About Hard Things, Ben Horrowitz If you would like to listen to more conversations about dentistry, check out our episode with Tobias & Anne Richter. Don’t forget to give us a follow on our Twitter, Instagram, Facebook and Linkedin accounts, so you can always stay up to date with our latest initiatives. That way, there’s no excuse for missing out on live shows, weekly give-aways or founders dinners!

Timestamps: 3:21 - Balancing entrepreneurship and politics 9:23 - How politics can help startups 16:58 - Measuring economic impact 22:28 - Making Switzerland more startup 26:59 - Mainstreaming impact accounting About Gerhard Andrey: Gerhard Andrey is a Grüne Schweiz member and national councillor on the Swiss Parliament. He also co-founded the Swiss digital agency Liip, is a board member at Alternative Bank Schweiz, and has a background in engineering. Gerhard felt drawn to politics because he strongly believes political decisions should be made democratically by individuals, and not by corporations. However, being an entrepreneur himself, he thinks politics and entrepreneurship can act in a mutually beneficial way, and he’s especially passionate about SME’s potential to drive real positive societal impact. He’s a fan of the Verantwortungseigentum movement and thinks companies should be “owned by” their purpose and not their capital — he would like to see the development of a new legal structure in Switzerland to represent this kind of company. At Liip he’s had to say no to a long list of opportunities because of his commitment to not harm planet Earth. Recently, Liip has also begun to strive to live up to the UN Sustainable Development Goals. Gerhard is also adamant about maintaining a healthy work-life balance, both for his own sake and for the sake of his children. He’s currently working on creating a Swiss green bank which would finance cleantech projects. Memorable Quotes: "I don’t believe in a Unicorn economy." "SMEs are the most important companies for generating positive contributions to society." "To make Switzerland more startup we shouldn’t try to replicate Silicon Valley’s unicorn economy. We need to grow sustainably and look beyond pure financials. We have the brains, we have the universities. So let’s do it." If you would like to listen to the first four episodes in our Startup Days co-production, check out our conversations with Laura Matter, Olivier Laplace, Lars Mangelsdorf and Roland Siegwart. Don’t forget to give us a follow on our Twitter, Instagram, Facebook and Linkedin accounts, so you can always stay up to date with our latest initiatives. That way, there’s no excuse for missing out on live shows, weekly give-aways or founders dinners!

Timestamps: 1:41 - Switching from engineering to law 8:52 - Visiting the US blockchain scene 13:01 - Leaving DFINITY 22:03 - Explaining Liquity to a 5yo child 44:17  - Whether VCs own the blockchain About Robert Lauko: Robert Lauko is the co-founder and CEO at Liquity, a decentralized protocol that enables interest-free borrowing on the blockchain. He studied Microengineering at EPFL but then switched to Law at UZH. Robert worked for several years as a lawyer before pivoting to blockchain research. He worked as a researcher at DFNITY for 2 years before creating his own venture. To understand what Liquity allows you to do, let’s compare two lending scenarios: 1. You take out a loan from a bank to buy something like a house or a car. Whatever you have bought will then serve as collateral for the bank, meaning that if you default on your loan (= fail to pay it back), the thing you bought gets taken away and is sold by the bank, so that the bank can cover its costs. 2. You buy Ether and place it in the Liquity platform (or simply use the Ether you already owned), and then you take out a loan against it, meaning the Ether is your loan’s collateral. The loan you take out is in LUSD, a fully backed stablecoin pegged to the US Dollar that's maintained by an algorithmic monetary policy. The value of the Ether has to be 110% of the loan, otherwise you can get liquidated. You pay no interest and there is no repayment schedule. Memorable Quotes: "It’s yet to be seen how sustainable the NFT craze is, but I don’t think it makes DeFi redundant. There are good ways for combining the two, and either way there’s enough space for the both of them." Resources Mentioned: Binance Academy If you would like to listen to more episodes about the blockchain, check out our most recent conversation with Julian Liniger. Don’t forget to give us a follow on our Twitter, Instagram, Facebook and Linkedin accounts, so you can always stay up to date with our latest initiatives. That way, there’s no excuse for missing out on live shows, weekly give-aways or founders dinners!

