CHF 3.1 billion for Swiss startups in 2021
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With an increase of 44% in invested capital, the Swiss startup scene has made an impressive comeback after the slight decline in 2020 during the COVID-19 outbreak. The Swiss Venture Capital Report 2022 —published by the online news portal startupticker.ch and the investor association SECA, in cooperation with startup.ch—looks at the startups, cantons, and investors that contributed to a record-breaking year for the Swiss innovation ecosystem.
According to the Swiss Venture Capital Report 2022, equity investment in Swiss startups has been growing for 10 years. The amount invested has almost tripled since 2018, whereas it took more than five years for it to triple the first time.
The ICT sector, including fintech, was primarily responsible for the highest increase, followed by cleantech and healthcare. A look at the cantons makes it clear that the traditional heavyweights Zurich and Vaud, with their well-known universities ETH Zurich and EPF Lausanne, once again made significant gains. The five cantons that attracted the most money in 2021 were Zurich (CHF 1285 million), Vaud (CHF 604.6 million), Basel (CHF 338.4 million), Zug (CHF 149.5 million), and Ticino (CHF 116.6 million).
Switzerland positions strong in Europe
According to PitchBook data, venture capital investment in Europe and Israel crossed the EUR 100 billion mark for the first time in 2021. Startups in the UK raised the most in 2021 out of all European countries. Europe's most developed VC marked is followed by Germany (EUR 16.5 billion), France (EUR 9.9 billion), Sweden (EUR 6.6 billion), Netherlands (EUR 5.7 billion), Spain (EUR 3.2 billion), and Switzerland (EUR 3.1 billion). Compared to the number of inhabitants per country and the invested venture capital, Switzerland ranks third, just after Sweden and the UK and before the Netherlands and Germany.
“VC funding was very strong globally in 2022, and it is fantastic to see Switzerland among the leading nations,” said Stefan Steiner, co-managing director at Venturelab. “We expect the diversity and quality of the startups and scale-ups in Switzerland to keep attracting strong investments in the future. We already look forward to supporting the startups’ fundraising at the TOP 100 Investor Summit in September 2022 .”