Venture Leaders Technology 2023: Captain’s blog by Virtuosis co-founder Lara Gervaise

08.05.2023 11:29, Guillaume Tinsel

In mid April, the Venture Leaders Technology 2023 traveled to San Francisco to connect with and learn from investors and experts in Silicon Valley. We asked Venture Leaders Technology Team Captain Lara Gervaise to share her experience and take us behind the scenes of the week-long roadshow.

After spending nearly a month in the US for the Consumer Electronics Show (CES) in January, I witnessed the high demand for AI technology and was eager to return. The VL Tech roadshow presented the perfect opportunity for us to do so!

In late February, our Venture Leaders journey began with a preparation day near Zurich. We started by getting to know each other before diving into informative sessions led by Stefan Steiner and João Guerra from VentureLab. Thierry Barbey of Kellerhals Carrard provided a valuable workshop on term sheets, while Robert Skrobak from Rothschild & Co shared insights on cultural differences in the US. Armed with this knowledge, we were ready to embark on our Venture Leaders Technology adventure.

By mid-April, we landed in San Francisco and started the week with a briefing at Swissnex, conveniently situated on Pier 17 and overlooking the ocean. This visit brought back fond memories of my trip there in 2018 during the discontinued Silicon Valley Startup Camp by BCV. Time certainly does fly!

To prepare ourselves for the upcoming investor pitches, we participated in a pitch training session led by Amy Tez. Our first investor pitch was delivered to FYRFLY Ventures over a delicious Thai meal from Philipp Stauffer's (FYRFLY co-founder and managing director) favorite Thai restaurant! 



Unfortunately, I missed Jodi Johnson's workshop on HR as I was working on refining my 3mn pitch slides for US investors with the support of Robert Skrobak (Rothschild & Co). In the evening, we were graciously hosted by Swiss Ambassador & Consul Balz Abplanalp at his beautiful residence (in the picture), featuring a remarkable ocean and golden gate view with beach access near Jack Dorsey’s home. There, we met Doug Griffin and Sophie Lamparter from the DART Labs team, as well as many other investors. After the reception, we spent the remainder of the night socializing with the team and partners over drinks on a lovely rooftop.



Our second day began with a pricing workshop conducted by Jeffrey Tjiok from Simon-Kucher, drawing inspiration from the book “Monetizing Innovation” by Madhavan Ramanujam and Georg Tacke. He highlighted pitfalls to avoid, such as Feature Shock, Minivations, and Hidden Gems. Although a meeting with the Silicon Valley Bank (SVB) had been scheduled, it was no surprise when it got canceled due to the bank's unfortunate collapse. Nonetheless, this provided us with an opportunity to catch up on our pending work for our startups! We then took an Uber to Palo Alto, where we meet Yoichiro Taku, a lawyer from Wilson Sonsini Goodrich & Rosati who had worked on the IPOs of major tech companies. He discussed recent trends in fundraising. The day concluded with a team dinner at a Mexican restaurant.

Wednesday started in Palo Alto, where we pitched to Ben Narasin from Tenacity. We later met with Kelly Chen, Jack Buendorf, and Stephen Seymour from DCVC, the largest VC firm by Asset Under Management (AUM).



The day wrapped up with a BBQ at Swisscom Outpost, where we pitched to a panel composed of Google BizOps director Adrian Stalder, Sophie Lamparter, and Alexander Fries, whom we had met on the first night. The outpost, located in a charming house near garages where notable tech companies originated, is utilized by Swisscom to scout for new technologies.



Thursday marked our final day of pitching. When our first investor meeting was canceled, Simon from Ecorobotix kindly surprised us with delectable pastries from a nearby bakery. These treats fueled us for our subsequent pitches to Thorben Hett from Rothschild & Co and Rohit Sharma from True Ventures—a firm known for investing early and having “deep pockets” to support follow-up rounds.
The day concluded with a pitch night before we celebrated Joao's birthday with a night of bar hopping.



Our Venture Leaders Technology adventure culminated in a rewarding sailing tour around Alcatraz.



Thank you to my fellow Venture Leaders Technology teammates, the Venturelab team, and the sponsors: Robert Skrobak from Rothschild & Co, Juliette Ivanez from Canton of Vaud, Markus Müller from Canton of Zürich, Thierry Barbey from Kellerhals Carrard, EPFL, and ETH Zürich.