Timestamps: 3:43 - What makes ETH special 8:13 - Commercializing research at ETH 13:03 - Switzerland sells itself short 15:31 - Making Switzerland more startup 19:17 - Where our ecosystem is going About Roland Siegwart Roland Siegwart is a professor of Autonomous Systems at ETH Zurich and board member for Sevensense Robotics, NZZ, Komax and Evatec. He has been a visiting scientist at both EPFL and Stanford, and holds a PhD in Mechatronics from ETH Zurich. Roland’s original ambition was to become an entrepreneur; however, he does not regret having become a professor instead, since teaching at ETH Zurich has allowed him to help and watch grow a vast number of startups. Roland attributes ETH Zurich’s prominent role in the Swiss startup scene to the very clever students that it successfully attracts, and he suggests that if we want to further motivate students to become entrepreneurs, we should first and foremost offer them role models. He also would like to see ETH Zurich collaborate more with business-focused schools like HSG, so that the expertise of tech and business leads can be brought together. Roland is not of the opinion that every Swiss startup needs to scale massively. However, if scaling massively is the goal, then two things are needed: Founders must change their Swiss mentality and relinquish the desire of staying in control. Switzerland shouldn’t necessarily mimic Silicon Valley, but it needs to be faster to get bigger, and there is a lot of outstanding tech for us to do this. More financial support is naturally required. Memorable Quotes: "If you want to build a perfect product, you’ll never be on the market." "In order to motivate students to become entrepreneurs, we need to give them role models.  And we have to create a stronger link between established companies and startups." If you would like to listen to the first three episodes in our Startup Days co-production, check out our conversations with Laura Matter, Olivier Laplace and Lars Mangelsdorf. Don’t forget to give us a follow on our Twitter, Instagram, Facebook and Linkedin accounts, so you can always stay up to date with our latest initiatives. That way, there’s no excuse for missing out on live shows, weekly give-aways or founders dinners!

Timestamps: 6:00 - What makes a co-founder “the one” 9:47 - Solving your own problem 15:51 - Pricing strategy 27:29 - Technical challenges 34:41 - Getting acquired by Norstat group About Oliver Ganz: Oliver Ganz is the co-founder and CTO at Testing Time, a UX test and market research recruiter founded in 2015. Oliver has a Masters in Computer Science and previously worked at Amazee Labs and Doodle, at the latter of which he met Reto Lämmler. Testing Time was acquired by the Norstat Group in 2021. Reto and Oliver’s goal was to create the “uber” of UX testing. Market research is a rather old business which has, in many ways, missed the digitization wave: many companies still keep an excel sheet of test users whom they have to manually call and screen — Reto found this to be a huge pain at Doodle. Testing Time, on the other hand, allows UX departments to get a direct contact with their target audience and test their products and services in an early stage, saving them not only time but also money. Testing Time’s target customers are UX teams and project managers across several industries, from banks to B2Cs. They have several ways of finding test users: - Organically: test users google how to create an additional income stream and find Testing time. - Through campaigns: LinkedIn ads, Facebook ads, and sometimes even paper flyers. - Through referrals: good test users can refer their friends and have them join the platform. Testing Time pays users in real cash (through Paypal or eBank transactions) and the pricing for companies is based on the target group (how difficult the profiles are to find). For more info on their pricing, check out our episode with Reto Lämmler. In order to prevent future technical challenges, Oliver recommends: - To pick well-known programming languages and frameworks. The tech you pick should outlive your startup, otherwise you risk having to migrate stuff and incur huge costs. - Not to fall into the trap of trying to do everything yourself. Don’t build your own CRM software or your own call center — use cloud services for all they’re worth. They may be pricey at times, but it’ll pay off in the end. Memorable Quotes: "Building a startup means proving your idea at every level. First you solve your own problem, then you find the first paying customers, and then you start scaling." Resources Mentioned: Robot vacuum cleaner NZZ Akzent  Alles gesagt  Don’t forget to give us a follow on our Twitter, Instagram, Facebook and Linkedin accounts, so you can always stay up to date with our latest initiatives. That way, there’s no excuse for missing out on live shows, weekly give-aways or founders dinners!

