And the winners of venture kick stage two are…
22.01.2015
Two promising high-tech startups deserved the support of the venture kick jury and recently got awarded with CHF 20’000 each. One is a bioinformatics startup specialized in the identification of specific and sensitive biomarkers. The other develops smart encryption solutions to render documents inaccessible to anyone who does not possess the secret code chosen by the user, a little bit like a “digital safe” for sending confidential documents.
 Matthew Hall and Pedro Faustino of SimplicityBio
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 Radhakrishna Achanta and Damien Firmenich of Di55erent
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SimplicityBio is a bioinformatics startup specialized in the identification of specific and sensitive biomarkers by analyzing OMICS data. By using artificial intelligence algorithms and its proprietary software platform, SimplicityBio is able to combine these biomarkers into a robust signature with biological relevance. These signatures are used for instance to develop diagnostic tests for complex diseases such as cancer.
Di55erent, an EPFL spin-off, provides a user-friendly solution for end-to-end encryption and online collaboration. Its technology is based on a novel data structure, which allows for distributed storage, end-to-end encryption, and blazingly fast synchronization. Thanks to Di55erent’s technology, all files can be stored “on the cloud” with the best privacy protection, without compromising on ease of use or online collaboration.
We took the opportunity to ask a few questions to Radhakrishna Achanta, co-founder of Di55erent, about the good news after the jury session:
Hello Radhakrishna, Di55erent recently won a seed loan from the FIT (CHF 100’000) and it was selected for the IMD Startup Competition this year. And now venture kick stage 2. What are the benefits of venture kick for your startup?
The most important benefit is momentum. This seems to be the defining theme of venture kick, to impart momentum to startups. Another benefit is that the program pushes us to get out of our comfort zone and really test our assumptions.
How did you convince the jury on stage 2 and how, in your opinion, will you convince it on stage 3?
During stage 2, we showed the need for security solutions and why our solution is potentially good. We presented the progress made in the last 2-3 months, including the increase in the downloads of the free version of our software, called swi5t. Our financial projections reflected what we learned from the market in the last few months. We think this is what convinced the jury.
At stage 3 it will be important to show how we market the product and acquire paying users. We should also be able to show how we will build a fast-growing business around our products. We will try to convince the jury based on what we learned from the market and how we used it to generate revenue in a scalable manner.
What stage of development is Di55erent today?
We are in the process of developing the commercial version of our software, which encrypts data before placing it on clouds.
Read the article that EPFL made about Di55erent and their technology after it won venture kick stage 1 here.
Di55erent, an EPFL spin-off, provides a user-friendly solution for end-to-end encryption and online collaboration. Its technology is based on a novel data structure, which allows for distributed storage, end-to-end encryption, and blazingly fast synchronization. Thanks to Di55erent’s technology, all files can be stored “on the cloud” with the best privacy protection, without compromising on ease of use or online collaboration.
We took the opportunity to ask a few questions to Radhakrishna Achanta, co-founder of Di55erent, about the good news after the jury session:
Hello Radhakrishna, Di55erent recently won a seed loan from the FIT (CHF 100’000) and it was selected for the IMD Startup Competition this year. And now venture kick stage 2. What are the benefits of venture kick for your startup?
The most important benefit is momentum. This seems to be the defining theme of venture kick, to impart momentum to startups. Another benefit is that the program pushes us to get out of our comfort zone and really test our assumptions.
How did you convince the jury on stage 2 and how, in your opinion, will you convince it on stage 3?
During stage 2, we showed the need for security solutions and why our solution is potentially good. We presented the progress made in the last 2-3 months, including the increase in the downloads of the free version of our software, called swi5t. Our financial projections reflected what we learned from the market in the last few months. We think this is what convinced the jury.
At stage 3 it will be important to show how we market the product and acquire paying users. We should also be able to show how we will build a fast-growing business around our products. We will try to convince the jury based on what we learned from the market and how we used it to generate revenue in a scalable manner.
What stage of development is Di55erent today?
We are in the process of developing the commercial version of our software, which encrypts data before placing it on clouds.
Read the article that EPFL made about Di55erent and their technology after it won venture kick stage 1 here.