Local startups, investors, and operators based in Zurich, Switzerland.
59 entries.
Switzerland's leading conference for diversity, equity and inclusion in tech, organized by TechFace with female-led tech communities. Two days of keynotes, workshops and networking draw developers, engineers, designers, product leaders, students and allies. It is relevant to founders for talent, inclusive hiring and ecosystem networking.
Developer relations engineer at VoidZero and a Nuxt and Vue.js ecosystem contributor, known for his web development teaching and open-source tooling work in JavaScript and TypeScript. He is an announced speaker at the 2026 ZurichJS Conf in Zurich.
Senior full stack engineer at Tiptap, building the headless rich-text editor framework used across modern JavaScript and web applications. He is an announced speaker at the 2026 ZurichJS Conf in Zurich.
Software engineer and developer advocate, lead of the SolidStart project and a core contributor to the Solid.js JavaScript framework, working as a fullstack engineer in the developer-tools space. He is an announced speaker at the 2026 ZurichJS Conf.
Beekeeper is a Zurich-based enterprise software company founded in 2012 by Cristian Grossmann and Flavio Pfaffhauser to build a communication and operations platform for frontline workers — those in manufacturing, hospitality, retail, and logistics who don't sit at a desk. The platform provides a mobile-first digital workspace enabling team messaging, task management, document sharing, and HR workflows for workers without corporate email addresses. Beekeeper raised a Series C in 2021 led by Alpana Ventures with participation from Atomico and Swiss Post, bringing total funding to over $100 million. The platform is used by companies including Marriott, Hilton, and Heathrow Airport, supporting over 1,000 enterprise customers globally. Beekeeper is a flagship example of Zurich's SaaS ecosystem building at the intersection of human capital management and operational technology.
btov Partners (now operating as b2venture) is a European venture capital firm founded in 2000 in St. Gallen, Switzerland, managing approximately €510 million across institutional, partner, and private investor funds from offices in Zurich, Berlin, Munich, and Luxembourg. The firm invests in early-stage digital and industrial technology companies across Europe, with ticket sizes of €250,000 to €3.5 million and roughly €50 million deployed per year. Notable portfolio companies include DeepL, SumUp, Raisin, and Blacklane.
Chief Technology Officer at Incredible Holding GmbH and a web development educator active in the JavaScript and frontend community. She is an announced speaker at the 2026 ZurichJS Conf in Zurich.
Co-founder and CEO of Planted, the Zurich-based food technology company he co-founded in 2019 as an ETH Zurich spin-out. Jenny led Planted through a CHF 70 million Series B in 2021 and expanded the company's plant-based meat products across Swiss supermarkets, Germany, and European food service channels. Planted's wet extrusion technology, developed from ETH Zurich research, produces fibrous plant-based textures that closely mimic animal protein.
Climeworks is one of Europe's most important climate-tech companies because it is building commercial direct air capture systems that remove carbon dioxide from ambient air. The company operates in a category that sits beyond emissions reduction alone: carbon removal infrastructure intended to address legacy emissions and hard-to-abate sectors. Its plants use modular collectors and specialized filters to capture CO2, after which the gas can be permanently stored or used in industrial processes. That combination of chemical engineering, energy systems, project execution, and long-term offtake sales makes Climeworks a very different kind of startup from software-led climate businesses. It is a capital-intensive industrial platform that depends on trust, scientific credibility, and customer willingness to commit to the future carbon-removal market. In the European ecosystem, Climeworks matters not only for its own category leadership, but also because it shows that globally significant climate infrastructure can be conceived, financed, and scaled from Europe. It serves as a benchmark for founders and investors interested in hard-tech and climate infrastructure companies where the technical ambition, funding requirements, and operational complexity are far greater than in conventional SaaS.
Co-founder and CEO of Beekeeper, the Zurich-based frontline workforce platform he co-founded in 2012 with Flavio Pfaffhauser. Grossmann led Beekeeper through a Series C in 2021 backed by Atomico, Alpana Ventures, and Swiss Post, bringing total funding to over $100 million. The platform scales to over 1,000 enterprise customers including Marriott, Hilton, and Heathrow Airport, serving workers in manufacturing, hospitality, retail, and logistics without corporate email addresses.
Switzerland's largest blockchain, AI and digital-assets business conference at Kongresshaus Zurich. Two days, four stages, 3,000+ attendees and 250 speakers spanning Web3, AI and tokenized finance for founders, investors, institutions and policymakers.