Timestamps: 1:01 - Starting Yokoy 5:08 - Scaling from 40 to 200 employees 12:14 - Monthly company updates 16:42 - Asking for help 19:42 - Making Switzerland more startup About Lars Mangelsdorf: Lars Mangelsdorf is co-founder and CCO at Yokoy, the all-in-one spending management solution automating the expenses, invoice & credit card processes of medium and large firms. He previously worked as a Senior Account Executive at Beekeeper. After successfully raising over $100M in less than a year, Yokoy is now focusing on expanding its team, and has grown from 40 to 200 employees in the past few months. Lars is no longer down in the sales trenches nowadays but more so focusing on Yokoy’s international expansion and scaling up the team. In order to scale up their team, Yokoy works with both an internal recruiting team and external recruiters (for foreign markets).They’ve also begun having monthly company-wide updates, where things like strategy and funding updates are discussed. A new communication strategy has been put in place to make sure processes go through the right people and not everyone is stuck in meetings all day long. Memorable Quotes: "Sometimes when a company grows very fast, you try to include everyone in every meeting, and end up with your whole team in meetings all day long. That’s not good." If you would like to listen to the first two episodes in our Startup Days co-production, check out our conversations with Laura Matter and Olivier Laplace. Don’t forget to give us a follow on our Twitter, Instagram, Facebook and Linkedin accounts, so you can always stay up to date with our latest initiatives. That way, there’s no excuse for missing out on live shows, weekly give-aways or founders dinners!

Timestamps: 1:41 - The internet in the 90s 9:53 - Companies should digitize their shares 19:44 - Why you should use the blockchain 23:24 - Educating the market on the blockchain 35:25 - Deploying 1 feature per week About Peter Schnürer: Peter Schnürer is the CEO at daura, a digital equity platform which helps companies keep a digital share registry. Peter has a background in Business Administration and has worked for several banks and IT companies. 60% of Swiss companies aren’t sure their share register is correct — with daura, not only can you avoid this issue, but you can in fact manage the whole company lifecycle, from founding, to fundraising (which necessitates printing shares to sell them to people), to shareholder assemblies (which are significantly facilitated by having shares printed as tokens) to an exit scenario (where shares will of course be sold). Listeners should note, however, that daura is not like a stock exchange: a stock exchange is a secondary market, where shares that have already been printed may be traded; daura, on the other hand, focuses on printing the shares and distributing them to shareholders, who may then decide to sell these in a secondary market or transfer them to another person. daura’s business model consists of charging issuing companies a yearly fee for their share register, an additional fee for running a capital increase, and an additional fee for doing a general assembly. Memorable Quotes: "The blockchain empowers people to be responsible for their own assets and not rely on 3rd parties." Resources Mentioned: Sapiens: A Brief History Of Humankind, by Yuval Noah Harari Principles For Dealing With A Changing World Order, by Ray Dalio From The Earth To The Moon, Jules Verne Astronomical Telescope If you would like to listen to more blockchain-related episodes, check out our conversation with Julian Liniger. Don’t forget to give us a follow on our Twitter, Instagram, Facebook and Linkedin accounts, so you can always stay up to date with our latest initiatives. That way, there’s no excuse for missing out on live shows, weekly give-aways or founders dinners!

Timestamps: 1:22 - Wanting to be a VC 5:08 - Investing in B2B SaaS 8:32 - Getting more Swiss VC money 15:42 - Making Switzerland more startup-friendly 20:28 - Where the Swiss ecosystem is going About Olivier Laplace: Olivier Laplace has been a partner at the VC fund VI Partners since early 2022. He previously worked as head of corporate VC at Swiss Post and founded a company called Balumpa, which provided users a geo-localized social network. Throughout the years, his investor portfolio has included companies like TestingTime, Beekeeper and guuruu. At VI partners Olivier mostly invests in B2B SaaS. His typical day as a VC includes: - 2-3 phone calls with new potential companies - 2-3 calls with potential co-investors - A few random calls, like helping portfolio companies with day-to-day issues A common complaint within the Swiss ecosystem is that there isn’t enough gross capital. Olivier thinks this should be solved in two ways: - Swiss pension funds need to start investing in VC. There’s 1 trillion CHF in the Swiss pension fund system. Nowadays 1% of that (10B) goes into private equity, but very international private equity, and mostly into the buyouts. - Building innovation in-house might not be the best way to do it anymore, so Swiss corporations need to buy out more startups. Despite popular perception, IPOs are very rare ends to the startup journey — it’s mostly tradesales. Memorable Quotes: "In 15 years of work experience, I changed careers about 5 times — these changes were always based on opportunities." Resources Mentioned: Deep Tech Nation, Dominique Mégret The Power Law, Sebastian Mallaby If you would like to listen to the first episode in our Startup Days co-production, check out our conversation with Laura Matter. Don’t forget to give us a follow on our Twitter, Instagram, Facebook and Linkedin accounts, so you can always stay up to date with our latest initiatives. That way, there’s no excuse for missing out on live shows, weekly give-aways or founders dinners!

