eSignus in Desafía Switzerland 2025: Exploring the Swiss market

In Spring 2025, the Swiss edition of the Desafía program brought nine Spanish scaleups to Switzerland for an intensive two-week roadshow. Designed to accelerate international expansion and test the competitiveness of innovative deeptech solutions on a global scale, the program was supported by ICEX and Red.es in collaboration with Venturelab and the Economic and Trade Office of the Spanish Embassy in Bern. Participants benefited from tailored meetings with investors, corporates, and ecosystem leaders, as well as mentorship, networking, pitching opportunities, and company visits.

Following its 2024 launch, the 2025 edition welcomed a second cohort of deeptech companies, including eSignus, led by Daniel Hernández, which leveraged the program to explore potential collaborations and refine its international expansion strategy.

Company Name: eSignus
Location: Spain, Tenerife







What was the most surprising difference you noticed between the Swiss startup ecosystem and the Spanish one?
Switzerland’s ecosystem is highly relationship- and trust-driven. As a small, tightly connected market, reputation and introductions matter greatly, and building trust takes time and consistent presence. Another distinctive aspect is the depth of its trust-technology cluster: visits to SICPA’s Unlimitrust Campus in Lausanne and to companies like Tune Insight revealed a strong ecosystem around security and identity. They applied cryptography with no real equivalent in Spain.

What are the biggest challenges you faced when exploring the Swiss market for your product or technology? 
The main challenge is time-to-trust. The Swiss market is highly confidence-driven, with longer sales cycles and strong expectations around certifications, references, and local presence. Competition in self-custody and institutional custody is also intense, making differentiation around security, EAL6+ secure elements, and B2B white-label solutions essential. Finally, gaining traction often requires a Swiss-based partner or representative, which is a major operational step for a Spanish SME.

Which part of the Desafía Switzerland program (mentorship, networking, pitching, company visits) was most valuable for your startup and why.
The visits and curated meetings were the most valuable part. Spending time at Technopark Zurich and the Unlimitrust Campus, and meeting investors, legal experts, and research institutions in person, created discussions that remote outreach cannot match. The mentorship also helped us adapt our value proposition to regulated Swiss counterparts rather than retail audiences.

Did you identify any concrete collaboration opportunities with Swiss companies, investors, or research institutions during the program? If yes, which type of collaboration?
Yes. As a direct result of Desafía, we are now in discussions with several Swiss fintechs around B2B white-label deployments of HASHWallet and our payment-and-custody card, combining crypto custody with Visa/Mastercard rails. These are long-term, trust-based discussions, and the program was essential in opening them.

How did participating in Desafía influence your international expansion strategy?
Switzerland moved from being one of several target markets to a strategic priority for our institutional and B2B white-label roadmap. The program also validated our focus on structural security and regulated infrastructure over retail messaging, while helping us refine how to position HASHWallet for fintech and banking partners across the DACH region.

What advice would you give to startups considering applying to Desafía Switzerland in the future?
Come with a concrete commercial hypothesis, not an exploratory one. Know which specific firms you want to meet, what you want to ask them, and what you would do if a door opens. Pre-research every counterpart, prepare for a direct and unsentimental communication style, and use the company visits to deepen a few relationships rather than collect contacts. And take the mentors seriously. Swiss mentors will tell you politely the things you genuinely need to hear.

Describe Desafía in one word.
Crystallising. The program took a vague intention to "look at Switzerland" and turned it into a sharp, concrete strategy with named partners and live conversations.