Senior developer advocate at PagerDuty and a JavaScript and React engineer focused on state management and developer experience across the web platform. He is an announced speaker at the 2026 ZurichJS Conf in Zurich.
Founder of Pokélink and a JavaScript developer building real-time web and streaming tools for online communities. He is an announced speaker at the 2026 ZurichJS Conf in Zurich.
Open-source software engineer at Vercel and lead of the Nuxt core team, the Vue.js meta-framework, focused on the modern JavaScript and TypeScript web development ecosystem. He is an announced speaker at the 2026 ZurichJS Conf.
Platform engineer working on applied AI at Zephyr Cloud, a long-time developer advocate and web testing and tooling specialist in the JavaScript ecosystem. She is an announced speaker at the 2026 ZurichJS Conf in Zurich.
DeepJudge is a Zurich-based legal AI company founded in 2021 by AI researchers who met while completing PhDs at ETH Zurich. Its platform provides intent-driven, retrieval-first enterprise search across a law firm's internal document repositories and data sources such as SharePoint, OneDrive and document management systems, enabling permission-respecting access to institutional knowledge before generating AI responses. The product supports multi-document analysis and LLM-powered workflows for legal teams. Reported customers include Freshfields, Holland & Knight, Gunderson Dettmer and Homburger, and the company maintains teams in the United States and Canada.
Software engineer at Sentry and maintainer of TanStack Query, a widely used data-fetching and state-management library for the React and JavaScript ecosystem. He is an announced speaker at the 2026 ZurichJS Conf in Zurich.
Sustainability Project Manager in Smart Infrastructure at Siemens Switzerland, working on sustainability initiatives within the industrial and building-technology business. She is an announced speaker in the Hidden Figures Awards program at the 2026 #wetechtogether Conference in Zurich.
Co-founder of Planted, the Zurich-based food technology company he co-founded in 2019 from ETH Zurich research. Stirnemann's background in food engineering contributed to the development of Planted's proprietary wet extrusion platform for plant-based meat. The company raised CHF 70 million in 2021 and distributes products across Switzerland, Germany, and broader European markets.
ETH Zurich (Eidgenössische Technische Hochschule Zürich) is one of the world's leading technical universities, consistently ranked in the global top ten for engineering, computer science, and natural sciences. Founded in 1855 by the Swiss federal government, ETH Zurich has produced 22 Nobel laureates and is the academic origin of many of Europe's most important deep-tech companies, including Scandit, Planted, and Araris Biotech. Its Technology Transfer Office (ETH Transfer) manages IP licensing and supports spin-out creation, having enabled over 500 spin-off companies. ETH Zurich's Pioneer Fellowship and Student Project House programmes provide early-stage support to founders still on campus. For founders in the Swiss ecosystem, ETH Zurich is the deepest single source of engineering talent, research partnerships, and institutional credibility across fields from quantum computing and robotics to materials science and food technology.
Co-founder of Beekeeper, the Zurich-based frontline workforce platform he co-founded in 2012 with Cristian Grossmann. Pfaffhauser contributed to Beekeeper's technical architecture and product development, helping build the platform now used by over 1,000 enterprise clients globally. The company raised over $100 million and became one of Zurich's leading enterprise SaaS success stories.
Networking forum at the Swiss Stock Exchange in Zurich showcasing Italian startups and fostering cross-border partnerships between Italy and Switzerland. Features pitch sessions, investor panels, and structured B2B meetings. Valuable for Italian tech founders seeking Swiss capital, distribution partners, and access to the DACH market.
Co-founder of Neon, the Zurich-based Swiss challenger bank he co-founded in 2018 with Julius Krieg. Sandrock previously held roles in banking and payments before launching Neon, which grew to over 200,000 customers. Neon operates as Switzerland's leading mobile-first bank, running on a banking-as-a-service partnership with Hypothekarbank Lenzburg.
Co-founder of Neon, the Zurich-based Swiss challenger bank he co-founded in 2018 with Jörg Sandrock. Krieg led product and growth for Neon, helping the app reach over 200,000 Swiss customers with free everyday banking accounts and integrated savings products. Neon operates through a banking-as-a-service partnership with Hypothekarbank Lenzburg.
