10 Swiss Wearables Startups to Watch (and Wear!)
scroll south
Wearables are in fashion right now! Google's $2.1 billion purchase of Fitbit shows the ambition in a category set to grow as the size, performance and power-efficiency of sensors make it even more-economic to integrate smart technologies into the fabric of our daily lives - and daily outfits.
We select ten Swiss wearables startups that power portable analysis from hearts to ovaries, blood pressure to core body-temperature, pets to players, and virtual reality to rehabilitative therapy.
Watch our interviews with some of the founders featured below, then dig into the wearables cateogry of the startup.ch database for a deeper dive into Swiss startups shaking up this sector.
Makes the smallest and lightest sensor and physical performance tracking system for outdoor team sports players. It is a standalone device worn on a player’s back to collect statistics, which are synchronized at the end of the game or practice. The startup, based in the Olympic capital of Lausanne, won a seat to roadshow with Venture Leaders Technology in 2016.
And scooped the ‘Swiss Coup de Cœur’ prize at Europe’s most-important sporttech convention, THE SPOT, this year.
Creating the best tool for diagnosis and treatment of hypertension, by decoding key markers to understand our heart signals and blood pressure. Aktiia’s optical sensors pair with proprietary, clinically tested algorithms to measure blood pressure at the wrist in a comfortable wearable bracelet. The startup ranked among at the TOP 100 Swiss Startup Award for the first time this year.
Uses state-of-the-art sensor technology together with clinically proven methods to pinpoint a woman's fertile days in real time. Ava has raised more than $40 million in venture backing and was the top-ranked startup at the TOP 100 Swiss Startup Award two years in a row. The founders won 130,000 Swiss francs, training and support from Venture Kick in 2015, the same year as the startup pitched in Boston and New York with Venture Leaders USA.
The femtech startup toured China's mega-cities as part the Swiss National Startup team with the Venture Leaders China in 2016, was a winner of the Swisscom StartUp Challenge the following year, and took the Swiss Medtech Award in 2018.
Digital health solutions to help users maintain a healthy lifestyle, resulting in better patient outcomes and reducing the cost of healthcare. The startup integrates medical grade quality and reliability with ease-of-use, that has led its solutions to win multiple international prizes, including an X Prize.
The discomfort of today's virtual reality googles is holding back the entire VR and mixed reality industry, as 3D images with conflicting depth cues strain our eyes. This startup creates images with depth cues that allow eyes to change focus naturally and will allow this emerging market to flourish. CREAL3D received 30,000 francs of support, and entrepreneurial training from Venture Kick in 2017, roadshowed in San Francisco with Venture Leaders Technology in 2018, and returned to Silicon Valley as a Swisscom StartUp Challenge winner this year.
Offers the world's first sensor for continuous, non-invasive core body temperature measurement in wearables - vital to understanding a person’s health. This Zurich-startup received 30,000 francs of support and training from Venture Kick in 2009, ranked among at the TOP 100 Swiss Startup Award between 2011 and 2013, and won seats to roadshow with Venture Leaders China in 2014, and with Venture Leaders Mobile to Barcelona last year.
Won Venture Kick's highest level of support and training in 2018. The startup ranked at the TOP 100 Swiss Startup Award and was selected for the Swiss National Startup Team pitching with Venture Leaders Life Sciences in Boston last year, and roadshowed with the national team again with Venture Leaders China in 2019. The Zurich-based startup launched its first skin-friendly dry electrode, the Dryode, this month. The comfy medtech sensor can even read ECGs 42 meters underwater.
Medisanté AG
New horizons in medical IoT. The Luzern-based startup is building a global direct-to cloud medical IoT infrastructure that radically simplifies the integration of patient generated health data into clinical systems. It combines the best of global tech for anonymous device data with the best of healthcare privacy for sensitive patient data. By abstracting hardware complexity and diversity in the home of the patient, Medisanté allows remote patient monitoring to scale anywhere in the world. It makes it easy for care teams, bio-medical engineers, and patients at the same time.
MindMaze SA
MindMaze, the Swiss unicorn startup that received 30,000 francs of early support from Venture Kick in 2010, bought Swiss wearables startups Gait Up and Intento, in its strategy to accelerate learning and decode brain signatures. MindMaze founder Tej Tadi roadshowed with Venture Leaders to Boston and his ranked at the TOP 100 Swiss Startup Award five years in a row. Gait Up's wearable sensors enable better and safer movement by providing motion insights for healthcare, while Intento focuses on the rehabilitation stroke patients' upper-limbs. Intento was a Venture Kick winner in 2016, roadshowed with Venture Leaders Life Sciences in 2016, and twice ranked at the TOP 100 Swiss Startup Award.
Piavita's animal diagnostic system, customized for horses, saves veterinarians hours of manual monitoring, offering long-term insights into each horse's health and greatly increasing the range of diagnoses possible. The startup's wearable, non-invasive device measures each animal's vital signs – including ECG, core body temperature, heart rate and breathing – continuously and remotely. The startup has ranked at the TOP 100 Swiss Startup Award for the past three years, and roadshowed with the Swiss National Startup Team in Silicon Valley, with Venture Leaders Technology in 2017, and captained the team in China with Venture Leaders China this year.
