Buy yourself a start-up

Dear reader

This week we reported on two start-ups that have been taken over by large companies: Mobiliar has bought the tradesman platform Buildigo and the listed Chinese medtech company Bluesail has acquired Aargau-based NVT. We also reported on a start-up that has bought another young firm: Multiwave Metacrystal struck gold in the Netherlands. You can find out more about the background and the Multiwave Technologies group in our article.

Multiwave is not the first Swiss start-up to report acquisition of another company in recent weeks. These reports may increase if the current crisis leads to a shakeout that sees well-funded start-ups as winners. Speaking of well-funded start-ups, this week we reported on six financing rounds from companies in a wide range of industries, ranging from fintech (Teylor) to biotech (Tolremo) and digital health (Scailyte) to Auxivo, which has developed a wearable support system for workers who have to move heavy loads. In addition, the new Swiss SSUG flagship fund has announced its first investment – in agritech company Growcer. The example of Spineart shows where the journey may take the young companies. The Geneva-based medtech company secured a CHF50 million growth investment.

The five winners of the WA de Vigier Awards can also look forward to financial support, with each receiving CHF 100,000. In view of the COVID-19 situation, the awards ceremony did not take place in the summer house in Solothurn as usual, but for the first time as a television show. We will present the winners individually in detailed reports next week.

In our series of start-ups looking for investors, this week we introduced WhatToLabel. If you would like to learn something about the less glamorous side of machine learning and how WhatToLabel helps to get it under control, read our portrait.

This week came the remarkable story of robotics start-up Bota. Originally founded in Greece and with a move to Switzerland to participate in the Kickstart programme, the start-up has now settled in Zurich.

The event season is underway, although it is still online for the time being. The award ceremony of the ‘Seif Awards Tech for Impact’ will take place next week. The dates of other events can be found in our calendar.

Finally, I would like to point out a new initiative from Venturelab: its Summer Internship programme brings start-ups and students together. Applications for this first call are open until 30 June.

Have a good weekend.
Stefan Kyora

Editor in Chief, Startupticker.ch