Web development educator behind Embrace the Cascade, widely known for teaching CSS and modern frontend techniques to developers worldwide. He is an announced speaker at the 2026 ZurichJS Conf in Zurich.
Founder and Chairman of Lakestar, the Zurich-based venture capital firm he founded in 2012, which manages over 2 billion euros across early- and growth-stage funds. A German venture capitalist, he was an early backer of Skype, Facebook, Spotify, Airbnb, Revolut, Klarna and Coinbase, and also founded the NATO Innovation Fund.
Lakestar is a Zurich-headquartered venture capital firm founded in 2012 by Klaus Hommels, one of Europe's most prolific and publicly visible technology investors, whose pre-Lakestar angel track record included early bets on Skype, Spotify, and Facebook in Europe. The firm runs a multi-stage strategy spanning early-stage funds, growth funds, and public/crossover vehicles, with offices in Zurich, Berlin, London, and Zug. Notable portfolio companies include Revolut, N26, Mister Spex, Blockchain.com, GetYourGuide, FlixBus, and Opendoor. Lakestar manages over EUR 2 billion across funds and has been a vocal advocate at the EU level for scaling up European technology sovereignty, having been involved in initiatives like the European Tech Champions Initiative and the Scale-Up Europe pledge. It is one of the few continental European VCs that operates across the full venture lifecycle at significant scale.
Co-founder and CEO of Yokoy, the Zurich-based AI-powered spend management platform founded in 2019. Mangelsdorf led Yokoy through a CHF 80 million Series B in 2022 led by Sequoia Capital, one of the largest Swiss fintech rounds of that year, and expanded the company from DACH into the UK and the Netherlands, building deep integrations with SAP and Oracle for enterprise finance automation.
Ledgy is an equity and compensation management software company founded in 2017 in Zurich by three physicists who met at ETH Zurich. Its platform helps companies manage cap tables, employee share and option plans, funding rounds, valuations, compliance and investor relations, positioned as a European equity-management platform for high-growth international startups as well as larger and public companies. The company maintains offices in Zurich and London and reported reaching profitability in 2025.
Lightrock is an impact-focused growth equity platform backed by LGT Group, the private banking and asset management group owned by the Princely House of Liechtenstein. Founded in 2019 as a spin-out from LGT's direct private equity activities, Lightrock deploys growth equity tickets of €10–50M into companies demonstrating measurable positive impact across climate, health, and financial inclusion. The firm operates from London with offices in Basel, New Delhi, São Paulo, and other cities, giving it an unusually broad emerging-market reach alongside its European portfolio. Notable portfolio companies include Bima, Karma Kitchen, and Proxona. Lightrock occupies a distinctive position in European impact investing: it combines the balance sheet credibility of a century-old royal banking group with a focused mandate, operational on-the-ground presence, and a willingness to invest in geographies and sectors that conventional growth equity skips. For Swiss and European founders building in healthcare access, climate solutions, or financial inclusion, Lightrock is one of the few growth-stage investors that evaluates impact metrics alongside financial ones.
Chief Digital and Information Officer at Sandoz, a global generics and biosimilars company, with a career leading large-scale digital transformation across pharmaceutical and technology organizations. She is an announced keynote speaker at the 2026 #wetechtogether Conference in Zurich.
Senior engineer at Replay.io and a maintainer of Redux, the widely used state-management library for JavaScript and React applications. He is an announced speaker at the 2026 ZurichJS Conf in Zurich.
Staff software engineer at Medallia focused on web performance and the React and JavaScript ecosystem, and an active conference speaker on frontend engineering. He is an announced speaker at the 2026 ZurichJS Conf in Zurich.
Neon is a Zurich-based digital bank founded in 2018 by Julius Krieg and Jörg Sandrock as one of Switzerland's first challenger banks. Operating on a mobile-first model with no branch network, Neon provides Swiss residents with free everyday banking accounts, a Mastercard debit card, and integrated savings and investment products. The app launched in 2019 and grew to over 200,000 customers, carving out a position in Swiss consumer banking against incumbents like UBS and competing with European neobanks like N26 that do not hold a Swiss banking licence. Neon operates under a banking-as-a-service model through a partnership with Hypothekarbank Lenzburg, which holds the banking licence. It is a benchmark for digital-first financial services built from within Switzerland.
