How to Thrive in the Swiss Startup Support Ecosystem: Pascal Stürchler, Wendy Jordan & Sam Dumelin (EP# 557)

Episode Summary:

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Pascal Stürchler is the co-founder and CEO of Bloomhaus Ventures, a seed and early stage startup investor, as well as the President of Founders2, a growth program guided by top Silicon Valley coaches. Wendy Jordan is the Founder and COO of  ⁠Encuentra24.com⁠, the leading online classifieds platform in Central America, and founder of⁠ Fyiar Ventures⁠, a private capital firm focused on tech scale-ups. Sam Dumelin is the co-founder of ⁠Novu Campus⁠, a state-of-the-art coworking on-site campus in the heart of Zurich, and ⁠Novu Office⁠, a full service provider for office refurbishing equipment. 

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In this session we spoke about what makes the Swiss startup ecosystem unique, namely the presence of diverse and innovation-dense industries in close contact with each other, as well as the top quality higher education and legacy around innovation in Switzerland. We also discussed the best practices that can be implemented to level up the ecosystem, such as transitioning from a more specific to holistic approach in supporting early stage start-ups, the role of universities in promoting cross functional talent matchmaking, and how pitches are moving towards a more personal storytelling approach.

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We then heard the panelists share their insights on best practices for networking and reaching out to VCs in the Swiss context, as well as the how-to’s and value of validating a product before scaling-up, pivoting quickly, and leveraging the mentorship and support opportunities already in place for start-ups in Switzerland.

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The cover portrait was edited by ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠www.smartportrait.io⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠.

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The session ended with a Q&A with the audience, where our panelists shared tips on how to break into the large manufacturing space with limited capital and how to work with banks to secure debt funding.

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