Timestamps: 1:38 - Journalism during the dot com crisis 20:40 - Fostering female financial independence 24:13 - Sexist backlash 37:28 - Building media leverage 42:30 - Raising a family on a startup salary About Patrizia Laeri: Patrizia Laeri is a business journalist and the co-founder and CEO of elleXX, an independent money media platform for women. She studied business administration and then went on to start her journalism career in 2003 at SRF. During her time in Swiss television she reported on a number of subjects, like the World Economic Forum, Nobel Prize winners, and countries like Iran and North Korea. In 2020 she joined CNN Switzerland as editor in chief, only to see it declare bankruptcy soon after. In that same year, she decided to launch her own company, elleXX. Being well aware of the dire financial situation of Swiss women (56% of which are not able to support themselves independently), Patrizia was tired of simply raising alarm on the issue and wanted instead to become a part of the solution. Besides the financial independence issue, it is also a fact that Swiss women invest much less money than men, are very rarely targeted by wealth management companies (with 86% of them addressing men), and receive less than 1% of Swiss venture capital. During the pandemic, Swiss women also quit their jobs in larger numbers than men. elleXX has a few ideas on how to foster female financial independence: Offering financial literacy courses: to fix a problem, you first must understand it. elleXX regularly offers “money hacks” courses. Raising awareness about the importance of the 3a pillar: lots of Swiss women don’t have 3a insurance. Together with Vontobel, elleXX offers you a 3a pension solution to help you make sensible provisions. Offering legal protection against gender-based work discrimination: if you’re a Swiss woman in the workplace, chances are you’ll need a lawyer at some point throughout your career. Together with CAP, elleXX offers you legal advice and representation in court. Memorable Quotes: "25 years ago I didn’t know any founders personally, let alone female founders." "35 years ago Swiss women couldn’t open a bank account without the signature of their husbands." Resources Mentioned: The Double X Economy, by Linda Scott Influence, by Robert B. Cialdini Bloomberg Equality Reporter Financial Times The Economist If you'd like to listen to more conversations about female Swiss entrepreneurship, check out our second episode with Estefanía Tapias.

Timestamps: 0:57 - Why start a dating platform in Switzerland 5:45 - Rising up to the fundraising challenge 12:23 - Getting money from FFFs 15:12 - Transparency in the Swiss ecosystem 19:32 - Upcoming startup trends About Laura Matter and noii: Laura Matter is the co-founder and CEO of noii, a video chat-based dating app. noii combines sophisticated algorithms with psychological know-how to find suitable partners and then allows you to join them on a video chat speed dating round. You are then free to follow-up with the people you click with. Laura has a background in marketing and created noii out of a personal dissatisfaction with the available dating apps. From her recent experience fundraising for noii, Laura recommends raising money from people who already know you, because then you don’t have to convince them of your virtues as much — they already know you’re a hard worker with integrity. She also recommends focusing on landing a lead investor, since it exponentially smoothes things along. Despite the difficulties, Laura is of the opinion that compared to building a product, fundraising is nothing. Laura praises the amount of info available on the internet about starting a company in Switzerland, but she wishes there were more transparency between older and younger founders. She can also speak to the Swiss female entrepreneur experience — check out her recent article for the elleXX blog here. Memorable Quotes: "B2C is difficult in Switzerland. There’s not a lot of Swiss investors who invested in B2C success stories." Don’t forget to give us a follow on our Twitter, Instagram, Facebook and Linkedin accounts, so you can always stay up to date with our latest  initiatives. That way, there’s no excuse for missing out on live shows,  weekly give-aways or founders dinners!