Zurich-based AI-first enterprise operating system for SMEs and freelancers that automates invoicing, accounting, payroll, and document management in a single platform. Built on ETH and HSG research. Connects all operational processes with AI as the core layer rather than an add-on module.
Oviva is a digital health company that helps people with weight-related and metabolic conditions, including obesity, type 2 diabetes, prediabetes, and hypertension, improve their health through medical nutritional therapy. Its model combines a medical-device-certified smartphone app with clinical teams of doctors, dietitians, and behavioural specialists, with patients logging meals, activity, and weight while receiving tailored remote support from their dietitian. The company describes itself as Europe's leading digital health provider for weight-related conditions, with care reimbursed as a certified DiGA in Germany, delivered in partnership with the NHS in the UK, and integrated into Swiss public healthcare. It is headquartered in Zurich.
Co-founder of Planted, the Zurich-based alternative protein company he co-founded in 2019 as an ETH Zurich spin-out. Bieri contributed the food science foundation that underpins Planted's wet extrusion platform. Planted's products — planted.chicken, planted.pulled, planted.kebab — are sold in leading Swiss and German retailers and food service chains.
Co-founder and CTO of Yokoy, the Zurich-based AI-powered spend management platform founded in 2019. Sahli led the technical architecture of Yokoy's AI engine for expense reports and invoice automation, helping scale the platform to enterprise customers across Europe after the company's CHF 80 million Series B led by Sequoia Capital.
Staff software engineer at Netlify working on web platform and developer tooling for the modern JavaScript ecosystem. He is an announced speaker at the 2026 ZurichJS Conf in Zurich.
Planted is a Zurich-based food technology company founded in 2019 by Christoph Jenny, Pascal Bieri, Eric Stirnemann, and Judith Wemmer as a spin-out from ETH Zurich. The company produces plant-based meat alternatives using a wet extrusion technology that creates fibrous textures closely mimicking animal proteins. Planted's products — planted.chicken, planted.pulled, and planted.kebab — are sold in supermarkets, restaurants, and food service channels across Switzerland, Germany, and neighbouring European markets. The company raised CHF 70 million in a Series B round in 2021 from investors including Vorwerk Ventures and Movendo Capital. Planted is part of the broader ETH Zurich food-tech cluster and is considered one of Europe's most technically sophisticated alternative protein companies, combining deep food science with aggressive consumer distribution.
A three-day invitation-driven forum at Kongresshaus Zurich with 2,000+ attendees and 80+ regulators and central banks, on digital assets, AI in finance, and policy. For a fintech or web3 founder it offers unusually direct access to regulators and central banks alongside investors.
Developer advocate at Auth0 with a background in frontend engineering, testing and developer experience across the JavaScript and web development ecosystem. She is an announced speaker at the 2026 ZurichJS Conf in Zurich.
Redalpine is a Zurich-based multi-stage venture capital firm founded in 2006 by Michael Sidler and Peter Niederhauser, and has grown into one of the most active Swiss VCs by number of early-stage checks across the DACH and wider European technology landscape. The firm invests from seed through Series B across digital health, fintech, deep tech, climate tech, and software, and is best known as an early backer of N26, Taxfix, Inkitt, 9fin, and Proxima Fusion. Redalpine closed its sixth fund at EUR 300+ million in 2023 and has built one of the larger Swiss-based venture teams, typically writing checks between EUR 1-15 million into companies it then follows through multiple rounds. It is a reference fund for Swiss and DACH founders looking for a locally anchored lead investor with international reach.
Senior developer advocate at AWS focused on frontend, cross-platform and web development across the JavaScript ecosystem. He is an announced speaker at the 2026 ZurichJS Conf in Zurich.
Co-founder and CEO of Scandit, the Zurich-based enterprise computer vision company he co-founded in 2009 as an ETH Zurich spin-out. Mueller led Scandit from a research project into a global B2B platform used by DHL, Sephora, and the NHS, raising over $150M from investors including Atomico, G2VP, and Swisscom Ventures. He holds a PhD in computer science from ETH Zurich, where he worked on mobile augmented reality before commercialising barcode-scanning technology for enterprise use.
Scandit is a Zurich-based enterprise software company founded in 2009 by Samuel Mueller and Christian Floerkemeier as an ETH Zurich spin-out. The company built a computer vision and AI data capture platform that enables enterprises to scan barcodes, QR codes, text, and ID documents using standard smartphone cameras, eliminating the need for dedicated hardware scanners. Scandit's SDK is embedded in apps used by logistics companies, retailers, healthcare providers, and manufacturers to power item scanning for picking, inventory management, and patient safety workflows. The company has raised over $150M from investors including Atomico, G2VP, and Swisscom Ventures, and its technology runs in production at DHL, Sephora, the NHS, and hundreds of other enterprise customers. Scandit operates globally from Zurich with offices in London, Boston, and Tokyo, and is one of Switzerland's most prominent B2B enterprise software scale-ups.
Software engineer at Sentry, co-host of the Syntax.fm web development podcast and founder of the Level Up Tutorials education platform for JavaScript and frontend developers. He is an announced speaker at the 2026 ZurichJS Conf in Zurich.
Non-profit developer community based in Zurich that runs ZurichJS meetups and the annual ZurichJS Conf, Switzerland's premier JavaScript and TypeScript conference. It gathers hundreds of developers, engineering leads and dev-tool startups for talks, workshops and networking around modern web technologies.
A high-level partnering and investor conference connecting life-science innovators, investors, and industry across Switzerland, Austria, and the Nordics. For a biotech or healthtech founder it provides structured 1-to-1 partnering meetings with investors and pharma in a focused single-day format.
The national robotics gathering, organised by ETH Zurich's RobotX at the StageOne Convention Center, showcasing Swiss robotics research, spin-offs, and live demos. For a robotics or hardware founder it concentrates the Swiss robotics talent pool, lab spin-offs, and industrial partners into one day.
A 48-hour fintech hackathon, backed by the Swiss State Secretariat for International Finance and powered by Tenity, where students and professionals team with industry partners on real financial-sector challenges; in 2026 it anchors the inaugural Swiss FinTech Week. A fast route for developers and early founders to industry mentors, APIs, and pilot opportunities.
Swiss non-profit promoting diversity, equity and inclusion in technology, building communities for women and underrepresented groups in tech. It organizes the #wetechtogether Conference, Switzerland's leading conference for diversity in tech, drawing developers, designers, product leaders, students and allies.
Lead mobile developer at Sapphire Holidays, building cross-platform mobile applications with JavaScript and web technologies. He is an announced speaker at the 2026 ZurichJS Conf in Zurich.
Venturelab's Top100 day combines a curated investor summit — handpicked startups raising their next round pitching to Swiss VCs — with the evening Top100 Swiss Startup Award ceremony. For a fundraising founder it is one of the highest-signal investor-matching days in Switzerland.
CEO of This Dot Labs, a Google Developer Expert and RxJS core team member, and a prominent figure in the JavaScript and open-source web development community. She is an announced speaker at the 2026 ZurichJS Conf in Zurich.
Wingman Ventures was a Zurich-based pre-seed venture capital firm founded in 2019, known for closing what was described as Europe's largest debut seed fund at that stage. The firm backed founders across B2B software, industrial tech, robotics, and climate tech, with notable exits including Insightness (acquired by Sony) and Bring! Labs (acquired by Swiss Post). In February 2024 the firm rebranded as Founderful and launched a Fund II targeting $120 million, with typical check sizes of $1–2 million.
Yokoy is a Zurich-based AI-powered spend management platform founded in 2019 by Lars Mangelsdorf, Philippe Sahli, and Michael Fehr. The company automates expense reports, invoice processing, and corporate card management using machine learning, reducing manual finance workflows for mid-market and enterprise clients. Yokoy raised a Series B of CHF 80 million in 2022 led by Sequoia Capital, one of the largest Swiss fintech funding rounds of that year, and has since expanded across DACH, the UK, and the Netherlands. The platform integrates with major ERP systems including SAP and Oracle and is used by companies including DocMorris and Montana. Yokoy competes with Concur and Payhawk in the European spend management category.
Develops Solskin, an AI-controlled adaptive facade combining dynamic photovoltaic panels with automated sun shading. Active solar tracking raises PV output by 40%+, while AI-driven shading cuts building air-conditioning energy by 20–80%.
Switzerland's premier JavaScript and TypeScript developer conference, run by the non-profit Swiss JavaScript Group. It expects several hundred developers, engineers and tech leaders for talks on JavaScript, TypeScript, React and Node.js plus workshops and networking. It is relevant to technical founders and dev-tooling startups hiring or selling into the Swiss developer community.